An interleaver receives incoming data frames of size N. The interleaver indexes the elements of the frame with an N1 x N2 index array. The interleaver then effectively rearranges (permutes) the data by permuting the rows of the index array. The interleaver employs the equation I(j,k) = I(j,( alpha jk + beta j)modP) to permute the columns (indexed by k) of each row (indexed by j.) P is at least equal to N2, beta j is a constant which may be different for each row, and each alpha j is a relative prime number relative to P. After permuting, the interleaver outputs the data in a different order than received (e.g., receives sequentially row by row, outputs sequentially each column by column).