I don't know how cryptography works, so I'd like to know why the key length for all cryptography schemes seems to go up in powers of 2. What's the reason one couldn't have a 1300 bit RSA key, for example?
Fast modmults for crypto keys are done using Montgomery multiplication, if the numbers being multiplied are power of two in size the ops are all masks and shifts after the initial transformation.
Comments
I don't know how cryptography works, so I'd like to know why the key length for all cryptography schemes seems to go up in powers of 2. What's the reason one couldn't have a 1300 bit RSA key, for example?
Fast modmults for crypto keys are done using Montgomery multiplication, if the numbers being multiplied are power of two in size the ops are all masks and shifts after the initial transformation.
I don't see any reason why you couldn't. It seems like a 1280 bit key should be secure for at least a few more years.