Re: /dev/random in 2.4.6

Chris Friesen (cfriesen@nortelnetworks.com)
Mon, 20 Aug 2001 11:42:10 -0400

Doug McNaught wrote:
>
> Chris Friesen <cfriesen@nortelnetworks.com> writes:
>
> > Why don't we also switch to a cryptographically secure algorithm for
> > /dev/urandom?
>
> It IS cryptographically secure. Have you ever read the manpage?

Oops, my bad. I got errors doing man on urandom, but neglected to try a man on
random.

The main reason for my comment was the suggestion by Steve Hill that
/dev/urandom was NOT cryptographically secure. Re-reading it, his comment was
in the context of generating cryptographic keys, so perhaps I misunderstood what
he meant.

Chris

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