17 Dec
2003
17 Dec
'03
11:17 p.m.
Questions:
1) In non-mathematical terms, if possible, what difference does this make in terms of security?
None mathematically. A friend of mine (denaro09@darwin.poly.edu) has an interesting thought on this. If the NSA does have any method of screwing RSA in any way, it's probably optimized for the common key lengths for PGP. ie: 512, 1024, etc. So he uses a 1023 bit key. That one bit less may be unsecure for him, but the idea is still sound. Maybe a 1025 bit key would give them less of an advantage. Even so this is all speculation. We don't know what the NSA knows...