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Comment by lawnchair_larry | Hacker News Reader

Hasn't tptacek posted "nothing to see here" regarding this issue on HN a half dozen times because "nobody uses it"? :)

This was actually going to be the first thing I posted when I read this link.

tptacek repeatedly assured everyone that this was absolutely not a big deal and meant nothing because nobody in their right mind uses the standard.

Except whoops, one of, if not the, largest players in the field. I'm sure he'll have a bunch of really great replies that manage to simultaneously say why this still isn't a big deal and passive-aggresively insult our knowledge of the situation. I look forward to reading what he has to say.

He's been trying to downplay the importance of the leaks since it first started, so what did you expect.

I don't understand his constant line in the sand on this issue (amongst other things). You basically illustrated exactly how he structures his arguments on this topic.

If I was smart enough to understand what this comment meant, I'd respond to it. Maybe you could clarify? I can't find a way to reconcile it with its parent comment in a way that gives me anything to discuss.

You seem to have already addressed it in another comment:

>Thanks for the link. I would have just gone on confirming my own biases without it.

This is incredibly evident in your comments on Dual_EC and sometimes happens on other comments as well. You draw a line in the sand and argue around it constantly, eventually bleeding into passive-aggressive attacks on the knowledge of others.

I find it valuable to hear from others outside of my industry (which is not crypto) who have no expertise in that field. They often have a fresh and agnostic look at something. Do you think all these comments slinging mud at you - however inaccurate they may be - were born from nothing?

How about this: why don't you tell me what you think my "line in the sand" is? I bet I don't have that line at all.

I have a different explanation for why I always seem to be at odds with people on NSA topics, but I'll wait to provide it.

>eventually bleeding into passive-aggressive attacks on the knowledge of others.

Thanks for proving my point.

> I have a different explanation for why I always seem to be at odds with people on NSA topics, but I'll wait to provide it.

I'm very interested in that actually. I'm often curious what shapes people's perspectives on these issues, particularly if it doesn't align with any obvious incentives. I always thought that you must have family in law enforcement or something, but I'd love to know the actual reason.

* NSA topics are heavy on computer security issues and legal issues.

* I'm professionally involved in computer security, like you, and have an an amateur interest in the law (I'm considering law school at some point).

* Message board nerds have a lot of weird, wrong beliefs about computer security and the law.

There is a political difference between me and HN: I'm not an anarcho-capitalist (that silly "world's smallest political test" thingy puts me dead center in "left liberal"). But politics have little to do with where I end up on the NSA threads; it's things like not understanding (or really, having even skimmed) NIST crypto standards, or not taking the time to understand what the 4th Amendment means. The things that get me into "trouble" here have more to do with taking the time to actually read primary sources than anything else.

We probably disagree about NSA a lot less than you think we do.

I have a different explanation for why I always seem to be at odds with people on NSA topics, but I'll wait to provide it.

I hate it when people do that. If you have a position on something, don't leave us all guessing, just state it!

tptacek repeatedly assured everyone that this was absolutely not a big deal and meant nothing because nobody in their right mind uses the standard.

He was right. Nobody in their right mind does use Dual_EC_DRBG.

From this episode I conclude that RSA Security LLC was not in their right mind.

To be fair, the insanity of anyone using it was never called into question. We agree it shouldn't be used. As we all know, science has yet to establish any correlation between sanity and what companies are actually doing in the real world for security.

Edit: Actually, I take that back. I have no problem believing that RSA Security are perfectly sane. Would we be completely shocked if the reason they chose a questionable default was due to coercion from the spooks? Only NSA has the keys, so it's a pretty safe backdoor.

You know, props to China, had to go through the work of owning RSA's seed server last year just to level the playing field. They get so derided in the media for doing that, but it seems unfair when the other team has a backdoor. Who is the real "Advanced Persistent Threat"?

I'll call into question the sanity of anyone using it.

The problems with it were known days after the standard was published.. meaning anyone who implemented was well aware of its problems.

Edit: actually, the first attack was in march 06 -- 3 months before the standard was published: http://www.math.ntnu.no/~kristiag/drafts/dual-ec-drbg-commen...

Sorry, that was worded incorrectly. I meant that we all agree it was insane to use it. The contention was over whether or not it was in use, not whether it is a good idea to use.

I should have said calling into question the insanity, will edit.

.. because nobody in their right mind uses the standard

Looks like that still stands according to the article we're supposed to be discussing here:

".. no sensible cryptographer would go near the thing"

I too clicked looking for the tptacek comments…

But I also expressed the view that no one would have used this. I guess it makes a lot more sense now: It seemed weird to put it in the standard, as no one was going to just use it. I'd been guessing that they hoped that it would be made an option and then they could do some negotiation attack to force it. I was missing a more obvious explanation: Someone was already willing to ship it, but they wanted the plausible denyability of it being a standard, because it looked too suspect otherwise.

At that point my personal conspiracy is suggesting that tptacek has become some form of alliance officer for hn outreach efforts.

To be fair to tptacek, he was far from the only crypto person saying that...and for good reason. In the absolute best case the algorithm was known to at least be slow and complex to implement, two things that don't usually lead to widespread adoption. The news that RSA had it as the default is interesting regardless.

You seem to be implying that anyone uses BSafe. Does anyone use it?

You mean like here [1] and here [2] and here [3]?

[1] http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/article/129305/rsa_security_so...

[2] http://satchitssecurity.typepad.com/a_page_from_satchits_sec...

[3] http://www.tgc.com/dsstar/01/0724/103320.html

I'm surprised by this. We look at a lot of stuff. OpenSSL is far and away the most common crypto library we see. Commercial crypto libraries are way, way down the list, after "reimplemented all of elliptic curve by hand".

Thanks for the link. I would have just gone on confirming my own biases without it.

That, I think, is indicative of this community. I come across it a lot, and there are some insanely high profile, non-US organizations that rely on it. SAP being an example that I'm ok with mentioning.

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