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ECC2-109 Winners Certified
An anonymous reader writes "The ECC2-109 encryption challenge has now been broken and certified! Certicom announced on Tuesday that the winners, a team from Ars Technica and a member of TeamIMO, will both receive $2500 each for the matching distinguished pairs that has solved the elliptical curve encryption scheme."
$2,500 for breaking an encryption scheme. I wonder what SETI@Home will pay me for discovering an extraterrestrial...
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
The ECC2 Challenge, sponsored by Certicom, began in November 2002, and the gross CPU time used to solve the challenge was roughly equivalent to an Athlon XP 3200+ working nonstop for 1,200 years. This victory is especially notable because it is the biggest ECC encryption challenge ever solved and will likely remain so for a while since the next challenges are an order of magnitude larger and would require years to complete using current processors.
That's some pretty hardcore encryption.
---
Never criticize religion on Slashdot. You will be modded down for "Troll" no matter how factual it is.
Nasa will be the one awarding your prize... A pair of handcuffs, followed by a rag soaked with ether. After that you will just undergo lots of brainwashing, and you pretty much get the idea from there. :)
Only $2500? Some of the contests I've seen (namely having to do with the RSA encryption scheme) have been offering prizes upwards of 100 grand IIRC.
I bet the computing time just to break the code probably costed a wee bit more than $2500.
Nothing disturbs me more than blind loyalism towards some unrealistic and over-idealistic notion of one's nationality.
1) Put the decryptors in a remote island
2) Make them wear skimpy clothing
3) get them to compete in small subgames, such as
blow the fish up etc..
4) Get an affable good looking host to..err host..
5) Get cameman to zoom in on their mental games an
anguish as they try their best to out-decrypt the
other contestants.
voila..$1Million Cash Prize
Someone call Ashcroft.
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20530-0001
The contest website doesn't mention a $1M prize, but from the "details" pdf, it looks like you can earn the $1M prize by solving 19 smaller problems, each with their own bounty. $30k for an "infeasable" problem seems a little low to me... I imagine the mob may pay more ;-)
From the pdf: The 109-bit Level I challenges are feasible using a very large network of computers. The 131-bit Level I challenges are expected to be infeasible against realistic software and hardware attacks, unless of course, a new algorithm for the ECDLP is discovered.
The Level II challenges are infeasible given today's computer technology and knowledge. The elliptic curves for these challenges meet the stringent security requirements imposed by existing and forthcoming ANSI banking standard
Challenge Field-size(in-bits) Estimated-number-of-machine-days Prize(US$)
Elliptic curves over f2^m - Exercises:
ECC2-79 79 352 Handbook of Applied Cryptography & Maple V software
ECC2-89 89 11278 Handbook of Applied Cryptography & Maple V software
ECC2K-95 97 8637 $ 5,000
ECC2-97 97 180448 $ 5,000
Level I challenges:
ECC2K-108 109 1.3 x 10 6 $ 10,000
ECC2-109 109 2.1 x 10 7 $ 10,000
ECC2K-130 131 2.7 x 10 9 $ 20,000
ECC2-131 131 6.6 x 10 10 $ 20,000
Level II challenges:
ECC2-163 163 6.2 x 10 15 $ 30,000
ECC2K-163 163 3.2 x 10 14 $ 30,000
ECC2-191 191 1.0 x 10 20 $ 40,000
ECC2-238 239 2.1 x 10 27 $ 50,000
ECC2K-238 239 9.2 x 10 25 $ 50,000
ECC2-353 359 1.3 x 10 45 $ 100,000
ECC2K-358 359 2.8 x 10 44 $ 100,000
Elliptic curves over Fp - Exercises:
ECCp-79 79 146 Handbook of Applied Cryptography & Maple V software
ECCp-89 89 4360 Handbook of Applied Cryptography & Maple V software
ECCp-97 97 71982 $ 5,000
Level I challenges:
ECCp-109 109 9.0 x 10 6 $ 10,000
ECCp-131 131 2.3 x 10 10 $ 20,000
Level II challenges:
ECCp-163 163 2.3 x 10 15 $ 30,000
ECCp-191 191 4.8 x 10 19 $ 40,000
ECCp-239 239 1.4 x 10 27 $ 50,000
ECCp-359 359 3.7 x 10 45 $ 100,000
Just one crack is enough? Or shall we wait for better crack? To find if the method have weakness, we should open for more easy crack forever.
The current scheme does not encourage a better crack. Or expose the method for fully tested.
It will be very dangerous if the I.T. security is based on such a weak test system. Especially when many policy maker buy these security protection without aware of full picture.
In the real world, people grant trust based on the information they got from the media, the more mentation these on the news, the more they will trust a system. It is extreamly danger. Especially when digital security is going mainstream.
What about the ED-209 winners? Remember, that robot from Robocop?
No, not that one, that was Robocop. The other one. He was all robot. He didn't have Robocop's human side. But he did have some cool machine guns.
