HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: strnlght@netcom.com (David Sternlight)
Subject: Re: The Sidelnikov Saga... Now he's wrong again.
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest)
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 18:24:46 GMT


Congratulations to Simon McAuliffe for a wonderful worked example of how one
can, if one is willing to be considerate of all readers, post a message
containing both mathematical formulas and graphical materials readable to
"ordinary" mortals without the need for special jargon such as TeX.

May his efforts be rewarded.

David
-- 
David Sternlight
RIPEM Public Key on server  --  Consider it an envelope for your e-mail

Newsgroups: sci.crypt
From: st901745@pip.cc.brandeis.edu (Alastair M. Bor)
Subject: VCR+ Codes [request]
Reply-To: st901745@pip.cc.brandeis.edu
Organization: Brandeis University
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 20:05:49 GMT

Sorry to bring this up if its been talked about to death, but could
someone tell me where to find the VCR+ Codes? Is there a text file
that tells how to build your own VCR+ Codes, etc?

-Alastair
Please reply E-Mail since I dont usu. read this group...
st901745@pip.cc.brandeis.edu
From: shirriff@sprite.berkeley.edu (Ken Shirriff)
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
Subject: Re: Zimmermann's responses to Sidelnikov's
Date: 23 Jan 1993 01:46:35 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
NNTP-Posting-Host: sassafras.berkeley.edu

In article <1993Jan22.154035.20835@shearson.com> dmandl@shearson.com writes:
>>	DO 10 I=1.5
>If I remember correctly, it was an error exactly like this that
>blew up a U.S. rocket (complete with astronauts) back in the '70s.

Well, no.  This has been rehashed extensively in comp.risks.  The unmanned
Mariner I flight to Venus on July 22, 1962 went off course and was destroyed.
The cause was a missing hyphen in the hand-written guidance equations,
causing a faulty implementation.  Coupled with a failure of the onboard
rate system hardware, the computer processed the tracking data incorrectly,
the rocket went off course and was destroyed by the range safety officer.
Look in the comp.risks archives for extensive, referenced discussion of
this.

The period-for-comma story has been circulating for years in relation to
this incident, but according to the discussion on comp.risks, the missing
hyphen was the real story.

Followups probably belong in alt.folklore.computers, or somewhere.

Ken Shirriff			shirriff@sprite.Berkeley.EDU
Newsgroups: sci.crypt,alt.security.pgp
From: schneier@chinet.chi.il.us (Bruce Schneier)
Subject: Re: Wanted: very fast random number generator
Organization: Chinet - Public Access UNIX
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 03:21:15 GMT

In article <C1H7tG.7At.2@cs.cmu.edu> tgl+@cs.cmu.edu (Tom Lane) writes:
>What I need is a very very fast random number generator; it does NOT need to
>be cryptographically strong.  The application is in generating random noise
>for dithering a color image.  I need about 8 random bits on each call
>(randomness of the low order bits is less important than the higher).
>Ideally it would take, say, just a shift and XOR per value.  The code has to
>be portable C, so circular shifts and other non-C operations are out.
>
>I think something along the lines of a shift register with a constant
>pattern XORed in after every shift might solve my problem.  But I don't
>know how to design such a thing.  Info or references would be appreciated.

If you don't need cryptographyically-strong, use the one in Numerical Recipes
in C, page 266 on the bottom.

Just be sure to clock the thing each time you take a bit.  If you need 8 bits,
clock it eight times after you take the 8 low-order bits.

Bruce
Newsgroups: sci.crypt,sci.math
From: bs@gauss.mitre.org (Robert D. Silverman)
Subject: Re: Oh yeah?  Factor this...
Organization: Research Computer Facility, MITRE Corporation, Bedford, MA
Distribution: na
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 01:36:43 GMT

In article <1993Jan22.004018.2036@csi.uottawa.ca> cbbrowne@csi.uottawa.ca (Christopher Browne) writes:
 
stuff deleted....

