Reminds me of *Demolition Man *where Wesley Snipes' character pulled out
the warden's eye.  :)


 - William


On Mon, Jul 1, 2013 at 9:19 AM, Jeremy Page <[email protected]>wrote:

>  Also consider the "wrench" implication for biometrics. Given motivation
> the unscrupulous would cut your hand (or whatever) off for it too (or
> kidnap your loved ones or what have you).
>
> In the end I think that knowing when people access stuff with decent
> pattern analysis is going to be more reliable/scalable than anything else.
>
>
> On 07/01/2013 10:00 AM, William J. Robbins wrote:
>
>  The wrench never fails.  :)
>
>  For 99% of my passwords I use LastPass and the PW generator.  It irks me
> no end to come across a site that doesn't accept complex passwords, or ones
> with stupid limitations of 12 or less characters.  I had (past tense is
> key) a bank site that limited to 16 and didn't allow special characters.
> Discover actually requires a complex *username*...but I digress.
>
>  At the end of the day if someone knows enough to bother encrypting their
> system in the first place they know to use a decent passphrase...and they
> also know about the wrench.  As another tangent, the wrench is why I like
> TrueCrypt's "Duress password" ability.  But that also doesn't work on whole
> disk.  :(
>
>  Which is why I typically don't do whole disk for my personal stuff.
> Darn wrench.
>
>
>  - William
>
>
> On Mon, Jul 1, 2013 at 6:35 AM, Edward Harvey <
> [email protected]> wrote:
>
>>  Yeah, I like that one.   :-)
>>
>>
>>
>> Also this:
>>
>> http://xkcd.com/538/
>>
>>
>>
>> Incidentally, this is mine, and it's what I use:
>>
>> https://clevertrove.com/randcharsweb/
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] *On Behalf Of
>> *William J. Robbins
>> *Sent:* Sunday, June 30, 2013 11:07 PM
>>
>> *To:* Edward Ned Harvey (lopser)
>> *Subject:* Re: [lopsa-tech] Bitlocker vs Truecrypt
>>
>>
>>
>> Reminds me almost exactly of this:  http://xkcd.com/936/
>>
>> :D
>>
>>
>>
>>  - William
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Jun 30, 2013 at 8:29 PM, Edward Ned Harvey (lopser) <
>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>  > From: [email protected] [mailto:
>> [email protected]]
>> > On Behalf Of William J. Robbins
>> >
>>
>> > (And that's based on
>> > this:
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Password_strength#Entropy_as_a_meas
>> > ure_of_password_strength
>> > using the Alphnumeric character value of 5.954, Would be some higher
>> using
>> > special characters as one should)
>> > If I'm encrypting a drive I'd think a decent passphrase would
>> meet/exceed 42
>> > characters.  Something like: Dammit Jim, I'm a doctor not a bricklayer!
>>
>> To attack your password in a situation such as you described above, an
>> attacker only needs to learn (or guess) that you used some sort of phrase
>> instead of random characters, and they won't need to attack random
>> characters anymore.  They'll attack patterns of words, which is a *far*
>> smaller space to attack, considering you have only 8 words in there.  8
>> random words from the space including unusual words and proper nouns and
>> stuff, gets you around 104 bits.  Throw in some common substitutions such
>> as "d0ctor" and you gain a little bit, but they're predictable, unless
>> they're random.  In fact, *all* the characters are predictable unless
>> they're random.
>>
>> I emphasize, number of characters is only a measure of entropy, if
>> they're randomly selected by a machine, and then you memorize them without
>> any modification.  The measure of entropy in your password is measured by
>> the number of guesses an attacker would have to work through in order to
>> guess your pass.  As soon as you start making modifications such as
>> "Gpu7mvrDZ is too hard to type, I'm going to make it GPU7mvrDZ" the attack
>> space becomes smaller, based on predictions of human behavior.
>>
>>
>>
>> > But to get 256 bits of entropy is only around 42 characters isn't it?
>>
>> To answer this kind of stuff, I like wolframalpha.
>> Alphanumeric, mixed case, means 26*26*10 possibilities for each character.
>> log2((26*26*10)^21)
>> If you randomly choose 21 characters = 267 bits.  (20 chars is only 254
>> bits).  Here's an example of what the 21 char password would look like:
>>         omEzmGpu7mvrDZbYYPM4Da
>> Yes, you can memorize something like that, with some effort.  But you
>> certainly cannot expect it to be common practice.
>>
>> They have to be *random* characters.  No acronyms, nothing that reflects
>> the frequency of letters occurring in English, etc.  If you're not
>> selecting them randomly, you're reducing the space you select your password
>> from.
>>
>> Also, in this: https://code.google.com/p/randchars/ There is a 2264 list
>> of words.  log2(2264^23) = 256 bits.  So 23 random words would give you 256
>> bits entropy...
>>
>> suggest-pot-live-complaint-flood-mouth-bless-and-sauce-anger-mineral-discussion-point-gallon-notebook-wreck-mercy-drop-cousin-absence-other-ocean-sacred
>>
>> You could use a randomly generated 256 bit password like that.  It might
>> be easier to memorize than the random characters.
>>
>>
>>
>> > And if you are doing a home PC not on a domain, the only
>> > storage of the recovery key is where you put it on completion.  I've
>> seen
>> > folks screen shot it, print it off, etc.
>>
>> Good point.  Recovery key that was initially generated randomly is only
>> as secure as the security around your backup copy of that key.  The
>> truecrypt recovery media is equally strong as the truecrypt volume itself -
>> which is as strong as your password.  With bitlocker, you have several
>> options, so it's difficult to analyze the security of your backup keys.  If
>> stored in Active Directory ...  Well, AD is itself very secure if well
>> configured.  But lots of people don't configure it well.  And if you take a
>> screen shot, or copy text, then it all depends on where you choose to save
>> it...
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Tech mailing 
> [email protected]https://lists.lopsa.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tech
> This list provided by the League of Professional System Administrators
>  http://lopsa.org/
>
>
>
> Please be advised that this email may contain confidential information. If
> you are not the intended recipient, please notify us by email by replying
> to the sender and delete this message. The sender disclaims that the
> content of this email constitutes an offer to enter into, or the acceptance
> of, any agreement; provided that the foregoing does not invalidate the
> binding effect of any digital or other electronic reproduction of a manual
> signature that is included in any attachment.
>
> _______________________________________________
> Tech mailing list
> [email protected]
> https://lists.lopsa.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tech
> This list provided by the League of Professional System Administrators
>  http://lopsa.org/
>
>
_______________________________________________
Tech mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.lopsa.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tech
This list provided by the League of Professional System Administrators
 http://lopsa.org/

Reply via email to