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How does one become a cryptographer then? Do the people who perpetuate this meme with no basis not realise the clear and present danger it presents to humanity

• _jal 7y ago
  The answer is the same as when this always comes up: mentally append "for realsies". The advice is meant to suggest that people not publish code or run services with incompetent crypto. Nobody is saying not to learn and play. They're saying don't set off a rocket while staring down the engine. The reason why it has to be said is that the consequences of doing so when writing crypto are not so impressively immediate or dramatic, but just as devastating to the outcome (and maybe cryptographer, depending on adversary). > Straight out of the CIA handbook is how you look when you repeat this bullshit ad nauseum. The CIA does not care if you play with libsodium.
  • A2017U1 7y ago
    > The CIA does not care if you play with libsodium. Cryptographers are easy meat for lions. Care to place a long-standing bet on that? 20yrs or so? We can find a solid reasonable middleman here surely? They very much do care. I'm willing to bet on it becoming public knowledge within that timeframe. Keen?
    • saagarjha 7y ago
      How is the CIA going to stop you from downloading libsodium and doing whatever you want with it?
      • A2017U1 7y ago
        That was most certainly not the point made here. Go contribute to libsodium, go contribute to any reasonably well used crypto library, you've now got a big red dot on your back from an assortment of governments in perpetual conflict. I truly worry for anyone participating in these open source codebases and not being aware of how much they are targets. Take care of yourselves friends. Please.
        • icebraining 7y ago
          > I truly worry for anyone participating in these open source codebases and not being aware of how much they are targets. So when you extorted people to play with other's crypto codebases in the previous post, were you trying to make them into targets?
          • JetezLeLogin 7y ago
            Exhorted, you probably meant!
            • icebraining 7y ago
              Yeah, thanks.
        • misterdoubt 7y ago
          Huh?
        • tabletopneedle 7y ago
          This reminds me of the Niemöller's poem. IIRC it went something like First they came for the A2017U1s, or they would have, except he never opposed the wrongdoing.
• dspillett 7y ago
  > > If you're not a cryptographer then you shouldn't be rolling your own crypto. > How does one become a cryptographer then? > Yes certainly don't use homerolled crypto in production. That is the point. When the glib phrase is repeated it is to people who are working on production, or something that might be in danger of one day soon being in production (we've all seen things go from proof of concept to production with insufficient reworking, it happens far too often). In that context it is correct to be constantly restated. If you are explicitly trying to understand cryptography, then hopefully you are aware of the higher level dangers while you are poking around the lower level details and until you are ready for prime-time you are able to keep your exploratory code from going anywhere near production, at least not without proper scrutiny. It is like the first two rules of optimisation: Rule 1: Don't. Rule 2 (for advanced programmers only): Don't yet.
• nraynaud 7y ago
  No, either you want to become a cryptographer and you’ll need to learn, implement toy algorithm, toy with libraries, etc. But you’ll need some level of proficiency before putting anything to production. The real code contribution of cryptographers anyways tend to add some very specific details to libraries (like adding their latest invention). Now the general advice is that if you want to skip the 15 years it take to become a cryptographer and you want to send a message, there are ways.
• saagarjha 7y ago
  Nobody is telling you that you can’t play around with crypto in your personal projects; you’re attacking a strawman. What they mean is this: > Yes certainly don't use homerolled crypto in production.
  • opless 7y ago
    Even don't prototype with homerolled encryption. You should know how easy prototypes enter production!
• johncolanduoni 7y ago
  I think the track record of novel cryptography created by people inexperienced in the field indicates it’s something intelligence services would like people to do more of if possible. Are you sure you’re not working for the CIA?
• peterwwillis 7y ago
  > How does one become a cryptographer then? Get an advanced maths degree. Minor in cryptosystems. Spend a few years looking at old cryptosystems. Understand how they were designed, what their weaknesses were, and how new systems are designed. Read a lot of papers. Try to write your own system and ask peers to point out the glaringly obvious holes you didn't notice. > More importantly do not dissuade human beings with talent to roll their own, play with others codebases, and in general have a good fucking time with cryptography. The consequences of lots of people using shit crypto is that a lot of people become less secure, and won't have any idea about it. At the same time, us saying "don't roll your own" won't actually stop anyone who has a burning desire to play with crypto. So we're definitely going to keep dissuading people from rolling their own.