:ciphering scheme.  There may be some better methods of searching for
:factor candidates, but there aren't any "silver bullets," or algorithms
:that can factor numbers in time on O(log N) time.  Factoring seems to take
:O(sqrt N) time, which just don't cut it.
 
Not quite. The best rigorously proved upper bound is

exp((1+o(1) sqrt(log N log log N))

The Number Field Sieve [on some reasonable unproved assumptions] takes

exp( (c + o(1))  (log N)^1/3  (log log N)^2/3)

with c ~ 1.91

These are both sub-exponential and considerably better than O(sqrt(N)).
Even the older Pollard Rho, Squfof and FFT-based P-1 achieved 
O(N^1/4), not O(sqrt(N)).

--
Bob Silverman
These are my opinions and not MITRE's.
Mitre Corporation, Bedford, MA 01730
"You can lead a horse's ass to knowledge, but you can't make him think"
Newsgroups: sci.crypt,alt.security.pgp
From: positron@quip.eecs.umich.edu (Jonathan Haas)
Subject: Re: PGP messages readable by more than one person
Organization: University of Michigan EECS Dept., Ann Arbor
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 19:23:20 GMT

warlord@MIT.EDU (Derek Atkins) writes:
>urlichs@smurf.sub.org (Matthias Urlichs) writes:
>
>   - How do I get pgp -fst/-fsat to not encode the message I want to sign?
>
>pgp -fsat +clearsig=on

While a new version is coming out, how about a less cumbersome way of
doing this? I mean, -a is the same as +armor=on... -t is the same as
+text=on... why not a simple command line option for +clearsig=on?

-- 
__/\__  Jonathan S. Haas         | Jake liked his women the way he liked
\    /  University of Michigan   | his kiwi fruit: sweet yet tart, firm-
/_  _\  positron@eecs.umich.edu  | fleshed yet yielding to the touch, and
  \/    Finger for PGP key       | covered with short brown fuzzy hair.
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
From: wstef@hubcap.clemson.edu (W. Gregg Stefancik)
Subject: Tropez Digital Cordless Phone Encrypted?
Organization: Clemson University
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 18:09:13 GMT

I have a Tropez 900DX corless phone which uses some form of digital
voice transmission.  From reading the manual I see that the digital
stream is supposed to be encrypted as well.  Does anyone know how this
phone does it's thing?  Supposedly it uses one of 64K keys which it
randomly selects each time it is being charged.

I've used a frequency counter to determine the transmit frequencies and
listened to them with a scanner.  The transmission surely isn't analog,
it hardly breaks squelch on my scanner.  The voice quality sure can't be
beat so the security is secondary to me.  I am just curious how much it
would take to over come.

Gregg
-- 
W. Gregg Stefancik
wstef@hubcap.clemson.edu
Xref: sparky sci.crypt:7170 alt.security.pgp:607
From: mathew <mathew@mantis.co.uk>
Newsgroups: sci.crypt,alt.security.pgp
Subject: Re: PGP messages readable by more than one person
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 93 12:39:05 GMT
Organization: Mantis Consultants, Cambridge. UK.
X-Newsreader: rusnews v0.98

urlichs@smurf.sub.org (Matthias Urlichs) writes (about +clearsig=on):
> ... without changing the text at all?
> (Lines starting with a minus sign get "- " prepended.)

Yes.  This is a pain, as it means you can't sign Usenet message digests.

I can see why PGP would want to "- " escape lines saying things like "-----END
PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----", but it doesn't need to escape things like a line
of 70 dashes.


mathew
From: urlichs@smurf.sub.org (Matthias Urlichs)
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
Subject: Re: Is N a prime power?
Date: 26 Jan 1993 02:24:09 +0100
Organization: University of Karlsruhe, FRG
NNTP-Posting-Host: 127.0.0.1

In sci.crypt, article <C1Exs1.8uz@ms.uky.edu>,
  jedwards@ms.uky.edu (Jonathan Edwards) writes:
> I am reading an old paper by Tompa that describes Blum's protocol for
> flipping coins by telephone.  The first thing the verifier must do is
> verify that a very large (hundreds of digits) number has at least two
> distinct prime factors (i.e., that the number is not a prime power).
> Tompa gives no hint how to do this and I haven't been able to find anyone
> else who knows.  I'd very much appreciate it if someone could explain
> how it's done or point me to a paper somewhere...

