For me this article was not nearly deep enough for me to understand elliptical curve cryptography. What I learned was the equation of an elliptical curve and that it is used in cryptography, the rest was inscrutable.
The entire problem of the article is summed up this paragraph:
> The ECDLP involves finding the integer k such that P=k⋅G, where P is a point on the curve, G is a known point (the generator point), and k is the ephemeral key. The difficulty of this problem is what makes ECC secure.
So uh. What is P? Why do I want to work it out? What’s G? Why do I know it, or not know it? Also k. I assume I know maybe one of these values, but maybe I know none.
Why does any of this make anything secure? I get, in general, that knowing numbers that someone else doesn’t know is good for me to be good at security with someone else, but is it?
nxpnsv|10 months ago
hug|10 months ago
> The ECDLP involves finding the integer k such that P=k⋅G, where P is a point on the curve, G is a known point (the generator point), and k is the ephemeral key. The difficulty of this problem is what makes ECC secure.
So uh. What is P? Why do I want to work it out? What’s G? Why do I know it, or not know it? Also k. I assume I know maybe one of these values, but maybe I know none.
Why does any of this make anything secure? I get, in general, that knowing numbers that someone else doesn’t know is good for me to be good at security with someone else, but is it?
… just not good.
lelanthran|10 months ago
It's not inscrutable, it's missing.