In an electronic component using a secret key cryptographic algorithm, one operation utilizes a first table for supplying output data from input data. The output data, and/or derived data, is manipulated by critical instructions. A countermeasure method involves the use of other tables such that the output data and the derived data are unpredictable. The other tables are obtained from the first table by an exclusive-OR operation with a random value, or a derived random value, on one and/or the other of the input and output data of the first table.