Transport-level encryption with Tcpcrypt
From http://lwn.net/Articles/400913/ Transport-level encryption with Tcpcrypt By Jake Edge August 25, 2010 It has been said that the US National Security Agency (NSA) blocked the implementation of encryption in the TCP/IP protocol for the original ARPANET, because it wanted to be able to listen in on the traffic that crossed that early precursor to the internet. Since that time, we have been relegated to always sending clear-text packets via TCP/IP. Higher level application protocols (i.e. ssh, HTTPS, etc.) have enabled encryption for some traffic, but the vast majority of internet communication is still in the clear. The Tcpcrypt project is an attempt to change that, transparently, so that two conforming nodes can encrypt all of the data portion of any packets they exchange. snip http://tcpcrypt.org/ -- Sean McGrath s...@manybits.net - The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending unsubscribe cryptography to majord...@metzdowd.com
Beating Colossus: an interview with Joachim Schueth
http://www.netbsd.org/gallery/schueth-interview.html Beating Colossus: an interview with Joachim Schueth Joachim Schueth has beaten a reconstruction of the famous Colossus Mark II code breaking machine in November 2007. The Colossus computers were used in World War II to break the German encrypted messages. Equipped with a NetBSD-powered laptop and profound knowledge of cryptography and the Ada programming language, Schueth has won the code-cracking challenge. We talked with him about the historical and technical backgrounds of the Cipher Event and the tools he has used. -- Sean McGrath [EMAIL PROTECTED] - The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending unsubscribe cryptography to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
wireless transmission of quantum code over a distance of 144,kilometers (89 miles)
Original Message PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE The American Institute of Physics Bulletin of Physics News Number 815 March 16, 2007 by Phillip F. Schewe, Ben Stein www.aip.org/pnu [...] WIRELESS TRANSMISSION OF QUANTUM CODE over a distance of 144 kilometers (89 miles) between two Canary Islands has been demonstrated by a team of researchers in Europe. At the APS March Meeting, Anton Zeilinger of the University of Vienna ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) described how he and his colleagues transmitted single photons from an astronomical observatory in La Palma Island to another one in Tenerife. The transmitted photons' polarization states (representing 0s and 1s) formed the basis of a quantum key, a stream of information that could be used to decipher a longer encrypted message. The researchers used single photons because they are more secure than groups of photons, from which an eavesdropper could pluck information about the key. To detect potential eavesdroppers even better, the researchers entangled the outgoing particles of light with photons kept at the transmitting station. They used astronomy stations because their telescopes are sensitive enough to detect individual photons. The data transmission rate was low, only 178 photons in 75 seconds, but the photons are able to travel longer distances in free space (potentially thousands of kilometers or more) than they are in fiber optic cables (100 km) before they become undetectable. In a proposed experiment to be coordinated by the European Space Agency (ESA, which operates the Tenerife telescope and which participated in the Canary Islands experiment) the International Space Station can transmit entangled key to two earthbound stations separated by distances ten times greater or more. (For a preprint, see Ursin et al., quant-ph/0607182) *** PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE is a digest of physics news items arising from physics meetings, physics journals, newspapers and magazines, and other news sources. It is provided free of charge as a way of broadly disseminating information about physics and physicists. For that reason, you are free to post it, if you like, where others can read it, providing only that you credit AIP. Physics News Update appears approximately once a week. AUTO-SUBSCRIPTION OR DELETION: By using the expression subscribe physnews in your e-mail message, you will have automatically added the address from which your message was sent to the distribution list for Physics News Update. If you use the signoff physnews expression in your e-mail message, the address in your message header will be deleted from the distribution list. Please send your message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Leave the Subject: line blank.) -- Sean McGrath [EMAIL PROTECTED] - The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending unsubscribe cryptography to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: padlocks with backdoors - TSA approved
Ian Farquhar (ifarquha) wrote: [...] However, I will say that any government (or other) program which assumes the honesty of employees and contractors is fundamentally flawed, and any associated risk analysis is either incompetent, or in failing to identify risk to travellers, seriously incomplete. Ian. [...] The first time I used a TSA lock, it came back attached to one zipper pull, not two, leaving the luggage unlocked will a locked lock. The second time the lock did not come back. I don't use them any more. -- Sean McGrath [EMAIL PROTECTED] - The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending unsubscribe cryptography to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Chaos on a chip
