On 18/07/14 16:33, Justin Cormack wrote:
> Looking at what is being used, it is reading 512 byte chunks, several
> of them, so maybe trying to get 8k
>
> Thats actually rather too much to use /dev/random at all. Linux says
>
>        While  some  safety  margin  above  that minimum is reasonable,
> as a guard against flaws in the CPRNG algorithm, no crypto‐graphic
> primitive available today can hope to promise more than 256 bits of
> security, so if any program reads more than 256  bits  (32  bytes)
> from the kernel random pool per invocation, or per reasonable reseed
> interval (not less than one minute), that should be taken as a sign
> that its cryptography is not skillfully implemented.

In that case, either the manual page or NetBSD is not skillfully 
implemented ;)


As for the points in your other mail, the more I thought about this, the 
more convinced I was that before fixing anything, cprng and rndsink 
should be looked at critically to see what their requirements really are 
and if they really need to slurp in 8k.

As a mid-term hack, might just make the implementation always read from 
/dev/urandom and return some sensible amount of data.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Want fast and easy access to all the code in your enterprise? Index and
search up to 200,000 lines of code with a free copy of Black Duck
Code Sight - the same software that powers the world's largest code
search on Ohloh, the Black Duck Open Hub! Try it now.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/bds
_______________________________________________
rumpkernel-users mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/rumpkernel-users

Reply via email to