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Sizing Up Post-Quantum Signatures

Sizing Up Post-Quantum Signatures
Sizing Up Post-Quantum Signatures

Quantum computers are a boon and a bane. Originally conceived by Manin and Feyman to simulate nature efficiently, large-scale quantum computers will speed-up innovation in material sciences by orders of magnitude. Consider the technical advances enabled by the discovery of new materials (with bronze, iron, steel and silicon each ascribed their own age!); quantum computers could help to unlock the next age of innovation. Unfortunately, they will also break the majority of the cryptography that’s currently used in TLS to protect our web browsing. They fall in two categories:

  1. Digital signatures, such as RSA, which ensure you’re talking to the right server.
  2. Key exchanges, such as Diffie–Hellman, which are used to agree on encryption keys.

A moderately-sized stable quantum computer will easily break the signatures and key exchanges currently used in TLS using Shor’s algorithm. Luckily this can be fixed: over the last two decades, there has been great progress in so-called post-quantum cryptography. “Post quantum”, abbreviated PQ, means secure against quantum computers. Five years ago, the standards institute NIST started a public process to standardise post-quantum signature schemes and key exchanges. The outcome is expected to be announced early 2022.

At Cloudflare, we’re not just following this Continue reading

How To Prevent Arthritis From Computer Usage?

Arthritis is one of the most common conditions faced by office workers. It can be mild or severe. Sometimes the pain can be unmanageable too. Besides that, it can affect you permanently.

If you work on computers every day, you are more likely to suffer from arthritis. But worry no more. Here are some measures that you can take to prevent arthritis from computer usage.

Maintain Movement

Does your job require you to sit in front of a computer all day? If so, then you need to consider taking breaks in between. That is because sitting in one position can stiffen your muscles. By moving around, you can release tension.

Besides that, you should also take small breaks when performing a repetitive task. For example, if you type consistently for long periods, stop in between. And for at least five minutes, ensure that your hands are at rest.

Keep Your Feet In Good Position

If you work on a high desk, then it’s most likely your feet won’t be touching the ground. That is something you need to avoid because it can stress your lower back. As a result, the risk of arthritis development will increase.

One way to ensure Continue reading

Automation 4. Extracting and Exploring 6WING YANG Modules with NETCONF, Pyang and Ansible

Hello my friend,

Some time ago we’ve explained how to deploy a 6WING vRouter in a Linux environmennt, such as our Open Source Virtualised cloud with Debian Linux and ProxMox. One of the good things about 6WIND is that its configuration is entirely based on YANG modules and is exposable via NETCONF. Today you will learn how to get 6WIND YANG modules, how are they structured with Pyang and how to automate its extraction with Ansible.



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Why Is Everyone so Passionate about Model-Driven Automation and YANG?

All we love nice configuration files made in easy readable YANG or JSON, isn’t it? The beauty of working with them is that you don’t need to create a text string parsers, which is always a difficult task. One of the reasons, why it is so difficult to create parsers, is because of ever changing CLI structures and also values in the semi-formatted text, our ascii tables we see Continue reading

How to rsync files between two remotes?

scp -3 can copy files between two remote hosts through localhost. This comes in handy when the two servers cannot communicate directly or if they are unable to authenticate one to the other.1 Unfortunately, rsync does not support such a feature. Here is a trick to emulate the behavior of scp -3 with SSH tunnels.

When syncing with a remote host, rsync invokes ssh to spawn a remote rsync --server process. It interacts with it through its standard input and output. The idea is to recreate the same setup using SSH tunnels and socat, a versatile tool to establish bidirectional data transfers.

The first step is to connect to the source server and ask rsync the command-line to spawn the remote rsync --server process. The -e flag overrides the command to use to get a remote shell: instead of ssh, we use echo.

$ ssh web04
$ rsync -e 'sh -c ">&2 echo $@" echo' -aLv /data/. web05:/data/.
web05 rsync --server -vlogDtpre.iLsfxCIvu . /data/.
rsync: connection unexpectedly closed (0 bytes received so far) [sender]
rsync error: error in rsync protocol data stream (code 12) at io.c(228) [sender=3.2.3]

The second step is to connect to Continue reading

Soap Opera: SRv6 Is Insecure

I heard about SRv6 when it was still on the drawing board, and my initial reaction was “Another attempt to implement source routing. We know how that ends.” The then-counter-argument by one of the proponents went along the lines of “but we’ll use signed headers to prevent abuse” and I thought “yeah, that will work really well in silicon implementations”.