Original Message Subject: Physics News Update 810 PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE The American Institute of Physics Bulletin of Physics News Number 810 30 January 2007 by Phillip F. Schewe, Ben Stein, Turner Brinton, and Davide Castelvecchi www.aip.org/pnu [...] CHAOS ON A CHIP. For the first time physicists have shown that well structured chaos can be initiated in a photonic integrated circuit. Furthermore, this represents the first time scientists have been able to study optical chaos at gigahertz rates. The output of a semiconductor laser is normally regular. However, if certain laser parameters are tweaked, such as by modulating the electric current pumping the laser or by feeding back some of the lasers light from an external mirror, the overall laser output will become chaotic; that is, the laser output will be unpredictable. To make the chaos even more dramatic (and exploitable) Mirvais Yousefi and his colleagues at the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven (in the Netherlands) use paired lasers, lasers built very close to each other on a chip in such a way that each affects the operation of the other. The Eindhoven chip, using the paired-laser mutual-perturbation approach to triggering chaos, is the first to exhibit chaos directly-revealing telltale strange attractors on plots of laser power at one instant versus laser power at a slightly later instant-rather than indirectly through recording laser spectra. Looking ahead to the day when opto-photonic chips are covered with thousands or millions of lasers, the Eindhoven approach could allow troubleshooters to pinpoint the whereabouts of misbehaving lasers---not only that but possibly even exploit localized chaotic effects to their advantage. According to Yousefi ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) other possible uses for chip-based chaos will be the business of encryption, tomography, and possibly even in the establishment of multi-tiered logic protocols, those based not on just on the binary logic of 1s and 0s but on the many intensity levels corresponding to the broadband output of the chaotic laser system. (Yousefi et al., Physical Review Letters, 26 January 2007; text at www.aip.org/physnews/select ) [...] *** PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE is a digest of physics news items arising from physics meetings, physics journals, newspapers and magazines, and other news sources. It is provided free of charge as a way of broadly disseminating information about physics and physicists. For that reason, you are free to post it, if you like, where others can read it, providing only that you credit AIP. Physics News Update appears approximately once a week. AUTO-SUBSCRIPTION OR DELETION: By using the expression subscribe physnews in your e-mail message, you will have automatically added the address from which your message was sent to the distribution list for Physics News Update. If you use the signoff physnews expression in your e-mail message, the address in your message header will be deleted from the distribution list. Please send your message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Leave the Subject: line blank.) - The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending unsubscribe cryptography to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Your secrets are safe with quasar encryption
http://www.newscientisttech.com/article.ns?id=dn8913print=true Your secrets are safe with quasar encryption * 16:00 29 March 2006 * NewScientist.com news service * Will Knight Intergalactic radio signals from quasars could emerge as an exotic but effective new tool for securing terrestrial communications against eavesdropping. Japanese scientists have come up with a method for encrypting messages using the distant astronomical objects, which emit radio waves and are thought to be powered by black holes. Ken Umeno and colleagues at the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology in Tokyo propose using the powerful radio signals emitted by quasars to lock and unlock digital communications in a secure fashion. The researchers believe quasars could make an ideal cryptographic tool because the strength and frequency of the radio pulses they emit is impossible to predict. Quasar-based cryptography is based on a physical fact that such a space signal is random and has a very broad frequency spectrum, Umeno told New Scientist. One-time pad Randomness provides a simple means of high-security information encryption, providing two communicating parties have access to the same source of random information. For example, a randomly generated one-time pad shared by two parties can be used to encrypt and decrypt a message by simply transposing each individual bit of a message for bits on the pad. Genuine randomness is hard to generate artificially and the “pseudo-randomness” which most computers use is unsuitable for use in cryptography as patterns will be revealed over time. In addition, it is also tricky for two parties to share a source of randomness securely. Umeno and his colleagues suggest using an agreed quasar radio signal to add randomness to a stream