Round 1

Round one of the Cryptographic Hash Algorithm Competition starts on Nov. 1, 2008 - the day after the hash submission deadline. NIST received 64 entries for the competition; after an internal review of the submissions, 51 were selected for meeting the minimum submission requirements, and accepted as the First Round Candidates.

NIST plans to host the First SHA-3 Candidate Conference at KU Leuven, Belgium to allow submitters of the First Round Candidates to present their algorithms, and also for NIST to discuss the way forward with the competition. NIST plans to discuss the process and criteria for narrowing down the first round candidates to a more manageable number for further studies by summer of 2009 and starts the Second Round of the Competition.