random number generator

['chris']

hi

during the startup of my Debian Sarge Stable, I get following error messages:

Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/hotplug/shpchp.o: init_module: Operation not permitted
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: Hint: insmod errors can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters.
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: You may find more information in syslog or the output from dmesg
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/hotplug/shpchp.o: insmod shpchp failed
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: shpchp: can't be loaded
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: missing kernel or user mode driver shpchp
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/hotplug/pciehp.o: init_module: Operation not permitted
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: Hint: insmod errors can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters.
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: You may find more information in syslog or the output from dmesg
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/hotplug/pciehp.o: insmod pciehp failed
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: pciehp: can't be loaded
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: missing kernel or user mode driver pciehp
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/char/i810_rng.o: init_module: No such device
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: Hint: insmod errors can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters.
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: You may find more information in syslog or the output from dmesg
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/char/i810_rng.o: insmod i810_rng failed
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: i810_rng: can't be loaded
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: missing kernel or user mode driver i810_rng
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/char/hw_random.o: init_module: No such device
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: Hint: insmod errors can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters.
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: You may find more information in syslog or the output from dmesg
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/char/hw_random.o: insmod hw_random failed
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: hw_random: can't be loaded
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: missing kernel or user mode driver hw_random
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: ehci-hcd: already loaded
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: usb-uhci: already loaded
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/usb/host/uhci.o: init_module: No such device
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: Hint: insmod errors can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters.
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: You may find more information in syslog or the output from dmesg
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: insmod: /lib/modules/2.4.27-2-386/kernel/drivers/usb/host/uhci.o: insmod uhci failed
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: uhci: can't be loaded
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: missing kernel or user mode driver uhci
Sun Jun 26 13:17:39 2005: intelfb: ignoring pci display module


this is a very important PROXY / DNS server for ca. 300 clients
it seems the system cannot finde some modules.
how dangerous is, to run this server without a random number generator ?
when the random number generator is exactly required ?
or I can really sleep well if I blacklist these all modules ?

kind regards
chris

[Stuart Browne · Accepted solution]

I highly doubt you have a hardware-random-number-generator!

And why is your system trying to insert all these drivers of hardware you don't have ?!

err, so 'No', won't do any bad thing. Black-list away!

[Gopi Sekar]

It looks like Debian simply tries to load all the modules regardless of whether the corresponding hardware exist or not.

check up /etc/rc.sysinit (I am not sure) which loads most of the drivers and call other scripts to load drivers.

I faced similar kind of issue in slackware where it tries to load all drivers

Hope this helps,
Gopi

['chris']

howto check if I need hardware-random-number-generator ?

[Stuart Browne]

I can say that you do not need one, without any doubt whats-so-ever. This server is only doing DNS and SQUID, nothing that needs good randomness!

You're not doing high level entropy testing and development, or physics calculations. You're not doing anything which would require true random numbers (just like 99.9% of the rest of us).

The '/dev/random' and '/dev/urandom' are good enough.

[Steven E. Protter]

Random number generators are important. Encryption uses them, secure shell and certain kinds of authentication needs a strong random number generator.

I would not tolerate this problem on a production server for any length of time.

SEP

[Stuart Browne]

Whilst SSH and HTTPS uses random number generation for it's encryption, they do not require a Hardware Random Number Generator.

I've actually never used a system with a Hardware Random Number Generator, and i've used many thousands of systems.

I wasn't aware that *ANY* HP server came with one, regardless of whether it was PARISC, x86 or IA64!

['chris']

thanks for all answers,
but howto check if my hardware support
random number generator ?
is it any tools for linux or windows ?

[Matti_Kurkela]

The comments in the Linux hw_random driver source code file (/drivers/char/hw_random.c) suggest that the driver recognizes three kinds of hardware random number generators:
- the one in AMD 768 chipset
- the one in some Intel i810 series chipsets
- the one in VIA Nehemiah CPUs (mostly seen in newer Mini-ITX motherboards).

The i810_rng was an older version of the driver, which supported only i810 chipset RNG. Later a generalized version with more hardware support was made, and it was named "hw_random".

Before these chipsets, the hardware random number generator was a feature only in some SSL accelerators or other specialized hardware. Since the hardware RNG is not very difficult to implement and cryptography is getting more important, someone had an idea to add it to a basic PC chipset.

[Guru Dutta]

I think that you get errors because the modules are missing. Compile a new kernel with all the modules that you need into the kernel

[Stuart Browne]

No, the errors are becuase the hardware the drivers are trying to access are absent.

Thus meaning that the system this is running on does not have those pices of hardware.

[Steven E. Protter]

Hardware random number generator?

No, you don't need that. The CPU has a math coprocessor and all the power it needs built in. Software random number generation built into the OS will more than do the job.

Apologies if I confused anyone here.

SEP