cipher - a method of encrypting information at high speed. Each communicating party would only need to know which quasar to monitor and when to start in order to encrypt and decrypt a message. Without knowing the target quasar and time an eavesdropper should be unable to decrypt the message. Umeno believes astronomical cryptography could appeal to anyone who requires high-security communications. He adds that the method does not require a large radio antenna or that the communicating parties be located in the same hemisphere, as radio signals can be broadcast over the internet at high speed. Concerning potential users, I suggest international financial institutions, governments and embassies, Umeno says. The researchers used quasar signals collected by Very Long Baseline Interferometry antenna at the institute to encrypt messages and have filed two patents covering quasar-based cryptography: one for locking and unlocking messages and another for generating digital signatures that can be used to match messages or files to a person. However, some cryptography researchers question the need for such an unusual means of securing messages. This is interesting research, but there's no reason for anyone to use it in a practical application, says Bruce Schneier of Counterpane Security. Furthermore, this is a brand new idea. Why would anyone want to use something new and untested when we've already got lots of good cryptography? Markus Kuhn from the University of Cambridge, UK, adds that the physical set-up could have potential weaknesses. It is easy to play tricks with reception antennas, he says. For example, he suggests that an attacker could mimic a radio signal and gain a lot of control over the signal that the receiver can see. Related Articles * Photon detector is precursor to broadband in space * http://www.newscientisttechnology.com/article/dn8877 * 21 March 2006 * Busted! A crisis in cryptography * http://www.newscientisttechnology.com/article/mg18825301.600 * 17 December 2005 * Let chaos keep your secrets safe * http://www.newscientisttechnology.com/article/mg18825262.000 * 19 November 2005 Weblinks * National Institute of Information and Communications Technology * http://www.nict.go.jp/ * Quasar Encryption patent * http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2Sect2=HITOFFp=1u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.htmlr=1f=Gl=50co1=ANDd=PG01s1=20050242987OS=20050242987RS=20050242987 * Quasar Authentication patent * http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2Sect2=HITOFFp=1u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.htmlr=1f=Gl=50co1=ANDd=PG01s1=20030145202OS=20030145202RS=20030145202 Close this window - The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending unsubscribe cryptography to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Attack of the Teleclones
PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE The American Institute of Physics Bulletin of Physics News Number 765 February14, 2006 by Phillip F. Schewe, Ben Stein, and Davide Castelvecchi ATTACK OF THE TELECLONES: Should quantum cryptographers begin to worry? In contrast with everyday matter, quantum systems such as photons cannot be copied, at least not perfectly, according to the no-cloning theorem. Nonetheless, imperfect cloning is permitted, so long as Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle remains inviolate. According to Heisenberg, measuring the position of a particle disturbs it, and limits the accuracy to which its complementary property (momentum) can be determined, making it impossible to reliably replicate the particle's complete set of properties. Now, quantum cloning has been combined with quantum teleportation in the first full experimental demonstration of telecloning by scientists at the University of Tokyo, the Japan Science and Technology Agency, and the University of York (contact Sam Braunstein, [EMAIL PROTECTED] and Akira Furusawa, [EMAIL PROTECTED]). In ideal teleportation, the original is destroyed and its exact properties are transmitted to a second, remote particle (Heisenberg does not apply because no definitive measurements are made on the original particle). In telecloning, the original is destroyed, and its properties are sent to not one but two remote particles, with the original's properties reconstructed to a maximum accuracy (fidelity) of less than 100%. (Heisenberg limits the ability to make clones as otherwise researchers could keep making copies of the original particle and learn everything about its state.) In their experiment, the researchers didn't just teleclone a single particle, but rather an entire beam of laser light. They transmitted the beam's electric field, specifically its amplitude and phase (but not its polarization) to two nearly identical beams at a remote location with 58% accuracy or fidelity (out of a theoretical limit of 66%). This remarkable feature of telecloning stems from the very magic of quantum mechanics: quantum entanglement. Telecloning stands apart from local cloning and from teleportation in requiring multipartite entanglement, a form of entanglement in which stricter correlations are required between the quantum particles or systems, in this case three beams of light. (An example of a multipartite entanglement is the GHZ state between three particles that was featured in Update 414.) In addition to representing