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NSA's 'Codebreaker Challenge' Features Exploiting Blockchain To Steal Ethereum (ltsnet.net)
"The National Security Agency's 2018 Codebreaker Challenge kicked off on Friday, 9/21, and runs through 12/31," writes Slashdot reader eatvegetables. Each year's challenge -- which is open to U.S. students -- comes with its own (fictitious) backstory which the organizers say is "meant for providing realistic context."
This year's story? A new strain of ransomware has managed to penetrate several critical government networks and NSA has been called upon to assist in remediating the infection to prevent massive data losses. For each infected machine, an encrypted copy of the key needed to decrypt the ransomed files has been stored in a smart contract on the Ethereum blockchain* and is set to only be unlocked upon receipt of the ransom payment. Your mission is to ultimately (1) find a way to unlock the ransomware without giving in to the attacker's demands and (2) figure out a way to recover all of the funds already paid by other victims.
* For the purposes of this challenge, a private blockchain has been created with no real monetary value associated with the Ether.
"The first half focuses on network protocol analysis and binary reverse-engineering," writes eatvegetables, while "The second half is all about attempting to exploit the blockchain."
An email address from "a recognized U.S. school or university" is required, and the original submission notes that America's college students "are already hard at work trying to push their school to the top of the leaderboard."
This year's story? A new strain of ransomware has managed to penetrate several critical government networks and NSA has been called upon to assist in remediating the infection to prevent massive data losses. For each infected machine, an encrypted copy of the key needed to decrypt the ransomed files has been stored in a smart contract on the Ethereum blockchain* and is set to only be unlocked upon receipt of the ransom payment. Your mission is to ultimately (1) find a way to unlock the ransomware without giving in to the attacker's demands and (2) figure out a way to recover all of the funds already paid by other victims.
* For the purposes of this challenge, a private blockchain has been created with no real monetary value associated with the Ether.
"The first half focuses on network protocol analysis and binary reverse-engineering," writes eatvegetables, while "The second half is all about attempting to exploit the blockchain."
An email address from "a recognized U.S. school or university" is required, and the original submission notes that America's college students "are already hard at work trying to push their school to the top of the leaderboard."
These are difficult if not impossible tasks. Especially not college kids.
I can't wait to run these NSA-provided binaries on my computers
A new strain of ransomware has managed to penetrate several critical government networks and NSA has been called upon to assist in remediating the infection to prevent massive data losses.
Restore from backups! No backups? Let's start with who we're going to fire for not having backups and work our way up to indictments for gross negligence. ;)
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Editor changed post to sensationalist crap! The new title is nonsensical. The content of original post hacked up and a mess.
They will hack into a school computer and enter the competition to win the prix.
When your job find great codebreakers...well this is how you go about it. Not seeing the problem here.
Blockchain technology is one of the most proven tech's ever. I mean like ever in the history of computing. If there was a way to exploit Bitcoin for billions of dollars then someone would have done it.
Quite often any exploits are due to the software (often non-official) that uses the blockchain. Contracts in particular are vulnerable because this is external code (not blockchain code) that is written by morons.
I have three. And a nice USB sata drive adapter. I can backup our entire codebase in about 45 minutes, which I do every friday, and then I take the drive home. Really should get someone else in the rotation so backups are at two offsite locations.
Years and years ago we had this happen. Tapes that had been carefully updated week after week couldn't be read. What I really want to do at work is have a fire drill with nothing but the backup drives, PCs from Office Depot, and an internet connection and see how long it takes for everyone to get back up and running.
when people who are not from a university get dubious links from other people who will "share" the challenges with them.
Come on now NSA, Russia has enough students in your colleges and universities to infiltrate. Why not open it to everyone and then exclude them from leaderboard score ?
NSA delenda est
"The NSA did nothing wrong!"
"You tin foil hat!'
"The NSA leaks are all lies! Sieg Heil NSA!"
We used HDD systems for backup in freaking 1999.
But if you do not need fast random access, good old tapes haven't stood still, and still have *insane* densities and data rates.
Obviously if you are the world's enemy number one, like the NSA,you should have your entire network as a hot spare and again as a cold spare. Ideally always triple-mirrored. And then the entire thing, all three to nine networks of servers, cloned to two off-site locations a third around the world.
I mean I'm a private enthusiast, and I can afford that! You could nuke every major city in the world, and throw earth into a 100-year nuclear winter and my data wouldn't even blink. (Hint: Geothermal power rules.)
Math is always based on its own made-up world and rules. Of course it is sound, if you *make* it sound.
That is useless unless it is actually verified in the real world though. Not even including the complications of implementation over mere theory.
But: Nice "no true Scotsman" there, blockchain luddites!
sure vlad
Is this russian agitprop surge going to just be through the mid-term elections or is it a constant now?
The solution is not collegiate.
SO each participant have self pre-qual their code as candidate, target or suspect in future. Very much like fingerprinting is their signature coding style.
Smart!
Ethereum is the blockchain. The cryptocurrency is called Ether.
What kind of ultra-stupid, lonely moron would do NSA's 'Anything at all Challenge" ?
ITS A FUCKIN SPOOK/ASSASINATION GROUP you dumb shit
They dont "like" you and they are not "impressed" or whatever bullshit they want you to imagine.
They are seedy shitbags operating under the misguided belief that their flag, their god and their little douchebag family is the only thing that matters. You are the stupidest fuck if you get taken in by these "open challenge" bullshit. This is like "Hay! Top level counterfeiters! Here's your chance to show a SPY AGENCY with GLOBAL REACH who KILLS PEOPLE IN SECRECY all your counterfeiting and forgery skills! What could go wrong? If nothing else, enjoy being added to their list of potential actors capable of doing such a thing. Dumbass
Seriously, go do this because just participating in this says a ton about your psychological makeup:
* NEEDS ATTENTION
* LAZILY EXPOSES THEMSELF TO EVERYONE
* 100% EXPENDABLE
you forgot the people that did all you say, were all promoted and are still employed or very comfortably retired.
Since the inception of cryptocurrency, it was bound to be exploited to this particular degree. In reality, the fact remains that cryptocurrency as a whole will continue to falter as a viable currency in it's current state at this current time.
Changes in blockchain technology may improve this in the future, however, in it's current state it is too volatile to trust as a constant construct for valued currency.