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Re: Code copyright in Applied Cryptography (WAS: Re: copyright in one sourcefile of dcd)



On Sun, Apr 09, 2000 at 01:37:37AM +0200, Juergen A. Erhard wrote:
> >>>>> "David" == David Starner <dstarner98@aasaa.ofe.org> writes:
>     David> On Wed, Apr 05, 2000 at 09:43:23AM +0200, Othmar Pasteka wrote:
>     >> <quote>
>     >> 
>     >> /* NIST Secure Hash Algorithm */
>     >> /* heavily modified by Uwe Hollerbach <uh@alumni.caltech edu> */
>     >> /* from Peter C. Gutmann's implementation as found in */
>     >> /* Applied Cryptography by Bruce Schneier */
>     >> /* Further modifications to include the "UNRAVEL" stuff, below */
>     >> 
>     >> /* This code is in the public domain */
>     >> 
>     >> </quote>
>     David> I believe it's public domain, as the author says.  There's no 
>     David> evidence to say that public domain isn't being used in the
>     David> strict legal sense, which is clearly DFSG-Free. 
> 
> I guess what Othmar wants to know is the copyright on the code in BC's
> AC (;-), and, depending on that, whether putting this modified source
> into public domain is possible.
> 
> So, anybody look up Applied Cryptography and tell us?

SHA is discussed on pages 442-442 of _AC_, 2nd Edition, but no source code
is there.

Source code to 9 algorithms is provided in Part V of the book, but SHA is
not one of them.

Peter Gutmann is referenced only once in the book according to the index,
on page 353, as the author of MDC (Message Digest Cipher).

I cannot therefore verify the claim made in the above comment block, using
the Second Edition of Schneier's _Applied Cryptography_.  Perhaps the
matter should be investigated further.

The SHA algorithm can probably be cribbed from GNU Privacy Guard, however,
which is freely licensed.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson            |      "I came, I saw, she conquered."  The
Debian GNU/Linux               |      original Latin seems to have been
branden@ecn.purdue.edu         |      garbled.
roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~branden/ |      -- Robert Heinlein

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