Re: NIST publishes new DSA draft

[James Couzens <[e-mail]>]

> We might want to think about making SHA-256 be another MUST algorithm.
> The only MUST hash now is SHA-1.  Making SHA-256 be a MUST would make
> these new key sizes be more useful, and also give us an easier fallback
> if SHA-1 should be broken.

SHA-1 was broken, last month by three Chinese cryptographers as reported 
by Bruce Schneier through is website.  On February 15, 2006 he wrote of 
a new cryptographic result, an attack faster than brute-force against 
SHA-1.  Two days later he wrote an update to his original post and a 
quote from within it:

> Earlier this week, three Chinese cryptographers showed that SHA-1 is not 
> collision-free. That is, they developed an algorithm for finding collisions
> faster than brute force.
> 
> ...
> 
> They can find collisions in SHA-1 in 2^69 calculations, about 2,000 times
> faster than brute force. Right now, that is just on the far edge of 
> feasibility with current technology. Two comparable massive computations 
> illustrate that point.

Reference URL (02/18/2006): http://tinyurl.com/4rl78
Original post (02/15/2006): http://tinyurl.com/4bmcc

With respect to your suggestion about thinking about making SHA-256 a MUST 
algorithm I couldn't agree more.

Cheers,

James

-- 
James Couzens,
Programmer
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