[Cryptography] nuclear arming codes

[Watson Ladd]

On Fri, Jan 3, 2014 at 8:50 AM, Jerry Leichter <leichter at lrw.com> wrote:
> On Jan 3, 2014, at 1:01 AM, John Gilmore wrote:
>> PS: Gus Simmons was also key to making the test-ban treaties work, by
>> providing cryptographic protocols that allowed sensors to be placed in
>> each others' countries, that would report back only what the treaty
>> allowed them to report, with no covert channels for additional
>> information, and verification that the sensor packages had not been
>> tampered with.
> Use of public key cryptography for this kind of thing was in common public discussion when RSA first gained broad use.  Was it just an obvious application, given the confluence of the invention of public key and the wide discussions surrounding the negotiations on test bans at the time, or did something of the secret work actually slip out?  A topic for some future historian's dissertation, perhaps.
>
> Meanwhile, a forward-looking question:  Given what we know today - about cryptography in general, and NSA's infiltration of pretty much anything having to *do* with cryptographic implementations in particular - would it be possible to have an agreement such as the old test-ban treaty whose verification relies on cryptography?  The 1980's ideas about public key looked naive even prior to Snodownia, but at least one could argue that it was *possible* to get the required level of assurance for both parties.  Is that even conceivable today?

The test ban treaty doesn't use verification with covert channels an
issue. Instead they drop seismographs into wells, then cap the well
with concrete. The seismograph can send back whatever info it likes:
it's in a block of concrete. Tampering is prevented because the
seismograph will detect any drilling, and the blast of a nuclear bomb
within a very large radius.

For the arms control treaties they use statistical methods AFAIK.
Sincerely,
Watson
>                                                         -- Jerry
>
>
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