Re: The importance of IVs

From: Gregory G Rose (ggr_at_qualcomm.com)
Date: 08/29/05 

Date: 29 Aug 2005 11:02:23 -0700

In article <l2i4h1d5i2smufshgm6gd4mplfhfejb40u@4ax.com>,
Regis <nobody@thisaddress.com> wrote:
<On 28 Aug 2005 08:06:39 -0700, "mobius30" <mobius30@hushmail.com>
<wrote:
<>I haven't looked into Twofish very much, but I will someday.
<
<Schneier wrote Blowfish first, and the Twofish later -- in order to
<address the limitations of Blowfish.
<
<>O.K. (Get's ready to duck...) Time for some rhetoric on AES vs.
<>Blowfish. I know, the almight NSA, with its 11-digit budget, has given
<>AES its "you are cool enough to be in our little club" stamp of
<>approval. Good enough for government work, right?
<
<It wasn't the NSA's "stamp of approval" that made Rijndael the AES
<cipher of choice. Rijndael was chosen as the new AES by a group of
<respected and very knowledgeable cryptographers from around the world.

Not really correct. While the analysis and
submission was done by knowledgeable
cryptographers from around the world, it was said
from the very beginning that NIST would make the
final decision based on its own criteria. One of
those criteria was NSA blessing.

<> Yeah, right. So was DES. (It takes less than a day to crack that now, right?) But as
<>far as AES goes, I believe (yes, just my lay opinion here) that
<>14-round AES-256 will be cracked LONG before 16-round Blowfish-448.
<
<I don't think you're going to find too many people who agree with you
<on that one. Rijndael was chosen to be the new AES because it was
<deemed to be more secure than Blowfish. Keep in mind that Blowfish
<never even made it into the AES competition.

Blowfish wasn't *qualified* for the AES
competition; it only had 64-bit blocks.

< Schneier decided to
<submit only Twofish because he already knew by that time that Blowfish
<wouldn't stand a chance against the other entries. Rijndael came in
<first place, thereby winning the AES title. Serpent came in second,
<and Twofish came in third, followed by RC6 and MARS.

There were no minor placings. Lots of people have
their opinions, but according to NIST, Rijndael
won, the other four were equal second. (I agree
with your order, personally, but it has nothing to
do with reality.)

Greg. 

-- 
Greg Rose
232B EC8F 44C6 C853 D68F  E107 E6BF CD2F 1081 A37C
Qualcomm Australia: http://www.qualcomm.com.au

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