Energy Consumption Analysis of the Cryptographic Key Generation Process of RSA and ECC Algorithms in Embedded Systems

A subject that is gaining more strength in technological scenario is the embedded system. They are present in various products, from a simple MP3 player to an aircraft with the latest technology. Embedded systems have limited memory resources, processing and storage. Thus, the amount of computational resources used is a factor that should be taken into account in time to develop a software. Along with the reat expansion of embedded systems, also increased the number of attacks and threats to systems. Thus, security is a key aspect of the design of these systems. Taking into account the characteristic of safety related authentication, this paper presents the energy consumption analysis between the key generators for the RSA and ECC algorithms. Cryptographic keys can be used in the authentication process between entities that are communicating, improving the security of communication. Tests to check for a possible correlation between the runtime and energy consumption were also conducted. The algorithms were implemented in C language and the executions were carried out in the BeagleBoard platform. The conclusion is that the ECC algorithm presented a lower energy consumption than the RSA algorithm and a strong correlation between runtime and power consumption.