Initializing Secure Random (Reprise)

[roger riggs]

Hi,

This topic has languished for a bit and could use a bit of expertise from
Windows developers.

The improvements in entropy for initializing Secure Random in JDK 8 have
some negative attributes that affect maintainability, robustness and 
performance[1].
The dependency on networking, can in some OS's and configurations lead
to increased startup times and issues with bootstrapping the Java runtime.

Martin has proposed[2] an alternative for Linux based on /dev/urandom
with a fallback to a simpler algorithm if /dev/urandom is not available.

Since /dev/urandom is not native to Windows, it seems prudent to identify
a corresponding source of entropy data.

What are the recommended ways on Windows to get seeds for random?
Please suggest one or more ways to initialize SecureRandom

Thanks, Roger

p.s. Sorry to be covering old ground but I don't have all the context.


[1] 8060435  SecureRandom initialization latency on Windows
      https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8060435

[2] 
http://cr.openjdk.java.net/~martin/webrevs/openjdk9/ThreadLocalRandom-system-entropy/