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I think you're (again) falsely assuming something here. I definitely have opinions about what modes of operation should be used for a cipher, as it's yet anothe

I think you're (again) falsely assuming something here. I definitely have opinions about what modes of operation should be used for a cipher, as it's yet another sensitive link in the chain. ECB operation was added because the head above me requested it to be there, not from my design choice. I think your fervent and, with all respect to your undebatable knowledge in this topic, priggish nature makes you prone to turn discussions into "unstoppable force meets immovable object" farces, if you understand what I mean, so let's just agree on disagreeing about ciphers :)

tptacek 16y ago
Sorry, but I wouldn't have lasted very long in this field if "fear of sounding priggish" had a major impact on my behavior, so let me give this to you straight: In response to SJCL, a library implemented by bona fide cryptographers that at least attempts to capture some of the pitfalls of doing crypto code, you, because of the fact that the library doesn't offer the obsolete Blowfish cipher, recommended: * A Blowfish library that implements only the terribly insecure ECB block cipher mode, which you wouldn't know unless you looked at the code since it doesn't call it "ECB" * A library that claims to implement CBC mode but in fact implements ECB mode, and, as an added bonus, implements RSA as nothing but a wrapper around bignum math. * A library that implements CBC mode --- though without control over IVs --- but only for AES; Blowfish is stuck in ECB mode. Recall your reason for citing the library was "access to things like Blowfish". I'm sorry, but you just gave really bad advice. Give better advice and I promise I'll be less of a twat. I am, for the record, not a crypto expert. Colin Percival is our resident crypto expert. All I know is what I know. In this case, that includes: don't do what 'hackermom just said to do.
- rleffmann 16y ago
  stumbled over this via the referrer list on my host and thought i'd just add something for the record: my jsbfsh does cbc only, not ecb. i think the one making guesses instead of looking at code was you ;-) this was a very interesting and complementing discussion thread.

tptacek 16y ago

Sorry, but I wouldn't have lasted very long in this field if "fear of sounding priggish" had a major impact on my behavior, so let me give this to you straight: In response to SJCL, a library implemented by bona fide cryptographers that at least attempts to capture some of the pitfalls of doing crypto code, you, because of the fact that the library doesn't offer the obsolete Blowfish cipher, recommended: * A Blowfish library that implements only the terribly insecure ECB block cipher mode, which you wouldn't know unless you looked at the code since it doesn't call it "ECB" * A library that claims to implement CBC mode but in fact implements ECB mode, and, as an added bonus, implements RSA as nothing but a wrapper around bignum math. * A library that implements CBC mode --- though without control over IVs --- but only for AES; Blowfish is stuck in ECB mode. Recall your reason for citing the library was "access to things like Blowfish". I'm sorry, but you just gave really bad advice. Give better advice and I promise I'll be less of a twat. I am, for the record, not a crypto expert. Colin Percival is our resident crypto expert. All I know is what I know. In this case, that includes: don't do what 'hackermom just said to do.

rleffmann 16y ago
stumbled over this via the referrer list on my host and thought i'd just add something for the record: my jsbfsh does cbc only, not ecb. i think the one making guesses instead of looking at code was you ;-) this was a very interesting and complementing discussion thread.