Google ramp up encryption effort

Interesting that Google have waited until half the IT mammoths were outed by Snowden as being compliant with the NSA, to further try to encrypt their content. By their own admission, this will not stop a determined NSA, but in theory slow them down, as universal decryption attempts will be costly, both in terms of money and time. The argument goes along the lines that if universal monitoring becomes expensive, the NSA and related oranisations will be forced to focus their efforts on certain individuals, rather than taking a sweeping approach. Why they have waited so long (and lets face it, they must have known what was going on 6 years ago), mystifies me, but at least it is a start. To be blatantly honest though, this is a small effort, and will probably not have that big an influence. The only way to get real results is to get the public at large to use strong encryption as a matter of course, something that I cannot see happening, pretty much relegated to the “too hard basket”

http://www.csoonline.com/article/739375/google-plan-to-thwart-government-surveillance-with-encryption-raises-stakes

Related articles

• Google Insists They’re Beefing up Encryption After NSA Leaks – (dslreports.com)
• Google racing to encrypt data transfers in response to NSA surveillance (theverge.com)
• Google Scrambles to Counter NSA in Encryption Race (bloomberg.com)
• How to Protect Yourself Against NSA Snooping, Even If Encryption Is Broken (news.softpedia.com)
• Google Boosting Encryption Between Data Centers (datacenterknowledge.com)
• Google Is Deploying New Encryption In Data Centres To Counter NSA (eteknix.com)
• Google Encrypts to Evade NSA Surveillance: Should You? (eweek.com)
• NSA Undermines Encrypted Communications (thesleuthjournal.com)
• Google Is Deploying New Encryption Between Data Centers to Counter the NSA (news.softpedia.com)
• Google encrypts data to block govt spies (stuff.co.nz)

When random isn’t random enough

This is a bit worrying, but I suspect people in the know in computer science have probably had a hunch on this. Turns out that the random number that is factored into crypto is generally taken from the statistical chance of a particular string of bits occuring in a file. While that might appear to be “random enough”, it is possible to match up that line of random bits against files with the same pattern. Once you nail one pattern, then you can follow the dots. Not a good look ….

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/encryption-is-less-secure-than-we-thought-0814.html

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• imabonehead: Google confirms critical Android crypto flaw used in $5,700 Bitcoin heist | Ars Technica (arstechnica.com)
• Vectorialized parallel selection that’s random? (stackoverflow.com)
• Algorithmic Random (ezrasf.com)