Wang Chao from Shanghai University, used a D-Wave machine to attack Substitution-Permutation Network (SPN) structured algorithms that perform a series of mathematical operations to encrypt info. SPN techniques are at the heart of the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) – one of the most widely used encryption standards.
The techniques used were applied to a 22-bit key but usually 2048 to 4096 bit keys are used. Breaking the longer keys is many billion trillions of times more difficult.
Adi Shamir – the cryptographer whose surname is the S in RSA – has predicted such events won’t happen for another 30 years despite research progress.
The US agencies and Singapore’s central bank believe there is significant risks over the next ten years.
IF the encoded secret is still important to remain secret then it has to be safe guarded now. Everyone is recording and storing all of the encrypted data. They can then wait until the codes are broken and then read all of the messages.
Vendors have and are introducing quantum safe encryption that can apparently survive future quantum attacks.
Information can just get exposed through carelessness and other mistakes.
In 2023, It was revealed by Microsoft that Chinese spies stole a consumer key in 2021 from a software crash dump. Microsoft admitted that the key should have been redacted and not have included the digital key in the first place.
Microsoft published these findings in a write-up titled “results of major technical investigations for Storm-0558 key acquisition”.
This mistake resulted in Chine being able to read a lot of encoded emails.
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
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Ah, a “tiny” version. My son had thought they had broke the real thing.
Difficulty of cracking the code is an exponential function of key length, so the difference between a 22 bit key and a 4096 bit key is mind boggling. A 22 bit key you could break using a good smart watch.
All they really demonstrated was that the system could run the algorithm, really.
Thanks for clarifying it. I actually didn’t read the article first and was just mindlessly scrolling down when I saw your comment. Saved me a lot of time and brainpower needed to read the whole article.
But about the article: Not being an expert in cryptography I can only look at this issue from a mathematical, analytical and yes psychological POV. From what little I get about breaking codes one obvious way is brute force. Your computers go threw all the gazillions of 1’s&0’s in any code trying to “know” what someone is saying, let alone what their intentions are (which is kind of the whole point)? OMG, I have ADHD, which means I’d last less then 10seconds trying to figure out the “importance” of what the computer “decrypted”. It may mean something, nothing, or everything at all. Then I’d go screaming into the night (or day, depending on what time it was where I was.) Frustrating. I know our (and other) intel agencies soak up so much communications “data” , we can’t “process it”. The difference between data, and information.
“Data” implies a real time “snap-shot” like a photograph, at any one moment, at any one moment. It’s utility, is IMO highly limited. Ever be in a picture with people you wished you were ANYWERE but there? But you smiled, because THAT was your job (or your Dad told you, you better…). So much “data” is so confusing because most lack any context. Information is all about intent and motivations not just what’s going on at anyone moment. Which may be “heartfelt”, or staged, or exactly what we want you to think it is; a pretty picture. So how to “detangle” all that data? I have a few ideas of how to introduce informatic variables into a data stream to “compartment and isolate” critical information in that data.
This protocol actually works even when you have NO IDEA anything about the content of the data. Example: Picture yourself in a huge banquet hall, minimum 1,000 people, rather “tightly packed”. You “know” people are talking to people around them. Or their cell phones, or themselves, who cares. We all know what the “murmur” of a very large crowd sounds and “feels” like. What to “learn something”? You may think what others are saying in that room is “out of your reach” bulls***. Get up from your table walk over to another (the more people at that table the better, the greater number of variables the higher probability you can control “more” of them. This is NOT about “playing fair”.)
Be respectful. You must appear non-threatening but not timid. (the first implies you respect them, the second, you respect yourself) Apologies for interrupting their dinner (or whatever). Ask any number of simple, “easy” questions. NEVER threatening, at most gently inquisitive. Most people love to talk about themselves, that’s very useful. A former code breaker told me “some codes ALMOST break themselves, if you ask the right questions, in the right way” My point (finally), is the social situation I just touched on, can be applied to communications intelligence. Introduce variables that will cause change, but not disruption (undirected turbulence) into a data stream. Losing control of your airplane is never good for you. And other people DO notice (all the more so, if you crash into their living room, so to speak…)
Military grade encryption is a marketing term.
“Military grade encryption” just means it’s “longer, and more layered”, taking longer to break. Can it be broken? Of course, by brute force or intellect, given time. A marketing term? Not necessarily by design. But if coopted for marketing purposes’? What would you expect?