Status report on the first round of the development of the advanced encryption standard

In 1997, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) initiate d a process to select a symmetric-key encryption algorithm to be used to pr otect sensitive (unclassified) Federal information in furtherance of NIST's statutory responsibilities. In 1998, NIST announced the acceptance of 15 c andidate algorithms and requested the assistance of the cryptographic resea rch community in analyzing the candidates. This analysis included an initia l examination of the security and efficiency characteristics for each algor ithm. NIST has reviewed the results of this research and selected five algo rithms (MARS, RC6(TM), Rijndael, Serpent and Twofish) as finalists. The res earch results and rationale for the selection of the finalists are document ed in this report. The five finalists will be the subject of further study before the selection of one or more of these algorithms for inclusion in th e Advanced Encryption Standard.