Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!tektronix!reed!mdr
From: mdr@reed.UUCP (Mike Rutenberg)
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
Subject: Re: Request for opinions: canadian cryptographic standard.
Message-ID: <8497@reed.UUCP>
Date: 20 Mar 88 06:49:15 GMT
References: <2463@geac.UUCP>
Reply-To: mdr@reed.UUCP (Mike Rutenberg)
Organization: Reed College, Portland OR
Lines: 44

In article <2463@geac.UUCP> daveb@geac.uucp (David Collier-Brown) writes:
>   We strongly believe that for sensitive Canadian secrets, a
>proprietary Canadian algorithm should be embedded into LSI, and the
>details shared with no one outside Canada.  Failure to do this makes
>a mockery of our already limited sovereignty. If we wish as
>Canadians to have our world views taken seriously by our allies, we
>must make the necessary expenditures not to be dependent.

Your suggestion sounds like "lets emulate U.S. practice" rather than
general support for strong cryptographic research and commercial
development within Canada.

If you are suggesting that a Canadian standard be developed solely for
the Government and military contractors, that might be appropriate (I
must admit some ignorance of where the encryption schemes used by the
Canadian government originate - does the Communications Security
Establishment (CSE) make them or do they come from the NSA?).

A more difficult problem would seem to be a public encryption
standard.  It is probably just my existence outside of the military
that makes me desire open cryptographic research and systems.  Black
boxes concern me, no matter who they come from (I also don't like
centralized key scheduling).  I also think there is a need for
generally available encryption, not just for national security
applications.  Banks, businesses, and even humble love letters all need
to be protected.  Maybe DES or the NSA chips are enough for these
applications, but I certainly wouldn't mind having the option of an
open, independent, "made-in-Canada" solution.

The subject of resources also comes to mind (maybe some messages on
this topic haven't made it out of Canada).  How does one make strong
cryptographic standards appear?  Where would they come from?  Thoughts
which come to mind are National Research Council (NRC) and the CSE, but
I don't know what resources they would have to tackle this seemingly
difficult project.  The open work that I know of is coming from places
like Queen's University and the University of Waterloo.  Do there
already exist proposals for a Canadian standard or is this a thought
which will later be turned into resources?

Anyways, neat stuff.  I'll buy one if it is cheap enough!

Mike
-- 
Mike Rutenberg    specializing in fast, robust software and food  (503)771-5516