  • A2017U1 7y ago
    While I want to commemd this comment, it all seems to have lit a bonfire of programmer-tier anger, so will still retaliate: People aren't using shit crypto, virtually no one is using anything other than what is highly vetted or otherwise google/apple/ms/etc is telling them to. What is the actual argument here? That some $randompeople play around with new cryptosystems and then share them with friends? The sheer derision that my original comment has directed at it is astounding, let the kids play with cryptography, who the fuck cares, I hope they roll all of the crypto themselves, the world will be a better place, who exactly is saying it should replace current elliptical curves decided so wholesomely for us all by NIST? The simple clear fact is that Western countries do not like and are actively campaigning against modern cryptography. Lets pretend we have some dignity left please as human beings. The West used to represent something, now it feels like we are taking notes from oppressive regimes and playing catch-up.
    • peterwwillis 7y ago
      > People aren't using shit crypto From Why You Should Stop Using Telegram Right Now (2016) (https://gizmodo.com/why-you-should-stop-using-telegram-right-now-1782557415 https://gizmodo.com/why-you-should-stop-using-telegram-right...): According to interviews with leading encryption and security experts, Telegram has a wide range of security issues and doesn’t live up to its proclamations as a safe and secure messaging application. [...] Telegram did what’s known as “rolling their own encryption,” which is widely considered to be a fatal flaw when developing encrypted messaging apps.
• inlined 7y ago
  > Everyone on Earth should roll their own crypto. Don't listen to this nonsense, the real world needs you. This is an interesting exercise to help understand cryptography, but if you think cryptography is subtle or magical, you haven’t started looking at cryptanalysis. There are nearly countless possible side channel attacks. This is why we don’t roll our own practically speaking. It can take advanced degrees in mathematics to merely give ourselves some sense of assurance that our home rolled system is safe. A friend of mine did roll his own security. A decade ago he invented a new homomorphic encryption algorithm (type of encryption that allows meaningful operations on cypertext without revealing secrets). His first step? Getting advanced degrees in mathematics and at least a year of peer review to test against possible attacks. Only years later did he found a company on it. Unfortunately while the system was believed secure, a zero-trust system took too long and too much battery to generate keys on phones.
  • sroussey 7y ago
    Any reference to their work?
    • inlined 7y ago
      https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2015/09/09/kryptnostic-homomorphic-encryption/amp/ https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrew...
  • Ar-Curunir 7y ago
    Is there a link to the paper? As far as I'm aware, there is no practical FHE scheme in existence.
  • A2017U1 7y ago
    I'm using the phrase in the sense of create or implement your own, play with it, not actually using it for critical applications. The world badly needs more cryptographers and their eyes on code whether from a purely academic background or digital tinkerer background. People should be encouraged everywhere to frolick in the ciphers.
• kokx 7y ago
  > How does one become a cryptographer then? Basically: studying it in depth (especially the mathematics part). Focus on cryptanalysis for a while, and find some flaws in existing implementations. The moment you really start to fix those flaws, you probably know enough to implement a cryptosystem in a reasonably safe manner. Even then, there likely will be many flaws in your implementation. So, you need other cryptographers to review it, several sets of eyes looking for flaws. Oh, and don't forget to make sure someone reviews for side channel attacks. (and some other things that I am probably forgetting right now) In the end, the cryptographers that implement cryptosystems are a rare breed. These generally include people that are good at both the hard mathematics involved and the low-level programming knowledge that it requires to prevent timing attacks and the like, and even some hardware knowledge. Who am I to say this? I have studied information security with some focus on crypto, including cryptanalysis and implementation of cryptosystems. Followed some MSc-level courses on implementation specifically, would not touch implementing a cryptosystem myself for production.
  • A2017U1 7y ago
    Quality reply, thankyou. > So, you need other cryptographers to review it, several sets of eyes looking for flaws. That's a real problem with no easy solution, for every "new" cryptographer trying to implement a cryptosystem you need a dozen half-capable eyes on what they are doing. For anything used widely you need hundreds. Creating more half-capable eyes is a good thing.
• wglb 7y ago
  First, start with a site that will teach you some surprising things about crypto that you may have not thought possible: http://cryptopals.com/ http://cryptopals.com/. That is a good start.