A world without certificate authorities

love locks
When networks began to expand and people saw the need for secure communication, they designed complex systems based on public key cryptography, that worked more or less. Problem: how do you trust that the key a server sent you is the right one? How can you make sure that it is not somebody else trying to impersonate that website?

Multiple solutions were proposed, and the most promising was a public directory of domain names and associated public keys, maintained by a peer to peer network named KeyCoin. It looked better than so called Web Of Trust solutions, because everybody could agree on what was the correct key for a given domain. As long as nobody hold 51% of the network, no change could happen without being validated by a lot of different peers. The network was maintained by 10000 enthusiast system administrators who took their task very seriously (after all, the security of the whole system depended on their honesty), and nobody had enough computing power to take over the network.

After a while, people began using the system, since it was directly integrated in their browsers, but they did not want to run a node on the network themselves. It was too bothersome, and they could trust the administrators. Also, they had to ask one of them to make a change everytime. The whole process was a bit artisanal.

In the meantime, some people demonstrated the 51% attack on networks of reduced size, and that worried people. They wanted a safe system, one that was not only relying on those sysadmins that could do anything. Who were they anyway? Running that system was still too complex for non technical too run it themselves anyway, so they did not worry enough. But some governments found that rewriting the truth of name/key matching was interesting. Maybe to catch pedophiles, terrorists, criminals. Or maybe to censor websites, I do not know, they told me it was for my own good.

Some smart person found a good solution: if controlling the whole system necessitated owning 51% of the system, the easiest way was to have a lot of machines, enough to counteract the sysadmins. That did not seem risky when people designed the system. Nobody could have enough computing power to take over the whole network, and there would be even more nodes every day.

Yet, that person got enough funding to install tens of thousands of machines and make them join the network. They even provided a nice enough interface for people and businesses to input their domain name and public key, as long as they paid some fees. The sysadmins welcomed him at first, since money coming in the system validated their ideas. Atfer a while, they started worrying, since none of them could keep up with the computing power, but that company asssured them it would never attain 51% of the network.

Other companies jumped on the bandwagon and started to profit from that new business opportunity. Governments started their own server farms to participate too. Problem: now that everybody (except the sysadmins) had a lot of computing power, nobody had enough to control the network entirely.

So they started making alliances. If a few major players work as a team, they can do whatever they want on the network. If one of them decided to try and replace a key on the ledger, others could help it. Of course, once they begun doing that, others wanted to participate. So they created a few rules to join their club. First, you needed to have enough machines. That was a good rule, because that made a big barrier to entry. You could not start as a small player. The other rules? You had to submit to an audit, performed by the other players. Yet another barrier to entry. And once they deemed you acceptable, you had to follow the requests of governments, which were arbitrarily refusing candidates.

Even with the big barriers to entry, a few hundred players came up, often backed by governments. Of course, all ended up in the same team, doing whatever they wanted, as long as nobody was complaining, because anytime one of them had something shady to do, all of them followed automatically.

Since building those big companies required money, they made their clients pay more and more, and to make it easier to accept, provided “premium” options where they show they trust you more, since they took the time to phone your company and ask a few questions.

Some found that big system too centralized, too obedient to states, and decided to fork it. There are separate public ledgers, but they do not come directly embedded in browsers, you need to integrate them yourself, and that’s bothersome. Also, most of those networks have a few hundred nodes at best.

From a nice, decentralized, home made system, we ended up with a centralized system controlled by corporations and governments.

Now let me tell you about that system I designed. It is based on a concept named certificate, a cryptographically signed file that links the public key to a domain name. Now here’s the catch: a certificate represents a key, and is signed by another key, which is represented by another certificate, and so on and so forth until a certificate that signs itself. That system is good, because you just have to embed the root certificate that your friends gives you, and you’ll be able to verify the key of his websites, even if those keys change. And this, without even asking the public ledger, so that is a truly decentralized and more anonymous system! Nothing could go wrong with that, right?

Programming VS Mathematics, and other pointless debates

I do not know who started this argument a few days ago. It feels like something coming from HN. Do you need to know mathematics to be a good programmer?

There is a lot of differing opinions. Maybe programming is a subbranch of mathematics, or programming is using mathematics. Or learning programming is closer to learning a new language. For me, saying that programming is about languages is like saying that literature is about languages. Sure, you need words to indicate concepts, some languages are better suited than others for that, and some concepts are better expressed in other languages. It is more like a hierarchy to me: philosophy formalizes concepts used by authors to write in common languages. Mathematics formalize concepts used by programmers to create code in common languages.
But this is besides the point.