This is probably a very stupid algorithm, but..:

isprimeroot(x) ::=

if(x prime) return TRUE;
for all n >= 2, n prime:
   y = x ^ (1/n)
   if (y integer) { if (y prime) return TRUE, else return FALSE }
   if (y < 2) return FALSE.

How to calculate n'th roots is left as an exercise to the reader.

Warning: The above is off the top of my head, so it may or may not be correct.

-- 
A spilled drink flows in the direction of the most expensive object.
                                       -- "The New Official Rules"
-- 
Matthias Urlichs  --  urlichs@smurf.sub.org -- urlichs@smurf.ira.uka.de   /(o\
Humboldtstrasse 7 -- 7500 Karlsruhe 1 -- Germany  --  +49-721-9612521     \o)/
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
From: res@colnet.cmhnet.org (Rob Stampfli)
Subject: Re: Zimmermann's responses to Sidelnikov's PGP critique
Organization: Little to None
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 14:39:16 GMT

In article <bontchev.727458566@fbihh> bontchev@fbihh.informatik.uni-hamburg.de writes:
>Ah, yes, nice sample; I haven't thought about that... BTW, my sample
>for difficult parsing contains my most serious mistake - I confused
>FORTRAN's loop operator with the loop operator in BASIC. The correct
>example should be
>
>	DO10I=1  ,N
>and
>	DO 10 I=1,N

Actually, among the oddities I find delightful (and scary) about fortran
is the fact that

	DO 10 I=1,5

and

	DO 10 I=1.5

are both valid, but do entirely different things.
-- 
Rob Stampfli  rob@colnet.cmhnet.org      The neat thing about standards:
614-864-9377  HAM RADIO: kd8wk@n8jyv.oh  There are so many to choose from.
From: pmontgom@math.orst.edu (Peter Montgomery)
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
Subject: Re: Is N a prime power?
Date: 26 Jan 1993 17:02:17 GMT
Organization: Oregon State University Math Department
NNTP-Posting-Host: lab12.math.orst.edu

In article <1993Jan25.150556.24096@linus.mitre.org> bs@fatima.mitre.org 
(Robert D. Silverman) writes:
 >In article <C1Exs1.8uz@ms.uky.edu> jedwards@ms.uky.edu (Jonathan Edwards) writes:
 >:I am reading an old paper by Tompa that describes Blum's protocol for
 >:flipping coins by telephone.  The first thing the verifier must do is
 >:verify that a very large (hundreds of digits) number has at least two
 >:distinct prime factors (i.e., that the number is not a prime power).
 >:Tompa gives no hint how to do this and I haven't been able to find anyone
 >:else who knows.  I'd very much appreciate it if someone could explain
 
 >Direct search. An upper bound on the number of exponentiations is
 >log_2(N). Each one takes O(log^3 N), so direct search takes only
 >O(log^4 N) operations. 

	I suggest testing whether GCD(N, b^(N-1) - 1) > 1,
where b is selected randomly and GCD(N, b) = 1.  
If N = p^k, then p-1 divides p^k - 1 = N-1, 
so p divides both N and b^(N-1) - 1.  This takes time O(log^3 N).

	It is possible for this test to get a nontrivial GCD when
N is not a prime power, but such N should likely be rejected
for other reasons.


-- 
        Peter L. Montgomery              Internet: pmontgom@math.orst.edu
        Dept. of Mathematics, Oregon State Univ, Corvallis, OR 97331-4605 USA
My visiting professorship ends in June.  Interested in program optimization,
compilers, computer arithmetic, number theory.  17 yrs industrial experience.
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
From: cs911007@ariel.yorku.ca (ANDREW J DICK)
Subject: Nation Security vs Personal Rights
Originator: cs911007@t12.ariel.yorku.ca
Organization: York University, Toronto, Canada
Distribution: york
Date: Sun, 24 Jan 1993 02:17:11 GMT


I am currently writing a paper on the issue of whether a nation's
security should have higher preference then a person's right to security
as far as being able to transmit 'securely' messages.  I would be interested
in hearing some of your opinions on the subject, so anyone with a couple extra
minutes and a desire to tell me what you think, please drop me a note concerning
your opinion on the topic.