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
Keeping
Now let's run the same test, but instead of attacking the algorithm, let's see how many hours it takes to social engineer the key :)
Sorry, you're wrong, it's:
...will each receive $2500 for the matching distinguished pairs that have solved...
I just took the asvab and i got a 73 is that good? I havent been told what MOS i got. My mom is scared I will be put in Infantry.
"Annie says: don't forget to drink your Ovaltine."
The solution was achieved through a collision of distinguished points found by Glenon from Ars Technica and a team member from TechIMO, both of whom will be receiving a prize of US$2,500. The ECC2 Challenge, sponsored by Certicom, began in November 2002, and the gross CPU time used to solve the challenge was roughly equivalent to an Athlon XP 3200+ working nonstop for 1,200 years. This victory is especially notable because it is the biggest ECC encryption challenge ever solved and will likely remain so for a while since the next challenges are an order of magnitude larger and would require years to complete using current processors.
D035 @Ny0n3 G07z @ 53rI@L5 0r cR@CkZ f0r 7urb07@x!!!
I'v3 G07 14 MiNu735 70 l0@D i7 uP @Nd g37 My 7@X3$ DoNe!
I bet $2500 that the other half of each of the team's "matching distinguished pairs" will:
1. Go shopping for shoes
2. Go shopping for jewelry
3. Go shopping gor shoes AND jewelry
Unless they are single, there is no way this gets spent on hardware.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
Is it just me, or is there no real point to these encryption challenges? Brute forcing one particular key doesn't help you attack the encryption algorithim in general, and we can already calculate about how long it will take to crack with current processors. Other than the prize money, there is no reason to participate (except maybe for bragging rights, but finding an algorithmic flaw would get you so much more). Perhaps the prize money and CPU time might be better spent searching for a cure for cancer? I know there's a distributed computing project out there that does just that (no link right now, I'm lazy), and this *is* a case where the computers are just as good at calculating numbers for cracking encryption as calculating numbers for saving lives.
well?
"Be sure to drink your Ovaltine."
Keep your eyes to the sky.
"... the gross CPU time used to solve the challenge was roughly equivalent to an Athlon XP 3200+ working nonstop for 1,200 years."
- Would that theoretical uptime be 1,200 years running Linux?
If this computer is running Windows, I think it needs to be put back on the Area 51 shelf next to the perpetual motion machines, hen's teeth and Tesla weapons.
Si tacuisses philosophus mansisses. If you had kept quiet, you would have remained a philosopher.
More importantly there are more useful distributed computing projects. Here is a pretty good index. For example there's Folding@Home which furthers our onderstanding of proteins, which are so important in so many life processes and diseases, and fightAIDS@home which has already found a promising new drug. Or how about SETI@home? Trying to crack encryption by brute force seems like such a waste in comparison to these.
Perhaps the encryption contests are so popular just because you can win money. It's like a lottery. Maybe the only thing that could be done would be to have a cash prize for significant findings in other projects, or if who did it can't be defined due to the nature of the algorithm, maybe even just an ordinary lottery?
Yeah, but obviously it wasn't hardcore enough. If that encrypted message happened to be my email, I wouldn't be a very happy chap.
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
Why do they call it Ovaltine? It comes in a round can... you drink it from a round cup... ah, forget it.
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
ECC2-109 is the same encryption scheme I have on my luggage!
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
1) It gives you a real world baseline of what kind of current power it takes to break your keys. You can then make some educated projections about what kind of security these keys will offer in the future. Computing power has and continues to grow at a fairly predictable rate. Thus you can infer how long a specific level of key will take to crack at a given point in the future, assuming no new mathematical or processing systems. Which leads us to
2) It encourages people to try novel types of attacks. Yes, there are those that are just doing a brute attempte and they are there fore reason #1. However there are those that will try to come up with new algorithms, new hardware, or a combination, to defeat your encryption and prove it weak. This is what it's all about. You don't prove encryption strong, you continually prove that it's not weak, lending creedence to the theory that it is strong.
It would appear that the technical/geek community on /. has little to say to articles like this. However, to the silliest shit posted get's incredible feedback. Most of it moderated funny. I come here everyday and I'm not sure why.
seventeenorbust.com - you can discover the a truly huge prime number if you are really lucky
The Singularity is closer than you think
Quant
- Donald Trump per episode (first season) 'The Apprentice' $50,000.00
- Donald Trump per episode (next season) 'The Apprentice' $215,000.00
- Britney Spears reality show per episode $1,000,000.00
- Exercises in F2m elliptic curve discrete log computation intended to probe the limits of a particular cryptography system $2,500
Need we say more?
Don't forget Bill Gates!
$4.29 Million per Day!
An elliptic curve is the set of solutions to a cubic equation in two variables on some field (a field is a set on which two operations which behave like multiplication and division are defined). The solutions form a cyclic group. A group is a set on which an operation is defined such that there is an identity element, every element has an inverse, and the associative property holds. In a cyclic group, if you "multiply" any element by itself enough times, you'll get the original element.
