[18881] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: How broad is the SPEKE patent.
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Steven M. Bellovin)
Wed Nov 9 11:48:59 2005
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From: "Steven M. Bellovin" <smb@cs.columbia.edu>
To: "James A. Donald" <jamesd@echeque.com>
Cc: cypherpunks@jfet.org, cryptography@metzdowd.com
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 08 Nov 2005 23:13:25 PST."
<43713115.4942.4A3995E@localhost>
Date: Wed, 09 Nov 2005 10:54:53 -0500
In message <43713115.4942.4A3995E@localhost>, "James A. Donald" writes:
> --
>Does SPEKE claim to patent any uses of zero knowledge
>proof of possession of the password for mutual
>authentication, or just some particular method for
>establishing communications? Is there any way around
>the SPEKE patent for mutual authentication and
>establishing secure communications on a weak passphrase?
>
It certainly doesn't claim EKE, by myself and Michael Merritt, since he
and I invented the field. Of course, EKE is also patented.
SRP is patented but royalty-free. Some of have claimed that it
infringes the EKE patent; since I don't work for the EKE patent owner
(Lucent), I've never tried to verify that.
Radia Perlman and Charlie Kaufman invented PDM specifically as a
patent-free method. However, the claim was made that it infringed the
SPEKE patent. Since it wasn't patented, there was no one willing to
spend the money on legal fees to fight that claim, per a story I heard.
Have a look at http://web.archive.org/web/20041018153649/integritysciences.com/history.html
for some history.
--Steven M. Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb
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