Thanks a lot,
   Andrew J. Dick

===============================================================================
Andrew J. Dick       IRC Administrator | The opinions stated above are mine and
irc@ariel.yorku.ca            Wildmage | quite  possibly  mine  alone.  However 
cs122014@sol.yorku.ca           on IRC | they could  be yours  too for  a short
cs911007@ariel.yorku.ca                | time  and a  nominal  fee.  Call  Now!
cs911007@moose.cs.yorku.ca             | Operators are standing by...
===============================================================================

Newsgroups: sci.crypt
From: oml@eloka.demon.co.uk (Owen Lewis)
Subject: Re: PGP/RSA - Sidelnikov's appreciation (was: 800MHz )
Distribution: world
Organization: Eloka Consultancy & Project Management
Reply-To: oml@eloka.demon.co.uk
X-Mailer: Simple NEWS 1.90 (ka9q DIS 1.19)
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 19:53:06 +0000

In article <1jna3cINNeed@roche.csl.sri.com> boucher@csl.sri.com writes:

>He made a similar table for RSA keys:
>
>          DATE 
>BUDGET       | 1993   2003   2013
>      -------|------|------|------
>      $25K   | 400  | 450  | 550
>      -------|------|------|-----
>      $25M   | 600  | 700  | 850
>      -------|------|------|-----
>      $25G   | 900  | 1050 | 1200
>
>So, 512-bit RSA keys aren't looking so great anymore.  1024-bit
>keys seem barely adequate in this light.  2K- to 3K-bit RSA keys
>seem prudent to protect any data that you are seriously 
>concerned might be attacked by a big-budget ($25G) enemy.

Despite the difficult English, there was an almost Germanic finality in the
'Academician Dr Sidelnikov' article when he made (basically) the same point 
in regard to PGP. On that point, one had the clear impression that the author
was not saying what he believed might be true, but was saying what he knew as 
a fact. It will be interesting to see what follows in due course. 
Newsgroups: sci.crypt,alt.security.pgp
From: warlord@MIT.EDU (Derek Atkins)
Subject: Re: PGP messages readable by more than one person
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
	<WARLORD.93Jan24213831@snorkelwacker.mit.edu>
	<1k0d74$92c@smurf.sub.org>
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 23:51:57 GMT

In article <1k0d74$92c@smurf.sub.org> urlichs@smurf.sub.org (Matthias Urlichs) writes:

   While we're on the subject of new releases..:
   - Make pgp -kxaf work. Ditto pgp -kaf.

Done.  These will also be in 2.2!  :-)

   - When extracting a key, I'd like to select which certifications for
     that key get exported.

What do you mean?  What *kind* of certificates?  Signatures?  ID's?

   - How do I get pgp -fst/-fsat to not encode the message I want to sign?

pgp -fsat +clearsig=on

   - Thoughts about better MIME integration? The MIME multipart stuff
     would be a far better idea than these BEGIN PGP lines.
     Define an "application/pgp" subtype ?

I've heard people talking about this.  You want to do it?  ;-)

-derek

PGP 2 key available upon request, or via AFS:
	/afs/athena.mit.edu/user/w/a/warlord/pgp-pubkey.asc
--
  Derek Atkins, MIT '93, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
      Chairman, MIT Student Information Processing Board (SIPB)
           MIT Media Laboratory, Speech Research Group
           warlord@MIT.EDU       PP-ASEL        N1NWH
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
From: warlord@MIT.EDU (Derek Atkins)
Subject: Re: Public Key Ciphers
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 01:43:17 GMT

If you are trying to secure the network, and if you can trust the
machines that you are trying to secure, then I suggest you look into
Kerberos (comp.protocols.kerberos, or kerberos@mit.edu).  It is based
on DES, and uses shared secrets between entities to prove
authenticity.

