RAND_DRBG

SHANE LONTIS shane.lontis at oracle.com
Mon Jul 27 01:14:27 UTC 2020


If this is not going to break 99% of users + it improves the interface + the replacement to achieve the same is a few lines of code and is likely to occur in one place in an app, then it seems reasonable to change it to me.


> On 27 Jul 2020, at 11:08 am, Dr Paul Dale <paul.dale at oracle.com> wrote:
> 
> The RAND_DRBG (crypto/rand/drbg_lib) APIs are quite some mess and sit badly with the move to provider based infrastructure.
> They are definitely being deprecated in master but without more, the extra layer of indirection and additional complexity generating random numbers will remain.
> 
> The option I see are:
> 
> 1. Remove, rather than deprecate, RAND_DRBG in 3.0.  This is a breaking change.
> 2. Bypass RAND_DRBG and live with a breaking change (refer: https://github.com/openssl/openssl/pull/12509#pullrequestreview-455396828 <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://github.com/openssl/openssl/pull/12509*pullrequestreview-455396828__;Iw!!GqivPVa7Brio!P_SYCN9POdf1ZT1I7v4h9G_oUTuels90DxKk1JmFkD7HcXsTPr9n0s3FX3XZZo_c2Q$>)
> 3. Leave things as they currently are in master.
> 
> The first two are breaking changes and will require an OMC vote.
> 
> 
> Some pertinent points:
> 
> 1. RAND_bytes will continue to work as is — this API is perfect for almost everyone.
> 2. The RAND_METHOD functionality remains — this allows wholesale replacement of OpenSSL’s RNGs if desired.
> 3. The name EVP_RAND is the working name and might change — this is not relevant to this discussion.
> 4. The RAND_DRBG APIs are unlikely to be widely used — they were introduced in 1.1.1.  The two users I know of (Akamai and NCP) are both fine with them being removed.
> 
> 
> Thoughts anyone?
> 
> 
> Pauli
> -- 
> Dr Paul Dale | Distinguished Architect | Cryptographic Foundations 
> Phone +61 7 3031 7217
> Oracle Australia
> 

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