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Recent events raised never ending question of "could the government place a backdoor in DES/AES/SHA/etc.?" My personal perception (based on available evidence)

Recent events raised never ending question of "could the government place a backdoor in DES/AES/SHA/etc.?" My personal perception (based on available evidence) is that government crypto is as strong as possible, but is weakened where needed via policies. A decade ago during crypto export limitation, there were no backdoors, but a policy: you may export only keys that long [so we can bruteforce them cheaper]. Another example: SSL is technically secure, but its biggest weakness is trust in a limited list of certificate authorities (CAs) like VeriSign. Then, there is policy that certificate authorities should give up their private keys when FBI/CIA asks for them. Another example: you may encrypt your files, but must give away your password to a court. Also, it makes sense economically. Government people need strong crypto like everyone else and the best way to test and verify it is by opening it up and deploying as widely as possible. So mistakes are noticed sooner than later. Then, people with guns will make sure you give up your secrets when they need you to. I believe crypto systems are alright. It is policies and violent coercion we should be afraid of.

DanBC 13y ago
> Government people need strong crypto like everyone else and the best way to test and verify it is by opening it up and deploying as widely as possible. One counter example: Clifford Cocks created a public key crypto system before RSA did, and GCHQ kept it secret for many years.
dfc 13y ago
You think Joan Daemen and Vincent Rijmen work for NSA?
doe88 13y ago
However it seems to me that to this day there is no proof they intentionally tried to weaken a standardized crypto algorithm, they seem to have instead relied in the past on imposing reduced sizes of keys. But even that seems to have changed nowadays, AES 256 bits despite all the scrutiny seems to still be a safe choice. Of course, I don't know what are their plans concerning crypto but the backlash will be huge if it appeared they rigged an algorithm. Of course, if they happened to honestly find a significant flaw or make a breakthrough in quantum computing for instance I doubt they would tell the public either.
dsl 13y ago
Having a CAs private keys allows for crude impersonation, not wholesale interception as many believe. (State actors have gone this route in the past and been quickly discovered) Google.com generates a public/private key pair and has the public key signed by a CA. The signature only says "I verify this public key really belongs to google.com," it does not become part of the actual cryptographic transaction.
WestCoastJustin 13y ago
Recent Q/A session with Edward Snowden [1] supports your assumption. Q: Is encrypting my email any good at defeating the NSA survelielance? Id my data protected by standard encryption? A: Encryption works. Properly implemented strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on. Unfortunately, endpoint security is so terrifically weak that NSA can frequently find ways around it. [1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/17/edward-snowden-nsa-files-whistleblower#block-51bf3588e4b082a2ed2f5fc5 http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/17/edward-snowden-n... p.s. I always like this comic about security: http://xkcd.com/538/ http://xkcd.com/538/

DanBC 13y ago

> Government people need strong crypto like everyone else and the best way to test and verify it is by opening it up and deploying as widely as possible. One counter example: Clifford Cocks created a public key crypto system before RSA did, and GCHQ kept it secret for many years.

dfc 13y ago

You think Joan Daemen and Vincent Rijmen work for NSA?

doe88 13y ago

However it seems to me that to this day there is no proof they intentionally tried to weaken a standardized crypto algorithm, they seem to have instead relied in the past on imposing reduced sizes of keys. But even that seems to have changed nowadays, AES 256 bits despite all the scrutiny seems to still be a safe choice. Of course, I don't know what are their plans concerning crypto but the backlash will be huge if it appeared they rigged an algorithm. Of course, if they happened to honestly find a significant flaw or make a breakthrough in quantum computing for instance I doubt they would tell the public either.

dsl 13y ago

Having a CAs private keys allows for crude impersonation, not wholesale interception as many believe. (State actors have gone this route in the past and been quickly discovered) Google.com generates a public/private key pair and has the public key signed by a CA. The signature only says "I verify this public key really belongs to google.com," it does not become part of the actual cryptographic transaction.

WestCoastJustin 13y ago

Recent Q/A session with Edward Snowden [1] supports your assumption. Q: Is encrypting my email any good at defeating the NSA survelielance? Id my data protected by standard encryption? A: Encryption works. Properly implemented strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on. Unfortunately, endpoint security is so terrifically weak that NSA can frequently find ways around it. [1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/17/edward-snowden-nsa-files-whistleblower#block-51bf3588e4b082a2ed2f5fc5 http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/17/edward-snowden-n... p.s. I always like this comic about security: http://xkcd.com/538/ http://xkcd.com/538/