Status of Cryptography Research in implementation of the EUCD

[Julian T J Midgley]

On Wed, 14 Aug 2002, Owen Lewis wrote:

>
> We are not considering a publication of abstract principles but of specified
> weaknesses in named code. Do be able do this, the researcher has had his
> head well and truly 'under the bonnet' of that proprietary code and will not
> easily be able to show otherwise. In the case of a copy protection
> algorithm, it will be unique to its owner.

There is no need whatever for a copy-protection algorithm to be unique to
its owner. If I were building a copy-protection system designed to be as
secure as possible, I would build it from tried and tested publicly known
algorithms, rather than inventing my own, that may well be flawed.  I can
think of a straightforward way of distributing electronic texts
copy-protected using a scheme based upon PGP, for example, which
would be considerably more secure than the scheme Adobe uses for its
eBooks.


Julian

-- 
Julian T. J. Midgley                      http://www.xenoclast.org/
Cambridge, England.                          PGP Key ID: 0xBCC7863F