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I find it highly unlikely just based on basic economics. Imagine the potential conversation between Intel and the NSA: NSA: Please backdoor your RNG for us. I
by nn3 10y ago
I find it highly unlikely just based on basic economics.
Imagine the potential conversation between Intel and the NSA:
NSA: Please backdoor your RNG for us.
Intel: We're making xx billions of this chip. What happens if someone finds out and we have to recall the chip. Are you paying us the xx billions back then?
NSA: ...
It is fairly unlikely the NSA could afford Intel.
- nickpsecurity 10y agoYou should look at the Snowden leaks sometime. They had cooperation, including backdoors, in a large number of companies' products and networks. RSA cost them about $30 mil to risk whole market. For carriers, usually around $100 mil or so. Also, remember that it's easier to do if you disguise it as a coding flaw. It wasn't a backdoor: just one among many flaws accidentally hitting our systems. Wouldn't cost any market share.
- CyberDildonics 10y agoI think it would be something more like: NSA: Please backdoor all sorts of stuf Intel: ok Security Researcher: these chips have backdoors Intel: Maybe they do, what are you going to do about it?
- PeCaN 10y agoIntel has plausible deniability. A backdoor in RDRAND would be some very minor statistical flaw. It could just be something tiny that makes private keys susceptible to some known or unknown attack.