RE: Question

["David Gillett" <gillettdavid () fhda edu>]

  No.

  The same result may be produced by a variety of algorithms --
including, trivially, a lookup table.

  Consider sorting algorithms.  Can you deduce, from the fact that
the data is in a sorted order, which algorithm was used to sort it?
No, you cannot -- all of them produce results which satisfy the 
requirements.

David Gillett
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: listbounce () securityfocus com 
> [mailto:listbounce () securityfocus com] On Behalf Of Lee Hilt
> Sent: Friday, February 08, 2008 9:03 AM
> To: security-basics () securityfocus com
> Subject: Question
>
> This probably would be a simple question, however I havent 
> found a clean method to do this.
>
> If you have, lets say the seed and the Key generated for a 
> particular secret, but no clue as to which algoritm was used 
> to generate the key, Is there a clean method for deriving how 
> the secret was generated?
>
> For example, if you had 
>
> Seed: Frank Smith
> Generated Secret : F5678B24783G
>
>
> Could you then find out how to make the same mutation on an 
> Initial string to Generate "valid" keys based on the algoritm.
>
> Not sure if I have explained this well, and it is for a 
> project I am doing and I am looking at any potential 
> workarounds in the system I might miss that might exploit my system.
>
>
> (The above is not a true generated example, just one I have 
> put here to further my question)