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The military-industrial complex provides solutions suited for the military-industrial complex’s interests. The three letter agencies have repeatedly expressed

The military-industrial complex provides solutions suited for the military-industrial complex’s interests. The three letter agencies have repeatedly expressed an interest in backdoored encryption over the past four decades. Your inkjet printer encodes thumbprints. Your laser printer won’t replicate currency. They are still good enough for ordinary use cases. I don’t think cryptography is any different. It’s fine by me if you disagree. My view is based on the opinion that failure to subvert cryptography would be professional incompetence and the three letter agencies are full of competent professionals with deep motivations like patriotism and better funded than everyone else. YMMV.

tptacek 3y ago
I'm fine with your beliefs about the trustworthiness of authorities, the IC, whatever. My problem with attempts to extend those beliefs axiomatically into computer science, where they don't hold. The IC's desire to subvert random number generation isn't a point I'd argue. Let's just stipulate that it's true. The process you're describing of accomplishing that, of preventing the distribution of random number generating circuits, doesn't work. That's not how random bit generation works in modern cryptosystems.
- brudgers 3y ago
  https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rdriley/487/papers/Thompson_1984_ReflectionsonTrustingTrust.pdf https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rdriley/487/papers/Thompson_1984_Ref... For me, it is not a question of computer science. It is a matter of practical engineering for manufacturing and distribution in a the context of reified political interests. Cryptography is a munition. All the technical details of current common methods are shaped by that fact or alternatively the military-industrial complex has given up its interest in controlling it. I never saw a press conference announcing the latter. If I saw one, that’s when I would put on my tinfoil hat…maybe Devo style flowerpot?
eternityforest 3y ago
That's why Linux doesn't use the HW randomness by itself, it gathers entropy from lots of sources like peripheral timings, and hashes it all. If the crypto algorithms are broken it doesn't matter if the RNG is good, without good crypto there's not much you can do with randomness except OTP.

tptacek 3y ago

I'm fine with your beliefs about the trustworthiness of authorities, the IC, whatever. My problem with attempts to extend those beliefs axiomatically into computer science, where they don't hold. The IC's desire to subvert random number generation isn't a point I'd argue. Let's just stipulate that it's true. The process you're describing of accomplishing that, of preventing the distribution of random number generating circuits, doesn't work. That's not how random bit generation works in modern cryptosystems.

brudgers 3y ago
https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rdriley/487/papers/Thompson_1984_ReflectionsonTrustingTrust.pdf https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rdriley/487/papers/Thompson_1984_Ref... For me, it is not a question of computer science. It is a matter of practical engineering for manufacturing and distribution in a the context of reified political interests. Cryptography is a munition. All the technical details of current common methods are shaped by that fact or alternatively the military-industrial complex has given up its interest in controlling it. I never saw a press conference announcing the latter. If I saw one, that’s when I would put on my tinfoil hat…maybe Devo style flowerpot?

eternityforest 3y ago

That's why Linux doesn't use the HW randomness by itself, it gathers entropy from lots of sources like peripheral timings, and hashes it all. If the crypto algorithms are broken it doesn't matter if the RNG is good, without good crypto there's not much you can do with randomness except OTP.