No Spook Leaves Randomness to Chance
Shaanan Cohney
DEF CON 33 (backfill) · Day 1 · Main Stage
In "No Spook Leaves Randomness to Chance," Shaanan Cohney, an academic researcher at the University of Melbourne, delves into the elusive question of how state-level adversaries, such as the NSA, manage to decrypt encrypted traffic at scale. Moving beyond common theories like brute-forcing or widespread hardware implants, Cohney presents a compelling argument that a significant vector for mass decryption lies in the subversion of cryptographic standards and the accompanying certification processes. His research, spanning over 15 years and involving a global team, meticulously dissects instances where seemingly subtle design choices or implementation guidance within official standards have introduced systemic weaknesses, which can then be exploited by sophisticated attackers.
AI review
Cohney delivers 15 years of original cryptographic research into a coherent, technically devastating argument: mass decryption at scale isn't science fiction, it's a standards problem. The combination of reverse-engineered firmware, live TLS decryption demos, and a unified theoretical model (PsyCO) that connects Dual EC to TETRA to RFC 5114 is exactly the kind of work that earns a permanent spot in the DEF CON canon.