Re:A wall of lava lamps helps encrypt the internet
by cmpxchg on Sunday December 31, 2017 @06:39PM
(#16043666)
A 10 μCi 137Cs source is not dangerous. Even here in California, you can legally throw these away in the regular trash (if solid) or wash them down a sink drain (if liquid). Compared to the kind of ordinary household chemicals people are using every day in large volumes, these things are harmless. You definitely don't need a lead-lined room.
Source: I worked in a lab
Re:A wall of lava lamps helps encrypt the internet
by gruez on Sunday December 31, 2017 @01:33PM
(#16041904)
>As the material decays, its rate of generating bits of data slows down.
can't you use something with a really long half-life?
Re:A wall of lava lamps helps encrypt the internet
by noir_lord on Sunday December 31, 2017 @01:43PM
(#16041954)
but then your initial rate is much slower.
Re:A wall of lava lamps helps encrypt the internet
by adam_w_02125 on Sunday December 31, 2017 @02:00PM
(#16042055)
So get more material!
The classic HotBits ( https://www.fourmilab.ch/hotbits/ ) uses radioactive decay to get its random data. This generates 100 bytes per second of randomness. But that also depends on getting a radiation source. A single one costs about $80. A lava lamp costs $10.
Working off the list of isotopes that they provide, You've got things that have half-lives. The issue there is that the way that one generates random data from radioactivity is get an event (A), and then get another event (B) and another event (C). The time between A and B is compared to the time between B and C. If AB is shorter than CD you've got a 1. If its longer than you've got a 0. If its the same, then throw about AB. As the material decays, its rate of generating bits of data slows down.
Lava lamps are easily replaceable and don't have half-lives.
I suspect there's also issue with "here is our lead lined vault where we keep a bunch of radioactive disks to generate random data". Sure, the units are micro Curie (the most active one is a 10uCi Cesium 137). But... do you want to go into that room and change a burnt out detector? How about swapping out a lava lamp because of a burnt out bulb?