Hawkynt

Shannon (DarkCrypt)

Shannon stream cipher (Hawkes, McDonald, Paddon, Rose, Wiggers de Vries), 256-bit key / 128-bit nonce, keystream-only path (MAC unused). Unmodified port of the published Qualcomm reference algorithm, as implemented in the DarkCrypt Total Commander plugin.

Properties

Property	Value
Category	Stream Ciphers
Sub-category	Stream Cipher
Security status	🎓 Educational Only
Complexity	Advanced
Inventor	Philip Hawkes, Cameron McDonald, Michael Paddon, Gregory Rose, Miriam Wiggers de Vries
Year	2007
Origin	🇦🇺 Australia
Source	algorithms/stream/darkcrypt-shannon.js

Parameters

Parameter	Supported values
Key sizes	32 bytes (256 bits)
Nonce sizes	16 bytes (128 bits)

Security

Status: 🎓 Educational Only

Known vulnerabilities

Issue	Description	Mitigation
Limited public cryptanalysis	Shannon has received comparatively little independent cryptanalysis; not recommended for new designs.	Use a modern vetted stream cipher such as ChaCha20.

Documentation

• Design and Primitive Specification for Shannon
• DarkCrypt plugin (Total Commander PlugRing)

References

• Reference implementation of the Shannon cipher

Test vectors

2 vectors ship with this algorithm and run in the test suite. Byte values are hexadecimal.

Vector 1 — DarkCrypt Shannon — incrementing key, zero nonce, 128-byte zero keystream

Field	Value
key	000102030405060708090a0b0c0d0e0f101112131415161718191a1b1c1d1e1f
iv	00000000000000000000000000000000
input	00000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000
expected	0ee2138f44128488c2420f73e456e8c6 9b882661cdbad4599ff1450cf3c404fe 51e404ad44d6b91e033baa73b68e02a4 19e4890205125a4db883de138ba9941f 84cebab0ea8b1aeb5b24dfe7ffd03039 9494cbbec37498d04d4f8b3b3563b241 0319d85c8fa845960d798127ff5431e4 b93ecca5ff8946213aeb27046ce8d6fc

Vector 2 — DarkCrypt Shannon — incrementing key/plaintext, zero nonce

Field	Value
key	000102030405060708090a0b0c0d0e0f101112131415161718191a1b1c1d1e1f
iv	00000000000000000000000000000000
input	000102030405060708090a0b0c0d0e0f 101112131415161718191a1b1c1d1e1f 202122232425262728292a2b2c2d2e2f 303132333435363738393a3b3c3d3e3f
expected	0ee3118c4017828fca4b0578e85be6c9 8b993472d9afc24e87e85f17efd91ae1 71c5268e60f39f392b1280589aa32c8b 29d5bb3131276c7a80bae428b794aa20

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