Codebusters Crack Encryption Key
Source: Wired.com
It took four years, 331,000 participants and a difficult legal case, but the relentless efforts of Distributed.net and its supporters have finally broken a 64-bit encryption key developed by RSA Data Securities.
When Distributed.net set up shop in 1997 to test various forms of encryption by essentially breaking through them, organizers figured it could take 100 years to uncover the RC5-64 sequence due to limited computer power and the fact that so many people would have to participate in the effort. Still, they forged ahead.
"We had confidence the rate would improve and that Moore's Law would help us cut down on that time," said David "Nugget" McNett, president of Distributed.net.
Not to mention a $10,000 reward put up by RSA -- along with Distributed.net and the Free Software Foundation, which provided the software used in the effort -- that would go to the person who found the secret message.
There was so much data to analyze for the project that when the key was eventually found in mid-September, McNett and his crew of participants around the world initially overlooked the winning entry. It read: "The unknown message is: Some things are better left unread."
The man who discovered the secret message used a 450-MHz Pentium II to find the solution. A resident of Tokyo, Japan, he has asked to remain anonymous.