This debate sparks outrage, since it touches a central point of our education, and one that is often not taught very well. “Look, I do not use geometry while writing a loop, so maths are pointless for me”. A lot of developers will never learn basic algebra or logic and will never need it in their day job. And that’s okay.
Programming is not a single profession anymore. Each and every one of us has a different definition. A mechanical engineer working on bridges, another on metallic parts for cars and another one on plastic toys all have different needs, different techniques for their job, although the fundamental basis (evaluating breaking strength, time of assembly, production costs) is the same. That does not make one of these jobs worth more than the other.

The real problem is that we are still fighting among ourselves to define what our job is. The other pointless debate, about software being engineering, science or craft, is evidence of that. And it will stay hard to define for a long time.
We are in a unique position. Usually, when a new field emerges, either tinkerers are launching it and later, good practices are studied to make it engineering, or scientists create it, then means of production become cheaper and crafters take over.
Computers were started by scientists, but the ease of access gave crafters a good opportunity to take over. But that does not mean research stopped when people started coding at home. So now, in a relatively new field (less than a century), while we are still exploring, we have a very large spectrum of jobs and approaches, from the most scientific to the most artistic kind. And that is okay. More world views will help us get better at our respective jobs.

So, while you are arguing that the other side is misguided, irrealistic or unrigorous, take time to consider where they come from. They do not have the same job, and that job can seem pointless to you, but they can be good at it, so there is probably something good you can learn from their approach. The only thing you should not forgive from the other side is the lack of curiosity.

How to choose your secure messaging app



Those are not good enough requirements:

  • independent from Facebook
  • fast
  • multi platforms
  • open source




  • Why do you need it?
  • With whom will you communicate?
  • Who is the adversary?
  • Does it need to be always available?
  • For how long will it be used?


Here are a few examples that you could consider.

The activist in a protest






The employee of a company with confidential projects





The common user





Your use case here



The problem with meritocracy

Everytime people discuss the hacker community and its diversity, I see someone waving the “meritocracy” argument. “It is not our fault those minorities are not well represented, if they knew more stuff or did more stuff, they would have a better status”.

It is easy to see how that argument would be flawed, as meritocracy is a power structure, and whenever a power structure is created, after some time it tends to reinforce its own community. But that is not my point right now.

I realized that the idea of meritocracy is so deeply ingrained in the hacker mindset that we lost sight of what was important. I can see how that idea is appealing. Once you prove you know stuff, people will recognize you, and that will be enough to motivate you to learn. Except it is not. The meritocracy is just another way to exclude people. Once you consider someone’s status by how much you perceive they know, things go downhill.

Some are good at faking knowledge. Some know their craft, but do not talk that well. Some are not experts, but have good ideas. Some would like to learn without being judged. Everytime you dismiss someone’s opinion because of their apparent (lack of) knowledge, everytime you favor someone’s opinion because of their apparent knowledge, you are being unscientific and unwelcoming. You are not a hacker, you are just a jerk.

Somewhere along the way, people got too hung up on meritocracy, and forgot that you hack for knowledge and for fun, not for status. It is all about testing stuff, learning, sharing what you learned, discussing ideas and helping others do the same, whatever their skills or their experience. Status and power structures should have nothing to do with that.

Guess what? I pointed out that bad behaviour, but I am guilty of it too. I have to constantly keep myself in check, to avoid judging people instead of judging ideas. That’s alright. Doing the right thing always requires some effort.





(from their FAQ)

Yup. Very secure, they said it.

So, let’s take a look around.

Available technical information




(Seen on Hacker News)





Network protocol




















SafeChat, P2P encrypted messages?



What is SafeChat?

Open source encryption based instant messaging software




Available technical information





Network protocol







Yup, I really feel safe now.

Joke aside, here is what we can guess:

  • no rekeying, ie no perfect forward secrecy
  • no info on message authentication or integrity verification


Threat model




Attacker types:

  • nation state: please, stop joking…



Alternatives to this service:


My ideal job posting







  • getting paid to write code
  • work on interesting technologies
  • a nice workplace atmosphere
  • learn
  • etc.












HN Discuss on Hacker News