4 ms·

I understand "never roll your own encryption" -- history is full of examples why and we all know that encryption is hard. But who makes encryption in the first

I understand "never roll your own encryption" -- history is full of examples why and we all know that encryption is hard. But who makes encryption in the first place -- groups?

chetanahuja 11y ago
and those crypto experts? They usually spring fully formed from the head of Zeus.
pygy_ 11y ago
Yup, groups of expert mathematicians, also known as "cryptographers". They create and review on another's schemes. The author of a scheme can be a single competent person, but it would be unwise to trust it before peer review, regardless of the author's track record.
rnovak 11y ago
There's a US Govt agency called NIST. They sponsor "contests" basically for academics and engineers to put forth proposals for crypto algorithms, which are then reviewed. I'd read up on here[1], if it interests you at all, you can find the original academic papers regarding each of what became the standards, and I think they have references as to the review process as well. [1]http://csrc.nist.gov/ http://csrc.nist.gov/
- pjscott 11y ago
  There are also contests run by groups without any NSA affiliation, such as the CAESAR contest for authenticated encryption [1] and, relevant to this subject, the Password Hashing Competition [2], which recently decided on a pretty impressive winner. [1] http://competitions.cr.yp.to/index.html http://competitions.cr.yp.to/index.html [2] https://password-hashing.net/ https://password-hashing.net/
saalweachter 11y ago
The short answer is "don't be a dilettante". If you want to do crypto, you have to do crypto. You can't just code up an algorithm one weekend and use it for the rest of your life (or the rest of your business's short life). You have to code up a bunch of algorithms, read a bunch of other people's implementations, learn the strengths and weaknesses of different techniques, follow the trade literature, go to conferences, argue with other cryptographers over beers. Be plugged into the sorts of networks which will let you know when your favorite crypto technique is starting to become weak. It's fine to have a diverse set of interests, try your hand at various things. But some things you have to really commit to. You can get away with half-assing a lot of things, but some things -- like cryptography -- need to be fully-assed.

I understand "never roll your own encryption" -- history is full of examples why and we all know that encryption is hard. But who makes encryption in the first place -- groups?

chetanahuja 11y ago

and those crypto experts? They usually spring fully formed from the head of Zeus.

pygy_ 11y ago

Yup, groups of expert mathematicians, also known as "cryptographers". They create and review on another's schemes. The author of a scheme can be a single competent person, but it would be unwise to trust it before peer review, regardless of the author's track record.

rnovak 11y ago

There's a US Govt agency called NIST. They sponsor "contests" basically for academics and engineers to put forth proposals for crypto algorithms, which are then reviewed. I'd read up on here[1], if it interests you at all, you can find the original academic papers regarding each of what became the standards, and I think they have references as to the review process as well. [1]http://csrc.nist.gov/ http://csrc.nist.gov/

pjscott 11y ago
There are also contests run by groups without any NSA affiliation, such as the CAESAR contest for authenticated encryption [1] and, relevant to this subject, the Password Hashing Competition [2], which recently decided on a pretty impressive winner. [1] http://competitions.cr.yp.to/index.html http://competitions.cr.yp.to/index.html [2] https://password-hashing.net/ https://password-hashing.net/

saalweachter 11y ago

The short answer is "don't be a dilettante". If you want to do crypto, you have to do crypto. You can't just code up an algorithm one weekend and use it for the rest of your life (or the rest of your business's short life). You have to code up a bunch of algorithms, read a bunch of other people's implementations, learn the strengths and weaknesses of different techniques, follow the trade literature, go to conferences, argue with other cryptographers over beers. Be plugged into the sorts of networks which will let you know when your favorite crypto technique is starting to become weak. It's fine to have a diverse set of interests, try your hand at various things. But some things you have to really commit to. You can get away with half-assing a lot of things, but some things -- like cryptography -- need to be fully-assed.