-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- On Sat, 20 Jul 1996, Deranged Mutant wrote:
Date: Sat, 20 Jul 1996 16:37:40 +0000 From: Deranged Mutant
To: cypherpunks@toad.com Subject: A Snake-Oil FAQ I've written a short "Snake Oil FAQ" below. It's incomplete and needs some work (adding a few definitions, rewording, aesthetic formatting, etc.), so think of it as a 'beta' FAQ (please don't post it on web pages, though I don't mind if it's distributed among anyone interested in criticizing or contributing). Comments and suggestions would be appreciated. Note that the aim is to write something accessible to 'newbies'. (Jeremy Barrett contributed to this, BTW)
Snake-Oil Warning Signs Encryption Software to Avoid
(Revision 0.1)
Looks very nicely done. I think you pretty much covered it... but...
Be wary of marketing gimmicks related to "if you can crack our software" contests.
Even the best cryptographers and security professionals have done this. RSA did it with their Public Key system, which took 20+ years to break. Throughout history, many security mechanisms, even the best ones, including Cyphers, Locks, Firewalls, etc. have been known to go as far as to offer prizes (some extremely high, upwards of a million dollars, some as low as RSA's famous $100 prize) I think that this one really is just a bit too broad. --Deviant -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQEVAwUBMfHIJDAJap8fyDMVAQEucAf+JxcuBAIoI0pamvlryqLQETpwrBPoVaPi EUMNWNY1B3iG9nuQ/3U5mhdMNK0ih4RoCDifMPnKGD+iDIjUoMHmGEDtScBCLVe2 cDaAQ54JXpwNvlzhmfvaPc4wUZD/gDgtHBHLOoLZNarEPNgVLtYuFgeJeCEruqTX UU5usrgoMUZrxT/dRnYcPs6YRT7cgOxnOWNnTsZBiIpDyEkvGPZBxZhDp25DESTq q0zE9BLmWCgpHyi3QYXCfOTMLhkd4k/mt/LSZtEDHl55kLphtQN4N1Y1xgNK5BIs o5cjzh7aRLc0fvw8WG1i85dxtRBhXIPAUA8sRVyPhHu9qiw82D1qcA== =01xE -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----