1996-02-25 - Encryption Chips

Header Data

From: “A. Padgett Peterson P.E. Information Security” <PADGETT@hobbes.orl.mmc.com>
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Message Hash: a75dbaf837a58feb39b15c15d1716f7fc0fe7a55dbc3f5866600c3f0f46c5290
Message ID: <960225114724.20210a61@hobbes.orl.mmc.com>
Reply To: N/A
UTC Datetime: 1996-02-25 17:10:12 UTC
Raw Date: Mon, 26 Feb 1996 01:10:12 +0800

Raw message

From: "A. Padgett Peterson P.E. Information Security" <PADGETT@hobbes.orl.mmc.com>
Date: Mon, 26 Feb 1996 01:10:12 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Encryption Chips
Message-ID: <960225114724.20210a61@hobbes.orl.mmc.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


>	Faking crypto chips for public algorithims is theoretically
>more difficult, because its simple to create a DES_verify routine to make
>sure your DES chip is working right.

a) chips do not need makeup
b) t'were me, I would just fix the chip so that instead of 2^56 (DES) keys
   or whatever, the PRNG was "fixed" so that the total keyspace was only 2^32
   for instance. Enough to be nearly impossible to check but small enough
   for a brute force engine to zip through in seconds *if you knew the 
   algorithm*.

The nice thing about am implimentation in software is that the code can be 
examined for just this sort of thing *on a randomly selected operating unit*.
- hard to do with a chip.
						Warmly,
							Padgett





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