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Comment by ogre_codes | Hacker News Reader

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ogre_codes·

Two are close I think.

A capped webcamera, CCDs pick up enough stray electrons to be reliable source of entropy.

A old cheap radio tuned to static plugged into your microphone port.

https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/81946/7-sources-randomne...

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> webcamera, CCDs pick up enough stray electrons to be reliable source of entropy.

Ironically, this is the same setup as the lavalamps, but without having to pay for the lava lamps.

I believe they figured out the lens cap hack when there was a lava lamp failure.

I’m trying to envisage what different lava lamp failures might look like, and I’ve gotta say, there are some entertaining possibilities in that idea.

Both the radio and the CCD seem like something a determined actor could undermine. Transmitting a directional pop of radio static at just the right moment, or whatever causes CCDs to show static (x-rays?)

If the bad guys can point an X-Ray gun at your stuff, random numbers are probably not going to be your biggest issue. :)

If your attacker can stage a sophisticated attack on your entropy source and your budget is $100, you are screwed regardless.

This is not a good idea for the uninitiated and is on par with rolling your own encryption algorithm to send highly sensitive data around the world.

For the price GP mentioned there's a dozen vetted opensource commercial options in the bottom half of that range.

The uninitiated have zero business sending highly sensitive data around the world in general.

And yet they still do it daily. This is why secure-by-default should always be the norm.

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