[12764] in Cypherpunks
Re: Random #'s via serial port dongle?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Phil Karn)
Sat Apr 30 00:05:52 1994
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 1994 21:03:17 -0700
From: Phil Karn <karn@qualcomm.com>
To: nelson@crynwr.com
Cc: cypherpunks@toad.com
In-Reply-To: <m0pwxLM-000IDpC@crynwr> (nelson@crynwr.com)
The easiest way to get true random numbers on a PC nowadays is
with a sound board, preferably 16 bit. Just MD-5 hash some gibberish
speech and/or background noise.
I am looking at various ways of generating good random numbers for my
IP security protocol, so I'm thinking about this stuff. Unfortunately
I can't always depend on there being a sound board, so I'm still open
to other ideas. Recently I tried looking at phase jitter between the
CPU and timer crystals, but this doesn't work on every machine.
Timing keyboard hits is a tried-and-true technique in PGP, but I can't
necessarily rely on that either (I want this to work in a standalone
system that boots by itself). Suggestions would be appreciated.
Phil
