The secret-sharing perspective of masked circuits was initially considered in the threshold cryptography project. The project then considered two separate tracks (single-device and multi-party). The single-device track evolved to become the "masked circuits for block-ciphers" project. Early public feedback about the single-device threshold setting was received in talks at the NTCW 2019 workshop (sessions II.1 and II.2), comments provided for NISTIR 8214 (see the diff) and 8214A (see the diff) and at a related workshop organized by K.U. Leuven (July 2020).

The Masked Circuits call for feedback issued in June 2021 (open till 2021-Sep-06) received diverse comments. The call and the received comments are compiled here.

Some summary notes: 

• Some comments from Industry convey that the glitch-extended probing model is overkill (too strong as a baseline for security requirements of masking), as real application scenarios might do well with other models that enable cheaper solutions with better performance. Also, Industry comments there are tools to verify design compliance with intended masking, but testing is still necessary to measure leakage / side-channel resistance in hardware. 
• Some comments from Academia appeal for masking schemes that can be based on composable gadgets and be easily extended to higher-orders, and convey that efficiency can still be improved.
• Other comments mentioned the existence of standards (ISO/IEC) already in place for assessing the security level of cryptographic implementations.

The received feedback does not reveal a current consensus about the utility of standardizing concrete masking techniques. Yet, there is a recognized potential value for circuit masking. As a result, the project will focus on a stage of collecting reference material in the form of concrete masked circuits, to constitute a masked circuits library, to serve as an open reference for use by the community.

The project scope for 2022 is explained here.

In summary, the project plans to collect reference material in the form of concrete masked circuits, to constitute a masked circuits library, to serve as an open reference for use by the community.

In the future, the MCL will serve as a basis for comparative analyses of side-channel leakage and resistance for certain physical implementations. However, said testing and evaluation is currently out of scope for this project.

At this stage, this project is not considering actions toward standardization.

The current step is focused on masked circuits at the logical level. Future discussions may consider:

• Algorithm vs. implementation profiles: the masking techniques are defined at the algorithmic level, but their effectiveness relies on some hardware implementation assumptions. It is useful to characterize the implementation profiles for which the proposed techniques will improve resistance against side-channel attacks.
• Usefulness to the industry: the success of new standards will depend on an alignment with not only improved security but also their adoptability by the industry.