What makes all of this junk more interesting to computer people is that if you use a field with finitely many elements, you end up with some tools that can be used for things like factoring and other problems in number theory.
Elliptic curve cryptography is based around the discrete log problem. That is, you are given two elements of the group, a and b, you want to find what value of k makes a^k=b. This problem can be solved in polynomial time in some cyclic groups, but elliptic curve groups lack certain niceties that make solving the problem for them tough.
It is believed that elliptic curve cryptography will allow one to use significantly smaller keys than those needed by RSA without a loss of security.
My only political goal is to see to it that no political party achieves its goals.
ECC ("this Certicom encryption system") has turned out to be exactly as hard to break as Certicom and everyone else expected - if anything, the results of this challenge increase our confidence in it.
/. moderators sometimes...
109 bits was deliberately chosen to be short enough to break. The next challenge is 131 bits, which is also considered breakable (though it will be about 2048 times harder).
After that, you get on to the "Level II" challenges, which are not considered breakable. They start at 163 bits, the least recommended for real use, and would be about 140 billion times harder to break.
I worry about the
Xenu loves you!
...that has solved the elliptical curve encryption scheme.
Ahem; that should be elliptic.
just being pedantical.
Weeks of coding saves hours of planning.
Wonder no more ...
RFC 3607 - Chinese Lottery Cryptanalysis Revisited: The Internet as a Codebreaking Tool
The Internet's nature is peer to peer - 20050301_cs_profs.pdf
These contests were not designed by the encryption companies to have brute force used on them...Thus you have higher level challenges with "realistic" prizes. Sadly there is no reverse engineering when most of these teams think up their strategem, or even basic engineering for that matter. The RSA and eliptical encryption schemes were not thought up for mearly "normal" encryption....OBVIOUSLY if you have the key you have the file, but the underlying code (once encrypted) is meant to resemble nothing noticable, nothing useful to its cracking. Thus you have these contests, battles to see if people have a scheme, not brute force power.
Chances are they would want to find the one dude who thinks up a program that can hack that encryption to bits in 4 minutes instead of trying every password from here to "timbucktoo" on hundreds of computers at once just because you work the janatorial shift at the San Diego Super Computer Center.
Well, obviously you adjust your encryption to what you think people will be throwing at it. That goes without saying. ...or, actually, completely not. It's nearly always so cheap to use encryption that's completely infeasable to attack directly that you should always do that; it's crazy to use anything less to save a few cycles unless you're in a very limited resource environment.
Xenu loves you!
all computers in the country to run some unspecified distributed application. ... I doubt such a thing would happen in any country.
More than half of all windows boxes with broadband internet are running "some unspecified distributed application" of the spyware, backdoor, worm or trojan variety.
I truely wonder if the NSA has computers capable of breaking such an encryption in a few hours (or minutes?). I doubt so, but we will never know. There was a book about this... Digital Fortress was it? Looked pretty good, I was skimming through it a few weeks back in the book store.
I'm f#$king magic!
Given that I have a public key and can encrypt a file:
I attempt to decrypt the file that I just encrypted and come up with a private key that lets me do so. Does that mean that I have the private key that will decrypt all files encrypted with that public key?
How large a file or how many files do I have to decrypt to be assured that I have uniquely identified the private key?
Is it true that if I don't give out a public key that I can produce documents that are in principle un-decryptable.
The companies providing these encryption breaking challenges do not wish for someone to come up with some super quick method of breaking their products encryption scheme. Instead what they want is proven statistics that it takes X amount of time to crack their encryption scheme at rediculously low key lengths. This is so they can go around quoting their 1200 years and simillar to crack and sell more of their encryption product.
Please do not take this as me saying that these encryption systems are or are not any good - I am not a cryptographer. It is just that these competitions are obviously organised from a marketing perspective.
Certicom would be stupid if they know the key! here is the link on how RSAsecurity does it:
Congratulations to #$%D$%^ERT^&%^RFYU%^&TRYU%& 456RTY456%^&RU*& for this astounding decryption.
Make the suckers decrypt the new message to find out who the winners where in the last competition.
Consider that it's still not strong enough to keep secrets from Bill Gates.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
Insightful?!?!
That shit post was about as Insightful as a Fox news commentary on perpetual motion machines.
Bah! I suppose I shouldn't really be surprised though.
Not that I'm paranoid or anything. Ok, ok, so I'm paranoid and the governments' out to get me, but I still gotta wonder how quickly it was cracked by the boys with the big iron. Even though private/personal computational horsepower has increased dramatically over the years, while govt funding has decreased, I still can't see a general purpose CPU or network of CPUs being able to compete with dedicated crypto hardware .... Am I wrong??
Another interesting link here
Paper: "Architectural considerations for cryptanalytic hardware"
Cypherpunks Tonga
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.