From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Mar 7 16:50:15 2005 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C124316A4CE for ; Mon, 7 Mar 2005 16:50:15 +0000 (GMT) Received: from critter.freebsd.dk (f170.freebsd.dk [212.242.86.170]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0BA8C43D1D for ; Mon, 7 Mar 2005 16:50:15 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from phk@critter.freebsd.dk) Received: from critter.freebsd.dk (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by critter.freebsd.dk (8.13.1/8.13.1) with ESMTP id j27Gnoga018768; Mon, 7 Mar 2005 17:49:50 +0100 (CET) (envelope-from phk@critter.freebsd.dk) To: soralx@cydem.org From: "Poul-Henning Kamp" In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 07 Mar 2005 09:40:49 MST." <200503070940.49393.soralx@cydem.org> Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 17:49:50 +0100 Message-ID: <18767.1110214190@critter.freebsd.dk> Sender: phk@critter.freebsd.dk cc: aleine@austrosearch.net cc: freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG cc: tech-security@NetBSD.ORG Subject: Re: FUD about CGD and GBDE X-BeenThere: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Technical Discussions relating to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 16:50:15 -0000 In message <200503070940.49393.soralx@cydem.org>, soralx@cydem.org writes: > >> I also believe that it would be beneficial to implement regular rewriting >> of randomly picked lock sector(s) at random times during a user specified >> interval (up to x rewrites within n seconds) in order to further obscure >> the write pattern and provide additional protection for lock sectors. >> ALeine > >I agree. I would also add random reads (or specially designed, combined >random reads and writes) to make traffic analysis and differential attacks >a real PITA for the hacker (although this idea may not be very effective >against a highly motivated and determined attacker, such as some government, >for instance). If you want to do something like this, you want to do sectorrenaming and journaling since that means you can only see that something was written but not what it was that was written. The performance cost can be considerable and the complexity formidable. There are incredibly many cornercases to handle. >BTW, PHK, why did you choose the scheme of encrypting offsets of lock >sectors with part of key material and storing them somewhere, instead >of just using part of the key material itself to determine the offsets? Because if I used part of the key material you would have to change the location of the lock sectors when you changed the key material. -- Poul-Henning Kamp | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20 phk@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.