Abstract: In recent years, cache attack has become one of the most threatening attacks to block ciphers that implemented on microprocessors. The research in this area is a hot spot of cryptographic side channel attacks. This paper summarizes the cache attacks on block ciphers. The mechanism of cache and the side channel information difference of cache hit/miss are described. The characteristics of cache accesses and corresponding information leakages are analyzed. Several typical cache attack techniques on block ciphers are well discussed from the aspects of attack model, analysis method, research progress. Finally, the features of cache attacks are summarized, the current research pitfalls are provided, and the future directions of cache attacks are given.