Re: SHA-1 broken

[Peter Jeremy <peter.jeremy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On 2005-Feb-19 00:42:56 -0500, Anatole Shaw <shaw_bugtraq20050218@xxxxxxxxxxxx> 
wrote:
>Sadly, there is no magic bullet for the SHA-1 problem.  Let me say, in
>classic Bugtraq style, that I believe the "temporary workaround for this
>vulnerability" is to move to SHA-512 as quickly as possible.

There are two difficulties with this.  Firstly, SHA-512 generates a
hash that is somewhat over 3 times the size of SHA-1 - this may
present problems in some cases.  It's definitely not going to be a
drop-in replacement.

Secondly, AFAIK, it's not yet clear that SHA-512 (or SHA-256) are
resistant to this break.  Whilst a 2^11 reduction in collision resistance
would be unimportant in SHA-512, given the close relationship between the
SHA-* family, it's possible that that the _all_ of the SHA-* family have
a collision resistance similar to SHA-1 - around 2^70.

I agree that an alternative to SHA-1 is required fairly quickly.  It's
less clear that SHA-512 is even a temporary work-around.  I believe
that the immediate reaction would be to prepare a plan on how to
quickly replace SHA-1 with an alternative hash algorithm (probably
with a different sized result) and be ready to implement it once an
alternative is identified.  If you do move to SHA-512 now, you should
probably be prepared to make another change in the near future.

>The only fix will be informed analysis of the new paper from the Chinese
>team (which hasn't even been released yet) and the informed development
>of a solid cryptographic response.

Agreed.

-- 
Peter Jeremy

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