Footnote 2

[Page last modified: November 11, 1995]

It could be argued that the IV doesn't need secrecy while the keys do, so the IV should be transmitted separately. However, it doesn't hurt security to pass the IV in secret -- and if IV and keys were generated by a pseudo-random number source rather than a truly random source, then exposure of the IV might give information to the enemy about the keys themselves.

Carl Ellison --- cme@acm.org