Simply put ECDSA is a signature algorithm standardized by NIST in 2000 and used in all sorts of places to secure digital communication in day-to-day applications. Hence the ability to break it, would have huge implications for IT security.
The algorithm uses a magic seed value that has been provided by the NSA (who generated the curve parameters) without explanation. Over the years this lead to a number of conspiracy theories, that the seed may have been chosen to contain a secret backdoor.
One day an anecdote surfaced, that the seed may have simply been a SHA-1 hash of some english sentence chosen by a NSA employee. Huge efforts have been made over the years to find out how the seed may have been generated, and there was a five figure cash prize to be paid out to the first person to find it.
Then yesterday, anthropic posted this blogpost, announcing that some research model of theirs found the actual origin of the seed. Turns out it was just the output of several iterations of a standard PRNG from some 1990s C library seeded with a timestamp. I.e. as basic as it gets when it comes to generating pseudo random numbers.
This mostly debunks the conspiracy that the seed is part of some grand conspiracy to backdoor ECDSA, so good news I guess. But for the most part I can't help but find it very funny how a large online community spent years and loads of resources hashing random english sentences in the hopes of finding the seed's origin, only for an LLM to reveal it's been the output of a non-cryptographically-secure pseudo random number generator from an old C library all along. :D
Some important context here is that "ECDSA is backdoored" theory didn't come out of thin air. The NSA actually did backdoor a different elliptic curve-based encryption algorithm, Dual_EC_DRBG, which they paid a cryptography vendor $10 million in 2004 to set as a default algorithm. They only admitted to it being backdoored and removed it from standards in 2015.
I’d guess it’s the same as why they often use the “cannot confirm or deny” answer to questions. If they started giving detailed explanations of things they do that aren’t sketchy, it makes the lack of an explanation when they are doing something sketchy carry much more weight.
And that's why literally every classified document should be declassified and published after 20 years.
You get 20 years to resolve any issues that would pose a threat from publication. And if this would destabilize the globle....then we should probably stop doing things that destabilize the globe when they are public knowledge.
Occam's Razor points to this, IMO. Especially given how mundane the origin is, there's no particular reason it would be worth remembering. Especially when you work for the NSA and probably work on way more sensitive stuff every day.
[OP] AndreasChris | 23 hours ago
In case you don't know what this is about:
Simply put ECDSA is a signature algorithm standardized by NIST in 2000 and used in all sorts of places to secure digital communication in day-to-day applications. Hence the ability to break it, would have huge implications for IT security.
The algorithm uses a magic seed value that has been provided by the NSA (who generated the curve parameters) without explanation. Over the years this lead to a number of conspiracy theories, that the seed may have been chosen to contain a secret backdoor.
One day an anecdote surfaced, that the seed may have simply been a SHA-1 hash of some english sentence chosen by a NSA employee. Huge efforts have been made over the years to find out how the seed may have been generated, and there was a five figure cash prize to be paid out to the first person to find it.
Then yesterday, anthropic posted this blogpost, announcing that some research model of theirs found the actual origin of the seed. Turns out it was just the output of several iterations of a standard PRNG from some 1990s C library seeded with a timestamp. I.e. as basic as it gets when it comes to generating pseudo random numbers.
This mostly debunks the conspiracy that the seed is part of some grand conspiracy to backdoor ECDSA, so good news I guess. But for the most part I can't help but find it very funny how a large online community spent years and loads of resources hashing random english sentences in the hopes of finding the seed's origin, only for an LLM to reveal it's been the output of a non-cryptographically-secure pseudo random number generator from an old C library all along. :D
Or in other words (joke): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOQfNT6Jdkg
tibpoe | 8 hours ago
Some important context here is that "ECDSA is backdoored" theory didn't come out of thin air. The NSA actually did backdoor a different elliptic curve-based encryption algorithm, Dual_EC_DRBG, which they paid a cryptography vendor $10 million in 2004 to set as a default algorithm. They only admitted to it being backdoored and removed it from standards in 2015.
polle | 17 hours ago
Genuinely really impressive and fun.
I was afraid we would have to set those Minecraft seed hunters on the job but I'm glad we used machines for the menial repetitive jobs for once.
preposterous | 13 hours ago
Why wouldn’t the nsa explain the origins themselves and avoid all this? I must be missing something.
Greg | 13 hours ago
I’d guess it’s the same as why they often use the “cannot confirm or deny” answer to questions. If they started giving detailed explanations of things they do that aren’t sketchy, it makes the lack of an explanation when they are doing something sketchy carry much more weight.
vord | 10 hours ago
And that's why literally every classified document should be declassified and published after 20 years.
You get 20 years to resolve any issues that would pose a threat from publication. And if this would destabilize the globle....then we should probably stop doing things that destabilize the globe when they are public knowledge.
Octofox | 10 hours ago
It’s possible the person responsible really did forget the exact input
Omnicrola | 8 hours ago
Occam's Razor points to this, IMO. Especially given how mundane the origin is, there's no particular reason it would be worth remembering. Especially when you work for the NSA and probably work on way more sensitive stuff every day.