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Yeah, my first move on seeing this article was to scan it for mention of the fact that there are other hash algorithms than MD5 which still work perfectly well.
by mechanical_fish 19y ago
Yeah, my first move on seeing this article was to scan it for mention of the fact that there are other hash algorithms than MD5 which still work perfectly well.
I don't think this article would be bad if it had a second page that went on to provide some perspective. As it stands, it reads as a general indictment of all of computer security. They claim that the methods are secure, but they're really not! Don't trust those computer guys, because the One True Algorithm has a hole!
- tptacek 19y agoAt the risk of being a Reddit pedant: it's not really true that there are other reasonable safe hash algorithms. We're in a bit of a hash crisis now; SHA1 is expected to fall too, SHA256 is unreasonably expensive, and no alternative algorithm has the peer results to allay concerns. So, I guess there is an article you could write about the situation. But, of course, it has nothing yet to do with the Internet; SSL/TLS uses both MD5 and SHA1, simultaneously.
- mechanical_fish 19y agoThe moral of this story is that I'd rather read your article than the Economist's. :)