a new quantum-information tool, telecloning may have an exotic application: tapping quantum cryptographic channels. Quantum cryptographic protocols are so secure that they may discover tapping. Nonetheless, with telecloning, the identity and location of the eavesdropper could be guaranteed uncompromised. (Koike et al., Physical Review Letters, 17 February 2006; for an earlier partial demonstration of telecloning, between an original photon and one clone at a remote location and another clone local to it, see Zhao et al., Phys Rev Lett, 13 July 2005) [...] *** PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE is a digest of physics news items arising from physics meetings, physics journals, newspapers and magazines, and other news sources. It is provided free of charge as a way of broadly disseminating information about physics and physicists. For that reason, you are free to post it, if you like, where others can read it, providing only that you credit AIP. Physics News Update appears approximately once a week. AUTO-SUBSCRIPTION OR DELETION: By using the expression subscribe physnews in your e-mail message, you will have automatically added the address from which your message was sent to the distribution list for Physics News Update. If you use the signoff physnews expression in your e-mail message, the address in your message header will be deleted from the distribution list. Please send your message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Leave the Subject: line blank.) - The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending unsubscribe cryptography to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[CSL Colloq] The Architecture of Colossus, the first PC * 4:15PM, Wed February 04, 2003 in Gates B03 (fwd)
[Note: Webcasts available live and from archives] -- Forwarded message -- Date: Fri, 30 Jan 2004 00:23:31 -0800 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [CSL Colloq] The Architecture of Colossus, the first PC * 4:15PM, Wed February 04, 2003 in Gates B03 COMPUTER SYSTEMS LABORATORY COLLOQUIUM 4:15PM, Wednesday, February 04, 2003 NEC Auditorium, Gates Computer Science Building B03 http://ee380.stanford.edu[1] Topic:The Architecture of Colossus, the first PC Speaker: Benjamin Wells University of San Francisco About the talk: Colossus, the first electronic digital computer, was built by Tommy Flowers at the General Post Office Research Station in Dollis Hill, London. It was installed during December 1943 at Bletchley Park, the famous WWII British code-cracking enclave. Its purpose was to assist with the decryption of wireless traffic among German high-level commands encrypted using the Lorenz teletype cipher machine. Called Colossus because of its size, it could be run by a single operator --and often was. At least in that sense, it was also the world's first personal computer. Bletchley had already developed a highly successful automated attack on the Enigma cipher system under the guidance and genius of Alan Turing. Built without direct input from Turing, Colossus was designed to support the cracking of the highest volume of German strategic code transmissions. These intelligence-rich messages were thousands of characters long, overshadowing the hand-encoded tactical traffic using Enigma. Because Colossus was kept secret until 1973, and full details of its use and construction were not released until 2000, it did not play a direct role in the evolution of digital computers. Of course, many who worked on it were involved with later computers. With the release of previously classified documents, interest in Colossus has grown over the last three years. This accessible, multimedia talk will compare the architectural features of Colossus with those of modern PCs. Although it is tempting to assert that the former was a stored-program general purpose machine, as some have done in print, that analysis is less than promising. What is amazing is that Colossus introduced buffered I/O, branch decisions, biquinary representation, and bit masking, and anticipated some deeper modern features: parallelism, dual rail, hardware interrupt, shift register, asynchronous dataflow, and plug-ins. Moreover, recent results (AMS Abstracts 04T-68-2) show that a universal Turing machine could have been implemented on a cluster of the ten Colossi, proving the power of Colossus. About the speaker: Benjamin Wells teaches both mathematics and computer science courses at the University of San Francisco, including freshman seminars that combine science and art. He holds degrees from MIT and UC Berkeley and has studied in four countries. The last student of noted logician Alfred Tarski, Wells works on the boundary of logic, algebra, and computing; he also contributes to computer graphics and visual communication. He won a John Templeton Foundation science and religion course prize in 1998 and held the USF Davies Professorship in 1989. He enjoys mysticism, cooking, computer-supported art, hiking, languages, dancing, tales, and family. Contact information: Benjamin Wells Professor of Mathematics and Computer Science University of San Francisco [EMAIL PROTECTED] Embedded Links: [ 1 ]http://ee380.stanford.edu [ 2 ]mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] - The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending unsubscribe cryptography to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
