FIPS-PUB-140-1 test battery (Menu Analysis \ Analyse Randomness)

Choosing this menu entry opens the dialog FIPS-PUB-140-1 test battery.

This is a standardized random number test, which consists of 4 single tests. FIPS-PUB-140-1 examines exactly 2500 bytes. Shorter documents will not be examined, from longer ones only the first 2500 bytes are examined.

FIPS PUB 140-1 specifies security requirements for the design and implementation of cryptographic modules, including for pseudorandom number generators. Four statistical test procedures are proposed for pseudorandom number generators, by means of which the output of a pseudorandom number generator can be tested for randomness. The user is asked to choose a corresponding significance level and specific thresholds are specified for the individual test statistics. For applications which are extremely sensitive, the authors of FIPS PUB-140-1 recommend carrying out the four statistical tests every time that a random bit generator is restarted.

A 20,000-bit binary sequence generated by a pseudorandom number generator is subjected to four statistical tests. The sequence just has to fail one of the tests in order to fail the test overall. The following tests have to be carried out:

Length of runs Required interval
1 2267 – 2733
2 1079 – 1421
3 502 – 748
4 223 – 402
5 90 – 223
>= 6 90 – 223

Reference: Christian Schiestl, Pseudozufallszahlen in der Kryptographie, in Klagenfurt, 1999.