Root Causes: A PKI and Security Podcast

As a follow up to our episode 546, we break down the first of three sets of arguments about QWACs and examine their level of validity.

In our second of three episodes on the topic, we scrutinize arguments made for and against QWACs, this time focused on "governance and sovereignty."

You may have heard of side channel attacks. Now Jason explains what a side oracle attack is and how a side oracle attack in conjunction with AI could be effective against the HQC or Falcon PQC algorithms.

One of the NIST Round 3 PQC finalists that was never selected or eliminated is Classic McEliece. In this episode we explain in non-math terms how this algorithm works.

Continuing our examination of AI in 1000 days, we discuss the use of finely tuned small language models for highly specific use cases.

We discuss what happens when the quality gap between AI-generated and human-generated content drops to zero. We explore the consequences of this inevitable outcome.

In our ongoing series on what AI will look like in 1000 days, we discuss the spread of a new business process, where AIs do the bulk of the work while humans sit in the loop for certain specific tasks and roles.

Following up on our list of top 5 PQC vanguards, in this episode we detail the top 5 PQC laggards.

We describe the top five technology categories that are on the vanguard of driving PQC adoption. We describe what these categories have in common and how that results in early adoption of post quantum cryptography.

We detail the top ten groups inside the organization who introduce rogue certificates into IT organizations.

Tech watchers tend to conflate the many quantum technologies under development right now. In this episode we go through these technologies and explain how they connect.

We discuss quantum clocks and their potential role in cryptography.

We share our PKI predictions for 2026. Topics include PQC, eIDAS 2, CT logging, ACME, passkeys, CA distrust, AI model poisoning, and new attack vectors.

Jason explores the role cryptography and trust systems play in the command and control of groups of autonomous drone systems.

Certificate maximum term is shrinking. In this episode we examine exactly how short they could get.

In our ongoing series on AI in 1000 days, we describe the inevitable, complete distrust of voice printing as an authentication method, including why and what we think will happen.

We begin a new series about what we expect from AI in the next three years. In this episode we discuss AI emulating emotional intelligence and its benefits.

In this episode we discuss the value for enterprises in running mass revocation drills and compare the merits of tabletop exercises versus voluntary revocation events.

We are joined by guests Pol Holzmer and Johannes Sedlmeir to describe their recent research that documents and organizes public arguments made about QWAC certificates. You can find this research at https://orbilu.uni.lu/handle/10993/66334.

The MOSH tool aids the use of SSH-secured sessions, especially across different systems. Jason unpacks the security of this system and how it uses encryption and shared secrets.

We have seen the first known instance of an AI tool discovering a zero-day vulnerability. This could have vast implications on vulnerability detection and bug bounty programs. We discuss the implications.

Chain of lure is an attack method used to circumvent restrictions and boundaries placed on AIs. Jason explains this attack and its implications.

In this episode we go over some of the reasons one might choose HQC over ML-KEM as a PQC key exchange algorithm for specific circumstances. And we discuss the future diversity of cryptography.

NIST recently selected a second Key Exchange Module (KEM) among the PQC algorithms, HQC. We explain this code-based algorithm.

We define Cryptographic Bill of Materials (CBOM), which is more than a list of your cryptography and where it is. A CBOM need also include information about the PQC readiness of environments, availability of updates, and the importance of secrets.