Re: Using Yarrow in /dev/random

From: Igmar Palsenberg (maillist@chello.nl)
Date: Tue Sep 12 2000 - 18:23:30 EST


> No, not true. The mixing into the entropy pool uses a twisted LFSR, but
> all outputs from the pool (to either /dev/random or /dev/urandom)
> filters the output through SHA-1 as a whitener. The key here, though,
> and what makes this fundamentally different from yarrow, is that since
> we're feeding the entire (large) entropy pool through SHA-1, even if the
> SHA-1 algorithm is very badly broken (say as in what's been happening
> with MD5), as long as there's sufficient entropy in the pool, the
> adversary can define but minimal information about the pool, since the
> 8192 -> 160 bit transform has to lose information by definition.

Broken ?? Please explain.

        Igmar

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