Years later, Andrew Alston decided to document the state of the emperor’s wardrobe (TL&DR: of course SRv6 is insecure and can be easily abused) and the counter-argument this time was “but that applies to any tunnel technology”. Thank you, we knew that all along, and that’s not what was promised.

You might want to browse the rest of that email thread; it’s fun reading unless you built your next-generation network design on SRv6 running across third-party networks… which was another PowerPoint case study used by SRv6 proponents.

Soap Opera: SRv6 Is Insecure

I heard about SRv6 when it was still on the drawing board, and my initial reaction was “Another attempt to implement source routing. We know how that ends.” The then-counter-argument by one of the proponents went along the lines of “but we’ll use signed headers to prevent abuse” and I thought “yeah, that will work really well in silicon implementations”.

Years later, Andrew Alston decided to document the state of the emperor’s wardrobe (TL&DR: of course SRv6 is insecure and can be easily abused) and the counter-argument this time was “but that applies to any tunnel technology”. Thank you, we knew that all along, and that’s not what was promised.

You might want to browse the rest of that email thread; it’s fun reading unless you built your next-generation network design on SRv6 running across third-party networks… which was another PowerPoint case study used by SRv6 proponents.

Weekend Reads 110521


From Facebook to LinkedIn to Indeed, ads are popping up that promise well-paying jobs — if applicants provide their Social Security numbers and other details up front. Scammers then use the information to apply for unemployment benefits.


The coronavirus pandemic giveth to Amazon retail business and its Amazon Web Services cloud business, and the pandemic taketh away from the Amazon retail business.


Companies should recognize that collaboration platforms aren’t isolated, secure channels where traditional threats don’t exist.


The Federal Aviation Administration said on Tuesday it had issued a special information bulletin alerting manufacturers, operators, and pilots that action may be needed to address potential interference with sensitive aircraft electronics caused by the use of 5G telecommunications technology.


The holiday shopping season always means big business for phishers, who tend to find increased success this time of year with a lure about a wayward package that needs redelivery.


If not handled in time, the attacks can lead to IP reputation loss and blocklisting, causing severe and expensive damage to companies, but a few precautionary steps can help keep the threats at bay.


The following resources and tutorials will enhance your understanding of container network security and help you get started.


With Continue reading

Is the M1 MacBook Pro Wi-Fi Really Slower?

I ordered a new M1 MacBook Pro to upgrade my existing model from 2016. I’m still waiting on it to arrive by managed to catch a sensationalist headline in the process:

“New MacBook Wi-Fi Slower than Intel Model!”

The article referenced this spec sheet from Apple referencing the various cards and capabilities of the MacBook Pro line. I looked it over and found that, according to the tables, the wireless card in the M1 MacBook Pro is capable of a maximum data rate of 1200 Mbps. The wireless card in the older model Intel MacBook Pro all the way back to 2017 is capable of 1300 Mbps. Case closed! The older one is indeed faster. Except that’s not the case anywhere but on paper.

PHYs, Damned Lies, and Statistics

You’d be forgiven for jumping right to the numbers in the table and using your first grade inequality math to figure out that 1300 is bigger than 1200. I’m sure it’s what the authors of the article did. Me? I decided to dig in a little deeper to find some answers.

It only took me about 10 seconds to find the first answer as to one of the differences in Continue reading

When students go back to school mobile usage goes down

When students go back to school mobile usage goes down
When students go back to school mobile usage goes down

For many (especially in the Northern Hemisphere, where about 87% of humans live), September is the “get back to school” (or work) month after a summer break and that also reflects changes in the Internet traffic, particularly in mobile usage.

Looking at our data (you can see many of these insights in Cloudflare Radar) there’s a global trend: mobile traffic lost importance (compared with desktop traffic) in September. The next chart shows there was less percentage of Internet traffic from mobile devices after Monday, September 6, 2021, with a difference of -2% in some days, compared with the previous four weeks (August), and in late September it’s more than -3%.

When students go back to school mobile usage goes down

We can also see that the percentage of desktop traffic increased in September compared to August (we compare here to complete weeks between both months because there are significant differences between weekdays and weekends).

When students go back to school mobile usage goes down

A few of weeks ago, we  saw there are considerable differences between countries regarding the importance of mobile usage. Getting back to work (or office hours) usually means an increase in desktop traffic. In that blog we highlighted the advantages that mobile devices brought to developing countries — many had their first contact with Continue reading

Video: How Can You Master Public Cloud Networking?

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you’ve probably realized there’s still need for networking in public clouds, and mastering it requires slightly different set of skills. What could you as a networking engineer to get fluent in this different world? I collected a few hints in the last video in Introduction to Cloud Computing webinar.

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