An optimized parallel and energy-efficient implementation of SNOW 3G for LTE mobile devices

Abstract

Multi-core processors are becoming attractive for mobile devices because of the performance speedups and power savings they might attain. In this paper we employ such processors to investigate the SNOW 3G ciphering algorithm in the Long Term Evolution (LTE) protocol stack. In particular, we introduce several software optimizations, and present a novel parallel implementation of the algorithm. The proposed parallel design and its serial counterparts are then benchmarked using a simulated mobile phone platform. Evaluation results show that optimizations applied to the serial implementation saves 57% of energy consumption and shortens the execution time to the half. Moreover, the proposed parallel implementation meets the LTE speed, while reducing the energy consumption by 70%, and improving the energy efficiency by a factor of eight.