THE QUANTUM COMPUTERS ARE COMING...right? We got Samuel Jacques and John Schanck at short notice to answer that question plus a bunch of other about error correcting codes, logical qubits, T-gates, and more about Google's new quantum computer Willow.

Transcript: https://securitycryptographywhatever.com/2024/12/18/quantum-willow

Links:

- https://blog.google/technology/research/google-willow-quantum-chip/
- https://research.google/blog/making-quantum-error-correction-work/
- https://blog.google/technology/google-deepmind/alphaqubit-quantum-error-correction/
- https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08449-y
- Sam’s ‘Landscape of Quantum Computing’ chart: https://sam-jaques.appspot.com/quantum\_landscape\_2024
- The above, originally published in 2021: https://sam-jaques.appspot.com/quantum\_landscape
- https://sam-jaques.appspot.com
- https://jmschanck.info/

"Security Cryptography Whatever" is hosted by Deirdre Connolly (@durumcrustulum), Thomas Ptacek (@tqbf), and David Adrian (@davidcadrian)

Nothing we have ever recorded on SCW has brought so much joy to
David. However, at several points during the episode, we may have witnessed Matthew Green's soul leave his body.

Our esteemed guests Justin Schuh and Matt Green joined us to debate whether `Dual_EC_DRBG` was intentionally backdoored by the NSA or 'just' a major fuckup.

Transcript: https://securitycryptographywhatever.com/2024/12/07/dual-ec-drbg

Links:

- Dicky George at InfiltrateCon 2014, 'Life at Both Ends of the Barrel - An NSA Targeting Retrospective': [https://youtu.be/qq-LCyRp6bU?si=MyTBKomkIVaxSy1Q](https://youtu.be/qq-LCyRp6bU?si=MyTBKomkIVaxSy1Q)
- Dicky George: [https://www.nsa.gov/Press-Room/Digital-Media-Center/Biographies/Biography-View-Page/Article/3330261/richard-dickie-george/](https://www.nsa.gov/Press-Room/Digital-Media-Center/Biographies/Biography-View-Page/Article/3330261/richard-dickie-george/)
- NYTimes on Sigint Enabling Project: [https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/09/05/us/documents-reveal-nsa-campaign-against-encryption.html](https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/09/05/us/documents-reveal-nsa-campaign-against-encryption.html)
- On the Practical Exploitability of Dual EC
in TLS Implementations: [https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-checkoway.pdf](https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-checkoway.pdf)
- Wired - Researchers Solve Juniper Backdoor Mystery; Signs Point to NSA [https://www.wired.com/2015/12/researchers-solve-the-juniper-mystery-and-they-say-its-partially-the-nsas-fault/](https://www.wired.com/2015/12/researchers-solve-the-juniper-mystery-and-they-say-its-partially-the-nsas-fault/)
- ProPublica - Revealed: The NSA's Secret Campaign to Crack, Undermine Internet Security [https://www.propublica.org/article/the-nsas-secret-campaign-to-crack-undermine-internet-encryption](https://www.propublica.org/article/the-nsas-secret-campaign-to-crack-undermine-internet-encryption)
- DDoSecrets - Sigint Enabling Project: [https://data.ddosecrets.com/Snowden%20archive/sigint-enabling-project.pdf](https://data.ddosecrets.com/Snowden%20archive/sigint-enabling-project.pdf)
- IAD: [https://www.iad.gov/](https://www.iad.gov/)
- Ars Technica - “Unauthorized code” in Juniper firewalls decrypts encrypted VPN traffic: [https://web.archive.org/web/20151222023311/http://arstechnica.com/security/2015/12/unauthorized-code-in-juniper-firewalls-decrypts-encrypted-vpn-traffic/](https://web.archive.org/web/20151222023311/http://arstechnica.com/security/2015/12/unauthorized-code-in-juniper-firewalls-decrypts-encrypted-vpn-traffic/)
- 2015 IMPORTANT JUNIPER SECURITY ANNOUNCEMENT: [https://web.archive.org/web/20151221171526/http://forums.juniper.net/t5/Security-Incident-Response/Important-Announcement-about-ScreenOS/ba-p/285554](https://web.archive.org/web/20151221171526/http://forums.juniper.net/t5/Security-Incident-Response/Important-Announcement-about-ScreenOS/ba-p/285554)
- Extended Random Values for TLS: [https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-rescorla-tls-extended-random-00](https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-rescorla-tls-extended-random-00)
- The Art of Software Security Assessment: [https://www.amazon.com/Art-Software-Security-Assessment-Vulnerabilities/dp/0321444426](https://www.amazon.com/Art-Software-Security-Assessment-Vulnerabilities/dp/0321444426)

"Security Cryptography Whatever" is hosted by Deirdre Connolly (@durumcrustulum), Thomas Ptacek (@tqbf), and David Adrian (@davidcadrian)

You may not be rewriting the world in Rust, but if you follow the findings of the Android team and our guest Jeff Vander Stoep, you'll drive down your memory-unsafety vulnerabilities more than 2X below the industry average over time! 🎉

Transcript: https://securitycryptographywhatever.com/2024/10/15/a-little-bit-of-rust-goes-a-long-way/

Links:
- https://security.googleblog.com/2024/09/eliminating-memory-safety-vulnerabilities-Android.html
- “Safe Coding”: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3651621
- “effectiveness of security design”: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/16LZ6T-tcjgp3T8_N3m0pa5kNA1DwIsuMcQYDhpMU7uU/edit#slide=id.g3e7cac054a_0_89
- https://security.googleblog.com/2024/02/improving-interoperability-between-rust-and-c.html
- https://github.com/google/crubit
- https://github.com/google/autocxx
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stagefright_(bug)
- https://security.googleblog.com/2021/04/rust-in-android-platform.html
- https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/src/+/master/docs/security/rule-of-2.md
- https://www.usenix.org/conference/usenixsecurity22/presentation/alexopoulos
-https://kb.meinbergglobal.com/kb/time_sync/ntp/ntp_vulnerabilities_reported_2023-04
- https://blog.isosceles.com/the-legacy-of-stagefright/
- https://research.google/pubs/secure-by-design-googles-perspective-on-memory-safety/
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrrH2lcl9ew
- https://source.android.com/docs/setup/build/rust/building-rust-modules/overview
- https://github.com/rust-lang/rust-bindgen
- https://security.googleblog.com/2021/06/rustc-interop-in-android-platform.html

"Security Cryptography Whatever" is hosted by Deirdre Connolly (@durumcrustulum), Thomas Ptacek (@tqbf), and David Adrian (@davidcadrian)