🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <rodney.649107377@dali.ipl.rpi.edu> rodney@ipl.rpi.edu (Rodney Peck II) writes:


   What about the RSA patent?  It covers the RSA public key encryption
   algorithm.

actually, what is patented is the use of RSA to build a public key
communications device.  obviously using a general purpose computer is
one way to build such a device, but so is using dedicated hardware.

   I was going to use it in a piece of software, but it turns out that
   it is covered by a patent and usage requires licensing from the
   patent holders.

read the patent to find out exactly what is covered.  remember that it
is only patented in the us because of prior publication.

   I find it pretty amazing that the idea of making a ring from the
   product of two really big prime numbers and then doing some
   straightforward modulo arithmetic on it is patentable.

it isn't.

   I would possibly understand if there were restritions on someone's
   really fast implementation of it,

that wouldn't be patentable either.  it would probably be
thcopyrightable.

   but this is, in my understanding, a patent taht covers any usage of
   anything that uses this RSA idea.

it isn't.  just something that uses it for communicating data and
whatever else is claimed in the patent is protected.  and even then,
you might be able to argue that there is a defect in the patent,
either in its execution, or in the fact that it was granted at all.

   The best part is that all of the crypto books I have read refer to
   RSA and the knapsack algs and point out that knapsack has been
   broken and that RSA is the only known secure public alg.  Terrific.

read sci.crypt for a while for a better (and more accurate version) of
the facts.  the world isn't that simple.  only super increasing
knap-sacks are known to be easy to break.  of course, there is some
general distrust of knapsacks in general.  look up exponential key
exchange for another option.

better yet, if this really bothers you, invent a better system and
leave it free.
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