Elliptic Curve Back Door - Computerphile on HackerTube: recommended by 1 Hacker News commenter across 1 month, 2021–2025.
explainer · intermediate · evergreen
Dr Mike Pound explains the suspected backdoor in the Dual_EC_DRBG random number generator and how elliptic curve constants could let someone predict its output.
HN points to it as an intuitive explanation of how NIST standardized a backdoored generator.
“He also gives a super cool/intuitive breakdown on how this came to be.”
4 Hacker News comments link this video. Each one links back to its thread.
I recommend this video by Computerphile - He talks about how NIST may have been pressured into enforcing compromised (backdoored?) cryptography methods as a standard - Dual_EC_DRBG to be exact. He also gives a super cool/intuitive breakdown on how this came to be. It will definitely grow some food for thought. ▶ this video
in “NIST selects HQC as fifth algorithm for post-quantum encryption” · View on HN
Computerphile video discussing the mathematics around how such a number could have been used in a practical way. ▶ this video [link] When people say, “Don’t roll your own crypto,” it’s because the field is littered with footguns and (to stretch an analogy) guns in cryptography launch explosives.
in “Nothing-up-my-sleeve number” · View on HN
Long story short is that we don't know for sure, but there are some possibilities that's makes it plausible ▶ this video
in “Dueling over Dual_EC_DRGB: Consequences of Corrupting a Standardization Process” · View on HN
Computerphile[1] did a video about the specifics of the backdoor in Dual EC DRBG. As i understand it, the hackers replaced a magic number Q with a different value than the standards compliant one, where they had pre-computed P. [1]: ▶ this video
in “The NSA's Backdoor in Dual EC” · View on HN