It doesn't sound like you need real-time key distribution, which is
something that Public Key algorithms have over secret-key algorithms,
but if you have physical access to both machines, then you can place a
shared secret on both machines and now that link is secure...

I hope this helps.  If you have any more questions, feel free to ask.

-derek

PGP 2 key available upon request, or via AFS:
	/afs/athena.mit.edu/user/w/a/warlord/pgp-pubkey.asc

--
  Derek Atkins, MIT '93, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
      Chairman, MIT Student Information Processing Board (SIPB)
           MIT Media Laboratory, Speech Research Group
           warlord@MIT.EDU       PP-ASEL        N1NWH
Newsgroups: sci.crypt,alt.security
From: rja14@cl.cam.ac.uk (Ross Anderson)
Subject: Security Reviews
Organization: U of Cambridge Computer Lab, UK
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 13:59:19 GMT

The text of `Computer and Communications Security Reviews' volume 1, issue 1 
(December 1992) has been posted on ghost.dsi.unimi.it in directory /pub/crypt
as security_reviews.tar.Z. In case of difficulty, the server is mirrored by 
nic.funet.fi. We have almost run out of paper copies of this issue: hundreds 
of people wrote or emailed for samples.

Out of fairness to the publishing company, however, subsequent issues will
not be posted publicly (until a _considerable_ time after publication). 
Subscribers will however be able to get a machine readable version if they 
ask for it.


Ross Anderson
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
From: gtoal@pizzabox.demon.co.uk (Graham Toal)
Subject: Re: Actual cost of breaker machine for DES
Organization: Cuddlehogs Anonymous
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 04:00:01 GMT

In article <C1JFMC.L3C@vcd.hp.com> johne@PROBLEM_WITH_INEWS_GATEWAY_FILE (John Eaton) writes:
:Assume such a chip could be clocked at 10 mhz. It would take 16 * 100 ns
:to perform a single decryption. But since you have all 16 stages you
:could pipeline the process so that you preformed one decryption every
:100 ns. With 32 of these going at once you would average one DES operation
:every 3.125 ns. One chip could cover the entire keyspace in 7.14 years.
:A parallel machine of 1024 chips could do it in 2.5 days. We are probably
:talking in the 50-100K$ range.

What about the chip on the output end that decides if the output is a
valid decryption or just junk?  At that rate you can't feed it into a
general purpose computer can you?

Hmmm... makes me think that double-encryption (with another alg - I'd
guess double encryption with DES would be decodable in a single DES, or
no?) might be worthwhile if it forces the algorithm out of hardware
and back on to a CPU...

G
Newsgroups: sci.crypt,alt.security.pgp
From: meyer@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu (Don Meyer)
Subject: Re: PGP messages readable by more than one person
Organization: UIUC College of Agriculture
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 00:29:55 GMT

urlichs@smurf.sub.org (Matthias Urlichs) writes:

>In alt.security.pgp, article <WARLORD.93Jan24213831@snorkelwacker.mit.edu>,
>  warlord@MIT.EDU (Derek Atkins) writes:
>> 
>> PGP 2.2 *WILL* have multiple-recipient encryption!  The code is done.
>> The patches are in.  All that's needed is a 2.2 release to happen!
>> 
>While we're on the subject of new releases..:

To add my own two problems:
1) The OS/2 port refuses to accept input from stdin, for stuff like "Y/N" 
prompts this would be nice for those of us developing shells.  (I have my
suspicions why direct keyboard input is required to create the random seed(s),
but for ordinary input this shouldn't be necessary.)

2) Output to a pipe does not work - PGP tries to rename the "file" it finds, 
when it cannot, it prompts for a new filename.  (Simply allowing an overwrite
option should work wonderfully... preferably as a default or a command line
parameter.)

