Top all-time · #5699
Frédéric Jacobs
Personal blog · fredericjacobs.com/blog · on HN as FredericJsecurityprogramming
Frédéric Jacobs writes BrainOverfl0w, a personal blog at fredericjacobs.com about security and programming. Since 2012, 13 different Hacker News readers have linked it 30 times, most often “On SMS Logins: An Example from Telegram in Iran”. The last post was in 2024, but the archive is still widely read.
Too few sampled comments (5) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Frédéric Jacobs' blog for its security and cryptography posts: Signal and Telegram account takeovers, post-quantum key exchange, the NSA's shift to post-quantum crypto, and UDID tracking.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 5 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Frédéric Jacobs - Cryptographic & Software Engineering. Welcome to my corner of the Internet 👋
Most-linked posts?
- On SMS Logins: An Example from Telegram in Iran3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2016-01-14
- UDID Leak : Identifying the Traitor3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2012-09-04
- Revisiting the NSA Suite B Announcement3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2016-01-27
- Some Bits from the NSA COMSEC Guide2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2015-12-18
- Double Ratchet and the Quantum Computers2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2017-12-27
What Hacker News says?
I think tptacek was talking about actual takeovers of Telegram accounts. AFAIK there have been documented cases of this in Iran and Russia. See e.g. https://www.fredericjacobs.com/blog/2016/01/14/sms-login/
Comment linking /blog/2016/01/14/sms-login/
on “Why I won't recommend Signal anymore”Submitted UDID Leak : Identifying the Traitor as a story · 141 points
HN discussionhttps://www.fredericjacobs.com/blog/2016/04/07/qc-axolotl/ might be a good place to start answering this question. If you can break the ECDH, you can figure out the key that was calculated. However, if other unknown data (e.g. past ECDH outputs) is hashed together to generate the key (like Signal does, as a very rough description), it's only post-quantum secure if the adversary ever misses a single message . Other t…
Comment linking /blog/2016/04/07/qc-axolotl/
on “NIST Post-Quantum Cryptography Round 1 Submissions”Submitted One Million page views on movies.io as a story · 81 points
HN discussionIsn't that what http://fredericjacobs.com/identifying-the-traitor is?
Comment linking /identifying-the-traitor
on “That UDID script I wrote - 350K hits... (w/source)”Submitted Bumping into Stallman, again as a story · 30 points
HN discussionIf your UDID script returns a positve, could you display a link to http://fredericjacobs.com/identifying-the-traitor and his "identifying the traitor" survey?
Comment linking /identifying-the-traitor
on “That UDID script I wrote - 350K hits... (w/source)”Submitted Revisiting the NSA Suite B Announcement as a story · 14 points
HN discussionAccording to NIST, researchers are suggesting that a quantum computer capable of breaking 2048 will be available for less than a billion dollars within the next 15 years: http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/drafts/nistir-8105/nistir_... Also relevant is Frederic Jacob's analysis of the NSA's relatively sudden shift towards post-quantum cryptography: "[It] says that it takes up to 20 years for algorithms to be fully de…
Comment linking /blog/2016/01/27/NSA-QC/
on “The Long-Awaited Promise of a Programmable Quantum Computer”Submitted The Hypocrisy of the West - Angry Syrians rejected by Apple as a story · 10 points
HN discussionSubmitted What we know about the UDID Leak (and what we don't) as a story · 9 points
HN discussionSubmitted Check.torproject.org and IPv6 as a story · 5 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Broken Mindset as a story · 5 points
HN discussionSubmitted On SMS Logins II: An Example from Telegram in Russia as a story · 4 points
HN discussionSubmitted Some Bits from the NSA COMSEC Guide as a story · 4 points
HN discussionSubmitted What I know about successful software releases. as a story · 4 points
HN discussionSubmitted On SMS Logins: An Example from Telegram in Iran as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Broken Mindset as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted Axolotl and the Quantum Computers as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted On SMS Logins: An Example from Telegram in Iran as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Some Bits from the NSA COMSEC Guide as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Value of Retail as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Here is the new iPhone packaging as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted How to Record your Y Combinator Application as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Windows Phone is all about UX as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Double Ratchet and the Quantum Computers as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Revisiting the NSA Suite B Announcement as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Facebook Graph Search - The Monetization Theory as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted What I know about software releases as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Is Social Media Killing Journalism? as a story · 1 points
HN discussion