Re: the wisdom of crypto "challenges" (was Re: $100,000 reward)

Bruce Schneier (schneier@counterpane.com)
Tue, 23 Jun 1998 12:55:55 -0500

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At 10:17 AM 6/23/98 -0700, Dana W. Albrecht wrote:
>> I think it is worthwhile to break some of the pseudo-scientific crypto
>> nonsense that companies are spouting: virtual matrix encryption,
>> RPK, pseudo-one time pads, 16Kbit keys, chaos-theory encryption.
> ^^^
>
>My five minute take on this was that it was Diffie-Hellman/ElGamal warmed
>over and obfuscated, making it more "pointless" than "nonsense." Am I
>misinformed?

I think you're right, It's DH, with the same circuitry used as a stream cipher.
My guess is that the stream cipher is very weak, but I have not studied it
anywhere near the detail I would like to.

This is an example of something that would probably make a good paper
at a crypto workshop.

Bruce
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