MD5 proposal

----- Original Message -----
From: "Poul-Henning Kamp" <phk at critter.freebsd.dk>
To: "Andrei Robachevsky" <andrei at ripe.net>
Cc: "Olafur Osvaldsson" <oli at isnic.is>; <db-wg at ripe.net>
Sent: Wednesday, March 27, 2002 6:03 PM
Subject: Re: MD5 proposal


> In message <3CA1F83A.80802 at ripe.net>, Andrei Robachevsky writes:
>
> >My main concern here would be that basing the proposed method on an
> >implementation (md5-crypt), which may change or may be mixed with some
> >other implementation, rather than on the documented algorithm (md5
> >hash), which cannot, may cause confusion in the future.
>
> The implementation will not change, it would screw all cisco router
> enable passwords and most FreeBSD passwords.
>
> >And, as a side question from a person far from cryptography, is it a
> >proved fact that iterative complexity of md5-crypt makes the hash better?
>
> It makes dictionary attacks harder and more timeconsuming, it also
> makes it harder to do hardware implementations because you need
> many times more hardware.
>
> --
> Poul-Henning Kamp       | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20
> phk at FreeBSD.ORG         | TCP/IP since RFC 956
> FreeBSD committer       | BSD since 4.3-tahoe
> Never attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by
incompetence.
>