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Spectre

Spectre introduces a completely new way of thinking about passwords.

[[TOC]]

Don't store; derive

Every attempt to solve the problem of passwords by means of storing countless unique site-specific tokens inevitably leads to complexity, loss of control, and security compromise.

Spectre flips the problem on its head by rejecting the notion of statefulness and giving the user a single secret to remember. The Spectre algorithm then derives whatever secret tokens you need.

site-password = SPECTRE( user-name, user-secret, site-name )

How does it work?

In short (simplified):

user-key = SCRYPT( user-name, user-secret )
site-key = HMAC-SHA-256( site-name . site-counter, user-key )
site-password = PW( site-template, site-key )

Consequently, Spectre can derive any site-password given the necessary base ingredients (ie. the user-name, user-secret, site-name, site-counter and site-template).

As an example:

user-name = Robert Lee Mitchell
user-secret = banana colored duckling
site-name = twitter.com
site-counter = 1
site-template = Long Password
site-password = PozoLalv0_Yelo

We standardize user-name as your full legal name, site-name as the domain name that hosts the site, site-counter to 1 (unless you explicitly increment it) and site-template to Long Password; as a result the only token the user really needs to remember is their user-secret.

Source Code

Spectre's algorithm and implementation is fully documented and licensed Free Software under the (GPLv3)[LICENSE].

Components

The source is broken down into several components:

  • api: The algorithm's reference implementation and API library. There is a C, Java and W3C interface.
  • cli: The official command-line interface for POSIX systems.
  • desktop: The official cross-platform desktop application.
  • macos: The official Apple macOS desktop application.
  • ios: The official Apple iOS mobile application.
  • android: The official Google Android mobile application.
  • web: The official cross-platform web application.
  • www: The Spectre homepage.

Building and running

These instructions are for the Apple iOS application.

  1. Make sure you have all submodules checked out.
  2. Export application icons into design/icon.
  3. Open Spectre.xcworkspace in Xcode.
  4. Build & Run.