From: "Beavis B. Thoopit" <beavis@bioanalytical.com>
Date: Fri, 10 Nov 1995 03:37:30 +0800
To: sommerfeld@orchard.medford.ma.us (Bill Sommerfeld)
Subject: Re: Timed-release crypto and information economics
In-Reply-To: <199511091621.QAA01045@orchard.medford.ma.us>
Message-ID: <199511091852.NAA01172@bioanalytical.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


> That's a pretty large number of assumptions:
> 
> 	tamper-proof delay line
> 	=> tamper-proof crypto box ("transformation function with state")
> 	=> tamper-proof delay line
> 
> Why not just put a tamper-proof clock in the tamper-proof crypto box
> and not bother with the delay lines?

The tamper proof aspect is really secondary to the math question.
The idea that if I set up a stream of bits through a transform, that
the original state of the transform affects the final outcome after
N iterations.

If the transform exists, it will ease/eliminate the reliance on the
"economics" of cryptography to build a tamper-proof physical device.

Here is another implementation of the idea:

initialize buffer to '12#fjKL3_*(ASDdj1ll3_13 asdfasd-1-3!#!23'
do forever      /* actually until the plaintext spews out */
  sleep 1 unit
  for each element in the buffer
    buffer[ element ] = magictransform( buffer[ element ] )

The initial buffer must be secret!

Calculating the intial buffer in such a way that after N iterations
the plaintext message appears is what must happen.