🚀 go-pugleaf

jonathan@chpc.utexas.edu (Jonathan Thornburg) writes:
: Using a random number generator (RNG) to generate passwords is
: almost always a very bad idea -- it yields *highly* *insecure*
: passwords.  There are two reasons for this:
: [...] 
: Remembering multiple cryptographically-independent-and-high-entropy
: passwords is a hard problem, but using a "small rng" to generate them
: is not the solution.

Yes, the classic 2-line PRNG is probably not so good for generating
passwords.  However, a cryptographically strong function, such as 
DES or MD5, probably would be suitable.  In fact, I wouldn't be
surprised if crypto-based pseudo-random number generators turned
in strong performances on most or all general-purpose PRNG tests.  
They'd be somewhat slower than most of the competition, though,
and not easy to program into a hand-held calculator.

The obvious way of making a PRNG generator from a crypto function,
of course, is:

  random[0] = function(key)
  random[i] = function(random[i-1])

with suitable post-processing on random[i] to turn it into an integer,
floating point, or what-have-you.

Mark R.