Thanx,
Don
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
Don Meyer     Network Manager, UIUC College of Ag Microcomputer Facility
internet:     dlmeyer@uiuc.edu		
member:       NRA, ISSC, IL Farm Bureau	 "Don't blame me, I voted Libertarian!"
					    Nancy Lord in '96!
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
From: smb@research.att.com (Steven Bellovin)
Subject: Re: Automatic lang. determination of titles/subj. lines?
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 16:06:18 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories

In article <2216@blue.cis.pitt.edu>, wbdst+@pitt.edu (William B Dwinnell) writes:
> Actually, it would be interesting to know whether anyone has letter, digram
> and trigram frequency tables for various languages, Anyeone?

Helen Gaines's book ``Elementary cryptanalysis; a study of ciphers and
their solution'' has some tables for other languages, as I recall.  Note,
though, that there's no one table for any given language; you have to
have statistics based on the kind of traffic you're looking for.  To give
an obvious example, recent traffic in this newsgroup would show a weird
distribution of the digraphs ``pg'' and ``gp''.
From: choy@dvinci.USask.Ca (Henry Choy)
Newsgroups: sci.logic
Subject: Propositional calc question
Date: 21 Jan 1993 22:34:18 GMT
Organization: University of Saskatchewan
NNTP-Posting-Host: dvinci.usask.ca
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]


I'm reading "Mathematical Logic" by S.W.P. Steen and I don't get
the proof (if it is a proof) on how the composition building
scheme on p. 42 is reversible. Can anyone tell me what's going on?

I'm looking at a section on the classical propositional calculus,
called Pc. There's a negation symbol (Noo of type oo), a disjunction
symbol (Dooo), a variable (po), a generating sign (apostrophe), and
the parentheses. One of the proof rules is the composition building
rule:

 DNaw  DNbw
 ----------
   DNDabw

The rest of the proof rules:

                               DDDxaby
There is a remodelling rule:   -------
                               DDDxbay

There are 2 other building rules:

            x
dilution:  ---
           Dax
                   Daw
double negation:  -----
                  DNNaw

Steen says one of the properties of the composition rule is
reversibility. That is, from DNDabw constructive proofs can be
found for DNaw and DNbw. The justification given for finding a
constructive proof of DNaw is to rebuild the proof for DNDabw.
I'm not sure, but it seems that Steen is telling how to prove
DNaw, and there's only an indirect relation to DNDabw.

--

Henry Choy
choy@cs.usask.ca

What rolls down stairs alone or in pairs            This has been brought to 
Rolls over your neighbor's dog?                     you by the numbers 4
What's great for a snack and fits on your back?     and 9 and the letter P.
It's Log, Log, Log!  -- "The Log Song", from            -- Big Bird
                         Ren & Stimpy

Math is tough!       -- Barbie
Newsgroups: sci.logic
From: rar@csl.sri.com (Bob Riemenschneider)
Newsgroups: sci.logic
Subject: Re: Foundations without foundationalism.
Date: 28 Jan 93 13:19:05
Organization: Computer Science Lab, SRI International, Menlo Park, CA.
NNTP-Posting-Host: birch.csl.sri.com
In-reply-to: wft@math.canterbury.ac.nz's message of Wed, 27 Jan 1993 04:04:30 GMT

In article <C1HvBI.D9M@cantua.canterbury.ac.nz> wft@math.canterbury.ac.nz (Bill Taylor) writes:

>   ... I particularly liked seeing defended in print, the "heretical doctrine" that
>   first-order logic is *not necessarily* the be-all and end-all in logic.
>   It is nice indeed, merely to have the view expressed that it may be a good
>   idea to "shop around" for the most convenient logic for one's needs. ...

This doctrine is not so heretical as it once was; if "logician" is
fairly broadly construed, I would guess that a majority of logicians
agree with it.  Not many would go as far as, say, Barwise in arguing for
logical pluralism, but a variety of constructive, Intuitionistic, and
modal logics are generally considered quite respectable these days.

On the subject of choosing an appropriate logic for mathematics, I
recommend having a look at Barwise and Feferman's _Model_Theoretic Logics_.

                                                        -- rar
Newsgroups: sci.logic