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    Projects Random Bit Generation NIST SP 800-22: Documentation and Software

Random Bit Generation

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NIST SP 800-22: Download Documentation and Software

  • April 27, 2010: NIST SP 800-22rev1a (dated April 2010), A Statistical Test Suite for the Validation of Random Number Generators and Pseudo Random Number Generators for Cryptographic Applications, that describes the test suite.
     
  • Download the NIST Statistical Test Suite.


    July 9, 2014: This update has a few minor corrections to the source code. The first change corrects the non-overlapping template test to make it correctly skip bits when a sequence matches.  The second change is to correct the π values in the overlapping template test.

  • Software Revision History
    • August 11, 2010: NIST has released a minor update to the tool. The update is called sts-2.1.1. This update makes a minor change in the proportions value in the finalAnalysisReport.txt file. This value is now printed as a fraction of sequences passing the tests.
    • April 27, 2010: NIST has released a minor update to the tool. The update is called sts-2.1. The update fixes a problem with the Spectral Test. Additionally, it is recommended that the Spectral Test only be used for sequence lengths of 1,000,000 bits.

Note: When using the samples from the data/ directory to derive the values from Appendix B the suite should be invoked with a stream length of 1,000,000 bits and there is one stream per file. For the tests that have parameters the default values should be used. Additionally, the results from the tables in Appendix B are not found in the finalAnalysisReport.txt file. They are in the results.txt files in the individual test directories (when running the sample data files these test directories are in the directory experiments/AlgorithmTesting/

 

Software disclaimer: "This software was developed at the National Institute of Standards and Technology by employees of the Federal Government in the course of their official duties. Pursuant to title 17 Section 105 of the United States Code this software is not subject to copyright protection and is in the public domain. The NIST Statistical Test Suite is an experimental system. NIST assumes no responsibility whatsoever for its use by other parties, and makes no guarantees, expressed or implied, about its quality, reliability, or any other characteristic. We would appreciate acknowledgment if the software is used."

Additional Pages

NIST SP 800-22: Documentation and SoftwareGuide to the Statistical TestsRBG ArchiveNIST SP 800-90 Historical Information

Contacts

Ms. Elaine Barker
elaine.barker@nist.gov

Lawrence Bassham
lawrence.bassham@nist.gov

Topics

Security and Privacy: random number generation

Related Projects

Crypto Standards Development Process
Cryptographic Module Validation Program
Cryptographic Standards and Guidelines
Digital Signatures
Entropy as a Service
Created May 24, 2016, Updated February 12, 2018