Madhu's Corner :: Projects :: Yarrow

A secure PRNG that should improve security
Links, Information and a C++ implementation.

Random Number Generators

Note that I did not say Pseudo Random Number Generators. Here we are talking about the real McCoy, true, real, actual, random numbers. As John Von Neuman once said - anyone trying to generate random numbers through an algorithmic process is living in a state of sin. These are programs that live on machines trying to distill the true randomness or entropy, as it's commonly known as to provide unrepeatable sequences of cryptographically strong numbers.

• Ocotillo Implementation
  /dev/random for Unices that don't have one.
  


• Entropy Gathering Daemon
  Similar to Ocotillo, but written in Perl. Yum! Recommended by GNUpg, so I guess this is good!
  


• /dev/random for Solaris
  For use with GnuPG, so probably safe as well. In Version 0.6.
  


• Yarrow
  This is strong RNG designed by Bruce Schnieder and collegues. One of the first designed and thought out RNG's.
  


• Random Number Generation - Issues
  A good article at IBM Developer Works.
  


• /dev/random Support Page
  Links to /dev/random, BSD mainly.
  


• random.org
  A source of random atmospheric noise (via CORBA or the web).
  

Most if not all of these live in user space. The kernel space equivalents are the heavy duty /dev/random or /dev/urandom and their equivalents.

Yarrow - Implementations

These are the various implementations of the Yarrow Algorithm that I know of. If you have any idea about any other implementation, please let me know.

• The Original Incomplete Reference Implementation
  Originally written for Counterpane, is incomplete - designed for Win32.
  


• A C Implementation
  The first nearly complete code, lacking random source code, however.
  


• C Implementation
  From the FreeBSD /dev/random section.
  


• C++ Implementation
  An incomplete C++ implementation.
  


• Python Implementation
  A complete and useful python implementation.
  


• Nettle
  Nettle is a low level crypto lib thats supports Yarrow 256, using AES (thanks to Meilof Veeningen for the info)
  


• FreeBSD implementation
  The first OS implementation that I've seen.