Are there any known collisions for the hash functions SHA-1, SHA-224, SHA-256, SHA-384, and SHA-512?
By that, I mean are there known values of $a$ and $b$ where $F(a) = F(b)$ and $a ≠ b$?
Are there any known collisions for the hash functions SHA-1, SHA-224, SHA-256, SHA-384, and SHA-512?
By that, I mean are there known values of $a$ and $b$ where $F(a) = F(b)$ and $a ≠ b$?
This answer is now out of date as on Feb 23 2017, a collision for SHA-1 was found. See What is the new attack on SHA-1 “SHAttered” and how does it work?
In short, no.
So, what is the current state of cryptanalysis with SHA-1 (for reference only as this question relates to SHA-2) and SHA-2? Bruce Schneier has declared SHA-1 broken. That is because researchers found a way to break full SHA-1 in $2^{69}$ operations. Much less than the $2^{80}$ operations it should take to find a collision due to the birthday paradox.
As far as we know, the best available collision attacks on full round SHA-2 hash functions is still brute force $2^{n/2}$ (where $n$ is the bit length of the output).
First up, the following table should provide a nice comparison of the SHA algorithms and their status back in 2013, when I fist posted this answer:
[38] The theoretical attack on SHA-1 refers to “Freestart collision for full SHA-1” (PDF) by Marc Stevens and Pierre Karpman and Thomas Peyrin, first published 8 October 2015.
Meanwhile – in 2017 – things have gotten worse related to SHA-1. Nowadays, there are known collisions for SHA-1 and the graphic changed accordingly.
Related to SHA-1 being unsafe and (meanwhile) practically broken, the following two websites might also be of interest to you:
Website: The SHAppening: freestart collisions for
SHA-1
(Mentioned by Ohad Cohen)
This website contains latest news and background information regarding the SHA-1 freestart collision work from Marc Stevens (CWI, the Netherlands), Pierre Karpman (Inria, France and NTU Singapore) and Thomas Peyrin (NTU Singapore).
You can find the latest version of our technical article here (currently under submission) and the corresponding press release here.
…
and
Website: SHA-1 has shattered.
(mentioned by Dave L.)
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It is now practically possible to craft two colliding PDF files and obtain a SHA-1 digital signature on the first PDF file which can also be abused as a valid signature on the second PDF file.
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This result is the product of a long term collaboration between the Cryptology Group at Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) - the national research institute for mathematics and computer science in the Netherlands - and the Google Research Security, Privacy and Anti-abuse Group.
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The practical full collision linked above shows why you should not be using SHA-1 anymore. Instead, consider using safer alternatives… SHA-2, or the newer SHA-3!
So, to answer your question: yes, there are known collisions for SHA-1 at the time of writing this (February 2017). But there are currently no known collisions for SHA-2 (or SHA-3).