Improved Linear Cryptanalysis of CAST-256

CAST-256, a first-round AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) candidate, is designed based on CAST-128. It is a 48-round Generalized-Feistel-Network cipher with 128-bit block accepting 128, 160, 192, 224 or 256 bits keys. Its S-boxes are non-surjective with 8-bit input and 32-bit output. Wang et al. identified a 21-round linear approximation and gave a key recovery attack on 24-round CAST-256. In ASIACRYPT 2012, Bogdanov et al. presented the multidimensional zero-correlation linear cryptanalysis of 28 rounds of CAST-256. By observing the property of the concatenation of forward quad-round and reverse quad-round and choosing the proper active round function, we construct a linear approximation of 26-round CAST-256 and recover partial key information on 32 rounds of CAST-256. Our result is the best attack according to the number of rounds for CAST-256 without weak-key assumption so far.