Re: Generic checksums (MD5 DB)

[kluegel () LANL GOV (Thomas J. Kluegel)]

> Pool our tripwire databases together??? I'd like to see if some kids
> figure out a way to make their rootkit'ed version fit _one_ of the
> "ok" MD5's - random chance? :-{
>
> Cheers,
> Filip G.

MD5 is 128-bits, and there's no publicly known way to forge a file
that has a given MD5 value. Its exceedingly improbable that two
given files would accidently have the same MD5 values. Also, its
computationally too expensive to attack via brute force. The only
hope for cracking such a thing is for someone to make a mathematical
breakthrough that enables forging with a computationally feasible
effort. At this time, I think MD5 is safe.

-- Tom Kluegel
   Los Alamos National Laboratory
   Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA