On Thu, 30 Nov 2000, No User wrote:
> IBM's new as-yet-unnamed security algorithm simultaneously encrypts
> and authenticates messages. It works with symmetric cryptography in
> which the same secret key, or mathematical code, is used to encrypt
> and decrypt, as opposed to public key cryptography, in which two
> different keys are used. The new algorithm has been submitted to the
> U.S. Patent Office and proposed to the National Institute of
> Standards.
This sounds vaguely like Charanjit Jutla's preprint
http://eprint.iacr.org/2000/039/
It's a chaining mode for block ciphers.
> "IBM's got a track record of coming out with these major crypto
> announcements around early stage results" that haven't been evaluated
> and tested, said Dierks of Certicom. "They're seen as self promoting."
> An IBM algorithm dubbed the "Atjai-Dwork cryptosystem" was announced
> in 1997 and broken the following year, he said.
Yes, this is annoying. I think it reflects more on IBM marketing than IBM
Research.
-David
