[Whonix-devel] MinEntropy Implications for Passphrase Strength

Wed Nov 20 00:20:14 CET 2019

Hi Arnold. I came across a publication that claims minentropy is a more
accurate measure for passphrase strength than Shannon Entropy. The
Wikipedia article on the topic is complex and not really accessible for
people who want to learn about it.

Questions:

* What is Minentropy and how does it impact Diceware passphrase strength?

* How do I calculate it?

I would appreciate a plain English explanation I can add to our
documentation. TIA.

https://www.cs.bu.edu/~reyzin/papers/entropy-survey-ICITS-2011-no-animations.pdf

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Min-entropy

PS. Before sending I found this link that somewhat helps:

https://crypto.stackexchange.com/questions/63786/relation-between-entropy-and-min-entropy

Does this imply minentropy is only relevant in cases where passphrases
are formed from sources with non uniform distributions?

I have CC'd our ML so your reply can benefit our users.