4 ms·
I've seen you as the top commenter on almost every topic of email security, pitching the same arguments. There is significant demand for content-encrypted asyn
by lvs 9y ago
I've seen you as the top commenter on almost every topic of email security, pitching the same arguments.
There is significant demand for content-encrypted asynchronous messaging for all routine purposes. Chat apps do not provide the appropriate platform for real world communication of substance, and security is and must be sought by less dismissive developers than you.
- tptacek 9y agoSignal Protocol is designed for asynchronous messaging.
- lvs 9y agoOK, so implement a Double-Ratchet protocol for email clients and call it a day. Don't say that no engineering is possible on this problem, as if that isn't a farcical statement.
- blfr 9y agoThe problem is that you can't do it. More precisely, you cannot get people to convert to your encryption scheme. And if you could do it, you could as well convert them to a better protocol altogether. At least this is how I understand tptacek's argument.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- tptacek 9y agoHave you considered that there might be a reason why none of the proposed schemes to retrofit encryption onto email involve double-ratchet protocols, even though all sorts of people come up with new messaging apps that do use double-ratchets? I think it's because it's very painful to accomplish ratchets in store-and-forward email, where the message update frequency is often measured in minutes, not milliseconds. At any rate: suppose you actually accomplished that. You've still addressed only one of the bullets in my list above. Why bother? If you can get people to adopt new software, get them to adopt Signal, WhatsApp, or Wire.
- lvs 9y agoAn individual server-to-server communication occurs in milliseconds, so the fact that messages do not arrive frequently is completely irrelevant. It's simply because Moxie -- someone likely to be immune to your kind of negativism -- has not seen fit to work on the problem, given that messaging with an asynchronous chat format fits the general trend of user adoption. Someday I suspect he'll come around on it, I hope.
- tptacek 9y agoAn individual server-to-server communication happens in milliseconds, but these systems layer on top of existing email clients, which do not have a polling interval of milliseconds. I wouldn't hold your breath on email crypto from Moxie.
- lvs 9y agoI don't think you know how Signal or the underlying protocol works based on this comment, so I'll just leave the discussion there. Feel free to read the specification. It's quite comprehensible and well-written.
- tptacek 9y agoSend message to server. Wait for server to tell you if the list of device-id's is current; if not, re-send with the server's update. What part of that works well with a client that checks for new messages every 5 minutes?