SLH-DSA-SHAKE-128s
SLH-DSA (FIPS 205) is a stateless hash-based signature scheme, standardized by NIST in August 2024. It relies only on the security of cryptographic hash functions — no number-theoretic assumptions. Larger signatures and slower signing, but the most conservative security basis.
The “s” (small) variant optimizes for signature size at the cost of signing speed — note the sign time is measured in seconds, not microseconds. Choose the “f” (fast) variant when signing throughput matters more than signature size.
- CPU
- Xeon Platinum 8488C
- Measured on
- c7i.large
- OS / Kernel
- 24.04.4 LTS
- liboqs
- 0.15.0
- Wall clock
- 32m 32s
- CPU steal
- <0.01%
Parameters
- Family
- SLH-DSA
- Parameter set
- SHAKE-128s
- Public key
- 32 B
- Private key
- 64 B
- Signature
- 7.67 KB
- Iterations / op
- 1,000
- liboqs key
- SLH_DSA_PURE_SHAKE_128S
Regulatory approval status
Whether this algorithm family is approved/recommended for use under three regimes. Every badge links to its source — click through before citing this elsewhere.
SLH-DSA is not named as a CNSA 2.0 requirement (ML-DSA is the mandated lattice signature; LMS/XMSS/ML-DSA-87 cover the stateful/firmware case — see the LMS/XMSS row).
NSA CNSA 2.0 Cybersecurity Advisory · not directly verified this session, spot-check the source"Relevant and conservative option" per ANSSI's own cross-reference to BSI's aligned position; also covered under BSI §5.3.4.
BSI TR-02102-1, Version 2026-01 · not directly verified this session, spot-check the source"Relevant and conservative option" for contexts that can afford SPHINCS+/SLH-DSA's larger signatures; hybridization optional; the XMSS/LMS state-handling recommendations apply here too.
ANSSI views on the Post-Quantum Cryptography transition (2023 follow up), §2- Mean
- 111.54 ms
- 95% CI on mean
- ±0.03%
- Median
- 111.48 ms
- p95
- 112.20 ms
- p99
- 113.34 ms
- Stdev
- 524.2 µs
- Min
- 110.57 ms
- Ops/sec
- 9.0
Mean is known to 111505.06–111570.04 µs across 1,000 iterations. A 95% confidence interval on the mean, not a prediction interval for a single operation. It says how precisely the average is known from this run's samples; the standard deviation says how much the individual samples scattered.
Click any point to view the GitHub Actions run that produced it.
- Mean
- 850.80 ms
- 95% CI on mean
- ±0.01%
- Median
- 850.65 ms
- p95
- 853.06 ms
- p99
- 855.58 ms
- Stdev
- 1.48 ms
- Min
- 846.77 ms
- Ops/sec
- 1.2
Mean is known to 850704.74–850888.05 µs across 1,000 iterations. A 95% confidence interval on the mean, not a prediction interval for a single operation. It says how precisely the average is known from this run's samples; the standard deviation says how much the individual samples scattered.
Click any point to view the GitHub Actions run that produced it.
- Mean
- 852.1 µs
- 95% CI on mean
- ±0.35%
- Median
- 849.7 µs
- p95
- 909.8 µs
- p99
- 941.3 µs
- Stdev
- 47.8 µs
- Min
- 755.6 µs
- Ops/sec
- 1,174
Mean is known to 849.10–855.03 µs across 1,000 iterations. A 95% confidence interval on the mean, not a prediction interval for a single operation. It says how precisely the average is known from this run's samples; the standard deviation says how much the individual samples scattered.
Click any point to view the GitHub Actions run that produced it.