[TUHS] OT: Patternless Encryption

[Carl Lowenstein]

> X-From: mirian at trantor.cosmic.com (Mirian Crzig Lennox)
> Subject: Re: [TUHS] OT: Patternless Encryption
> Date: Tue, 8 Jul 2003 16:29:59 +0000 (UTC)
> 
> On Tue, 08 Jul 2003 15:31:08 GMT, John P. Willis <jwillis at coherent-logic.com> wrote:
> >
> >Just curious to hear the opinions of the many wise people here...
> >What is the likelihood of an encryption system in which the resulting data
> >has no pattern,
> 
> Such a thing exists, it is called a one-time pad.  Generate a
> completely random key as long as the plaintext, and then XOR each
> successive bit of the key with the corresponding bit of the plaintext.
> The result is indistinguishable from random noise; only someone with
> an identical copy of the key can decrypt it (using precisely the same
> method of course).
> 
> > and one character of encrypted data may stand for many
> >different characters when decrypted?
> 
> Assuming you mean "one character of encrypted data might represent any
> one of several different characters of plaintext" (not "one
> character's worth of encrypted data represents multiple characters
> worth of plaintext), this is indeed the effect of a one-time pad.
> Just don't ever reuse that key; promptly destroy both copies after
> use.
> 
> --Mirian

This is hardly the place for a long discussion on such topics, but
one might want to look at the FAQ for the net news group sci.crypt.

    carl
-- 
    carl lowenstein         marine physical lab     u.c. san diego
                                                 clowenst at ucsd.edu