Re: Crypto anarchy in a VW? (not the bug)

[Mark <mark@coombs.anu.edu.au>]

>Another possibility until then, and one that would be fun for people who
>like to play with EPROMS, is a card that had a cable leading to an external
>EPROM socket that you could lay on your desk or on top of the case or 
>wherever. You burn your keys for the HD into a chip and use it as a key,
>physically inserting the chip in the socket each time. There are lots 
>on new ways to make chips easy to plug in and out, I'm sure it wouldn't 
>be too hard.

Heh, I have a system liek this, designed by Viglen in the UK. It was/is 
originally from the BBC micro to allow easy use of swapping over 'sideways'
ROMS instead of opening the case. It's basically a ribbon cable with a 28way 
rom socket on the end with a edge connector socket on the other. Each ROM is
enclosed in it's own sturdy tiny black package with an edge connector that
slots into the socket that is mounted in the 'ashtray' of the Beeb.

You could easily copy the idea with a rom socket, a length of ribbon cable
and a ZIF socket to allow easy usage. The Viglen has pin protection so you
dont spike the thing, so it's able to be used on the fly without power
cycling.

One thing about ROM's, they're faster than disks....easier to hide too :)

>I still don't see why all of the actual encryption couldn't be done in 
>software though...

Me either, apart from TEMPEST issues...Linux comes with slot in file system
modules (as detailed in a letter to Jim) that you can easily adapt to your
own uses. Ive been playing around with this idea for a while. Adding a
desfs(tm) (me :) to a linux kernel is not going to be that hard I think..
(touch wood).

Mark
mark@coombs.anu.edu.au

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