[1740] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: Crypto in real life
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (David HM Spector)
Sat Oct 11 14:23:58 1997
To: "James A. Donald" <jamesd@echeque.com>
cc: Rick Smith <smith@securecomputing.com>, John R Levine <johnl@iecc.com>,
cryptography@c2.net
In-reply-to: Your message of "Fri, 10 Oct 1997 17:33:46 PDT."
<199710110033.RAA18134@proxy4.ba.best.com>
Date: Fri, 10 Oct 1997 20:56:42 -0400
From: David HM Spector <spector@zeitgeist.com>
...James A. Donald <jamesd@echeque.com> wrote
> The correct answer is: "Crypto software needs peer review because,
> you cannot tell when it fails, unlike other software."
Well, this is true with any software system that is both complicated
and subtle. The Therac-25 comes to mind. In a nutshell, it is (was?)
a radio-therapy machine that unforunately had a small deficiency in
that it allowed operators enter wild numbers for the radiation to be
delivered to a cancer patient. It's UI failed silently... only much
later was it was found out that patients were dead from radiation
poisioning. One could make the argument that the software "worked"
and that there was a "UI problem"... but that hardly matters to the
patient. samo samo for encryption.
In any case, your point is well taken... but often clients who don't
like pat answers (and their projects) will benefit from a more folksy
and less technical explanation of why this is a deep issue. The MEGO
factor is a big reason why lay-people don't get more involved in these
"deep issues" and don't use secure crypto.
regards,
David
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