Re: [Patents] Cryptographic patent... and research.

[Bernhard Kaindl <bernhard.kaindl@gmx.de>]

>
> > And he was explicitly talking about RSA saying that it took brillant
> > mind years do discover something that changed completely the shape of
> > cryptography.

Read this: http://www.cyberlaw.com/rsa.html

It demonstrates quite clear that RSA is just a variant of the Pohlig-Hellman
algotithm which existed before RSA.

Just see the table in the page yourself:

+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  Comparison of RSA and  |                        |                  |
|     Pohlig-Hellman      |                        |                  |
|-------------------------+------------------------+------------------|
|                         |RSA System              |Pohlig-Hellman    |
|-------------------------+------------------------+------------------|
|Encryption Operation     |C = M^e mod n           |C = M^e mod p     |
|-------------------------+------------------------+------------------|
|Decryption Operation     |M = C^e mod n           |M = C^e mod p     |
|-------------------------+------------------------+------------------|
|modulus                  |p * q (prime numbers)   |p (prime number)  |
|-------------------------+------------------------+------------------|
|Encryption exponent (e)  |e relatively prime to   |e relatively prime|
|                         |(p-1)*(q-1)             |to (p-1)          |
|-------------------------+------------------------+------------------|
|Decryption exponent (d)  |d = e^-1 mod ((p-1)*    |d = e^-1 mod (p-1)|
|                         |(q-1))                  |                  |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------+

The only difference is the use of n vs. p -> a product of two primes
vs. a prime.

So there is clear prior art and the autor of this page thinks that
the RSA patent is very weak therefore(and is has ran out in 2000, it
tells also)

> > He wanted for those who discovered RSA some "protection".

the protection it deserves is taking of the product of two primes
instead of just a prime should be very high...

> > I can understand that MP3 compression tell us something about the force
> > of nature since the filtering of sound that human do not hear is not
> > something that can be done without real testing.
>
> MP3 hardly tells us anything about *controllable* forces of nature, e.g.
> soundwaves, but, at best, about the psychology of hearing.
>
> If you look at the claims in the MP3-related patents, as listed at
>
>       http://swpat.ffii.org/patents/effects/mpeg/
>
> you may moreover find them not so different, e.g.

I was told that mp3 wasn't something really new, the mpeg encoding
for a signal was well-known, mp3 only adds the results of tests which
frequencies can be omitted(simplyfied, this was what I was told)

Many people have shown that patents are not a practical way to
stimulate reseach and make the research reuseable.

Bernhard

PS: I had a strange idea to replace software patents....:
(really strange, I don't think it's really realistic, just for fun)

What about replacing software patents with a software library licence,
where you don't need to apply for a patent put just put it up on a
centralized public library, add a descriptive text and work on sorting
the program component into a structure which allows efficient patent
search for software, and get your software component publically registered
there. All software in the public library gets a license which allows
free public use for education and testing purposes and a free license
to use in free software :-)

For commerical use the license costs only a low percentage of the
products revenue, but the sum of all licenses percentages will never
go beyond 10% of the product's revenue, so if there are more claims,
their percentages get divided....