5 ms·

I think observers have long assumed NSA is some number of years ahead – say, 2-30 years ahead – of openly published results in cryptanalysis and cryptosystem vu

by gojomo 13y ago

I think observers have long assumed NSA is some number of years ahead – say, 2-30 years ahead – of openly published results in cryptanalysis and cryptosystem vulnerabilities.

lifeisstillgood 13y ago
But it's really hard to assume that - that's assuming true mathematical leaps and invention. Admittedly if you put enough cryptographers on the payroll they may form their own university, but they still need the air of their peers on the outside. Imagine a cosmologist today transported 30 years back and asked to attend conferences - they would gain no inspiration. I think we put too much emphasis on the single data point of GCHQ inventing pgp early (IIRC)
- mayank 13y ago
  > the single data point of GCHQ inventing pgp early It's also much easier to invent a cryptosystem than to break one.
- ktsmith 13y ago
  There are multiple data points suggesting the NSA is/was ahead of public researchers. There's the sbox changes to DES in the 70's when differential cryptanalysis wasn't publicly discovered till the 80's. The revisions between SHA-0 and SHA-1 (the attack the changes prevent weren't found for at least 5 years). The Dual EC DRBG random number generator they supplied to NIST that many people suspect of being compromisable by NSA etc.
  - damarquis 13y ago
    "..that many people suspect of being compromisable by NSA etc." If it was a backdoor you certainly can't count it among the NSAs successes. It is never used.
    - rgbrenner 13y ago
      http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/11/the_strange_sto.html http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/11/the_strange_st...
    - ktsmith 13y ago
      I would count it's development and publication as another example of the NSA being a bit ahead as it very much looks like they developed an algorithm in secret with a backdoor. I would count the fact that the public found it (after a few years) a point for public crypto research.
- shabble 13y ago
  You may be thinking of the Ellis/Cocks/Williamson[1] invention of the RSA encryption and Diffie-Hellman key-exchange algorithms several years prior to their open publication. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H._Ellis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H._Ellis
  - lifeisstillgood 13y ago
    Yes thank you - too punchy to remember anything useful that late at night.
- nknighthb 13y ago
  Well, we have at least twice as many data points as that. IBM discovered differential cryptanalysis in the early 70s, and the NSA apparently knew about it before then, and nobody else found out until the late 80s. I don't know what organization spends the most money on cryptanalysis every year, but the NSA's gotta be near the top. It's reasonable to assume they've found important results that the public won't know of for several years.
- gojomo 13y ago
  But what if there are quantitatively and qualitatively more full-time, well-funded cryptographers inside the NSA (and its collaborating sibling organizations in its close allies) than outside? They may have an internal system, with geographically-distributed schools of thought, specialties, and long-running debates, as rich and open as the outside world - just completely segregated. At least, that's how I'd do it, if I found myself a global superpower after WW2, thanks in large part to superior signals/crypto work, and didn't want any other emergent groups to surprise me from a "higher perch" of signals omniscience.
  - eru 13y ago
    How do you keep all that so secret for so long?
    - gojomo 13y ago
      If you keep it secret, you're well-paid for cutting-edge work that's impossible to do anywhere else. And the general mission – keeping your home country's defense and political institutions the best-informed in the world – can be quite appealing. Inside, I'm sure you hear plenty about feel-good successes: lives saved and national interests protected. On the other hand, if you reveal the programs, you lose your job, get cut off from your professional colleagues, and likely go to jail.
- ig1 13y ago
  In practice they do, for example the Heilbronn Institute at Bristol University is funded by GCHQ: http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/research/heilbronn_institute/ http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/research/heilbronn_institute/
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
jpalomaki 13y ago
Bruce Schneier wrote in Applied Cryptography, Second Edition (around 1996): "The NSA probably possesses cryptographic expertise many years ahead of public state of the art (in algorithms, but probably not in protocols) and can undoubtedly break many of the systems used in practise." In 2010 former NSA technical director mentioned that they have been losing ground to their public counterparts during the last twenty years but that they would probably be still ahead of the public by "handful of years". [1] [1] http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/030410-rsa-cloud-security-warning.html?page=1 http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/030410-rsa-cloud-secur...
dnautics 13y ago
I remember someone here commenting that the NSA over time is becoming like any other gov't org - beholden to "other factors", i.e. political correctness, which basically amount to making their number theory recruits mediocre. I would not be surprised if the NSA had lost its advantage. In bureaucratic systems like this, where the target (advanced math) is best achieved by exorbitantly intelligent people getting lucky - the weight of a large number of mediocres can wind up becoming a drag instead of an asset.

by gojomo 13y ago

I think observers have long assumed NSA is some number of years ahead – say, 2-30 years ahead – of openly published results in cryptanalysis and cryptosystem vulnerabilities.

lifeisstillgood 13y ago

But it's really hard to assume that - that's assuming true mathematical leaps and invention. Admittedly if you put enough cryptographers on the payroll they may form their own university, but they still need the air of their peers on the outside. Imagine a cosmologist today transported 30 years back and asked to attend conferences - they would gain no inspiration. I think we put too much emphasis on the single data point of GCHQ inventing pgp early (IIRC)

mayank 13y ago
> the single data point of GCHQ inventing pgp early It's also much easier to invent a cryptosystem than to break one.
ktsmith 13y ago
There are multiple data points suggesting the NSA is/was ahead of public researchers. There's the sbox changes to DES in the 70's when differential cryptanalysis wasn't publicly discovered till the 80's. The revisions between SHA-0 and SHA-1 (the attack the changes prevent weren't found for at least 5 years). The Dual EC DRBG random number generator they supplied to NIST that many people suspect of being compromisable by NSA etc.
- damarquis 13y ago
  "..that many people suspect of being compromisable by NSA etc." If it was a backdoor you certainly can't count it among the NSAs successes. It is never used.
  - rgbrenner 13y ago
    http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/11/the_strange_sto.html http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/11/the_strange_st...
  - ktsmith 13y ago
    I would count it's development and publication as another example of the NSA being a bit ahead as it very much looks like they developed an algorithm in secret with a backdoor. I would count the fact that the public found it (after a few years) a point for public crypto research.
shabble 13y ago
You may be thinking of the Ellis/Cocks/Williamson[1] invention of the RSA encryption and Diffie-Hellman key-exchange algorithms several years prior to their open publication. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H._Ellis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H._Ellis
- lifeisstillgood 13y ago
  Yes thank you - too punchy to remember anything useful that late at night.
nknighthb 13y ago
Well, we have at least twice as many data points as that. IBM discovered differential cryptanalysis in the early 70s, and the NSA apparently knew about it before then, and nobody else found out until the late 80s. I don't know what organization spends the most money on cryptanalysis every year, but the NSA's gotta be near the top. It's reasonable to assume they've found important results that the public won't know of for several years.
gojomo 13y ago
But what if there are quantitatively and qualitatively more full-time, well-funded cryptographers inside the NSA (and its collaborating sibling organizations in its close allies) than outside? They may have an internal system, with geographically-distributed schools of thought, specialties, and long-running debates, as rich and open as the outside world - just completely segregated. At least, that's how I'd do it, if I found myself a global superpower after WW2, thanks in large part to superior signals/crypto work, and didn't want any other emergent groups to surprise me from a "higher perch" of signals omniscience.
- eru 13y ago
  How do you keep all that so secret for so long?
  - gojomo 13y ago
    If you keep it secret, you're well-paid for cutting-edge work that's impossible to do anywhere else. And the general mission – keeping your home country's defense and political institutions the best-informed in the world – can be quite appealing. Inside, I'm sure you hear plenty about feel-good successes: lives saved and national interests protected. On the other hand, if you reveal the programs, you lose your job, get cut off from your professional colleagues, and likely go to jail.
ig1 13y ago
In practice they do, for example the Heilbronn Institute at Bristol University is funded by GCHQ: http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/research/heilbronn_institute/ http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/research/heilbronn_institute/

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

jpalomaki 13y ago

Bruce Schneier wrote in Applied Cryptography, Second Edition (around 1996): "The NSA probably possesses cryptographic expertise many years ahead of public state of the art (in algorithms, but probably not in protocols) and can undoubtedly break many of the systems used in practise." In 2010 former NSA technical director mentioned that they have been losing ground to their public counterparts during the last twenty years but that they would probably be still ahead of the public by "handful of years". [1] [1] http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/030410-rsa-cloud-security-warning.html?page=1 http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/030410-rsa-cloud-secur...

dnautics 13y ago

I remember someone here commenting that the NSA over time is becoming like any other gov't org - beholden to "other factors", i.e. political correctness, which basically amount to making their number theory recruits mediocre. I would not be surprised if the NSA had lost its advantage. In bureaucratic systems like this, where the target (advanced math) is best achieved by exorbitantly intelligent people getting lucky - the weight of a large number of mediocres can wind up becoming a drag instead of an asset.