Re: [Hampshire] OpenSSL in Debian is broken

Chris Oattes <mailinglist@???> wrote:
> Assume you have a stream of numbers in base 10
> (i.e. made up of a series of digits from 0-9).
>
> This stream of numbers would be considered
> random if, given the first x digits, it is
> impossible to determine the x+1 th digit with
> probability > 1/10. That is to say, each digit
> is equally likely to be any one of the possible
> values.

I'm no cryptanalyst - or mathematician - so I'll
try to dig up an archive of the discussion.

I have a vague recollection that part of argument
was about sequence repetition. For cryptography,
it's not just a case of whether you can predict
the next digit, but whether earlier parts of the
'random' sequence allow you to infer properties of
future parts of the sequence.

Nick.

--
Nick Chalk ................. once a Radio Designer
Confidence is failing to understand the problem.