5 ms·

I'm also very curious about this. AES-GCM satisfies my threat model, "enhanced" does not.

blakesterz 6y ago
I'm curious about your threat model, only because this doesn't concern me much. Why does this not satisfy yours, I'm afraid I'm a missing something.
- TrainedMonkey 6y ago
  I believe parent infers that 'enhanced' means they modified crypto stack and broke prime directive: "Never roll your own crypto".
- jhardy54 6y ago
  The word 'enhanced' in the context of cryptography just means 'modified', and modifications to security-critical algorithms are considered unsafe unless proven safe. AES-GCM refers to a specific set of trade-offs. How do those trade-offs differ with the changes that Zoom has made?
fsflover 6y ago
Not sure how a closed code can satisfy a threat model depending on the encryption details. If you trust the company to implement AES-GCM in secrecy, why not also trust with the "enhanced" part?
- Rebelgecko 6y ago
  If they say they're using regular AES-GCM from a library that's been decently vetted, the main things you have to worry about are 1. intentional backdoors 2. someone using the library improperly (like using the same IV for every encryption) If they're rolling their own encryption library, you have to worry about 1. intentional backdoors 2. someone using the library improperly 3. the quality of their implementation of crypto primitives Getting #2 right is definitely doable for a typical programmer who takes a little time to understand the basic dos and donts. IMO #3 is not doable for a typical programmer, and certainly isn't trivial even for people that are experts (at least for a relatively complicated pair of algorithms like AES and GCM). So even though #3 is just one more thing that can go wrong, it's way more likely to be a problem than #2
  - dylan604 6y ago
    >1. intentional backdoors With all of the previously disclosed security fiascos of Zoom decisions, this would be my concern. Whether it was for debugging purposes later, it just makes something down the road easier, or it was done to satisfy an external request. I do not trust Zoom to get this right
    - searchableguy 6y ago
      They acquihired keybase a while ago: https://keybase.io/blog/keybase-joins-zoom https://keybase.io/blog/keybase-joins-zoom
      - Corrado 6y ago
        Yes, and that makes me sad every time I think about it. Keybase had such potential to change privacy/encryption but just couldn't make it work financially.
barkingcat 6y ago
Saying something "satisfies your threat model" is pretty foolhardy unless you can read Zoom's source code and implementation of this standard.
- Threeve303 6y ago
  It sounds good though
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]

I'm curious about your threat model, only because this doesn't concern me much. Why does this not satisfy yours, I'm afraid I'm a missing something.

TrainedMonkey 6y ago
I believe parent infers that 'enhanced' means they modified crypto stack and broke prime directive: "Never roll your own crypto".
jhardy54 6y ago
The word 'enhanced' in the context of cryptography just means 'modified', and modifications to security-critical algorithms are considered unsafe unless proven safe. AES-GCM refers to a specific set of trade-offs. How do those trade-offs differ with the changes that Zoom has made?

fsflover 6y ago

Not sure how a closed code can satisfy a threat model depending on the encryption details. If you trust the company to implement AES-GCM in secrecy, why not also trust with the "enhanced" part?

Rebelgecko 6y ago
If they say they're using regular AES-GCM from a library that's been decently vetted, the main things you have to worry about are 1. intentional backdoors 2. someone using the library improperly (like using the same IV for every encryption) If they're rolling their own encryption library, you have to worry about 1. intentional backdoors 2. someone using the library improperly 3. the quality of their implementation of crypto primitives Getting #2 right is definitely doable for a typical programmer who takes a little time to understand the basic dos and donts. IMO #3 is not doable for a typical programmer, and certainly isn't trivial even for people that are experts (at least for a relatively complicated pair of algorithms like AES and GCM). So even though #3 is just one more thing that can go wrong, it's way more likely to be a problem than #2
- dylan604 6y ago
  >1. intentional backdoors With all of the previously disclosed security fiascos of Zoom decisions, this would be my concern. Whether it was for debugging purposes later, it just makes something down the road easier, or it was done to satisfy an external request. I do not trust Zoom to get this right
  - searchableguy 6y ago
    They acquihired keybase a while ago: https://keybase.io/blog/keybase-joins-zoom https://keybase.io/blog/keybase-joins-zoom
    - Corrado 6y ago
      Yes, and that makes me sad every time I think about it. Keybase had such potential to change privacy/encryption but just couldn't make it work financially.

barkingcat 6y ago

Saying something "satisfies your threat model" is pretty foolhardy unless you can read Zoom's source code and implementation of this standard.

Threeve303 6y ago
It sounds good though
deleted 6y ago
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