Kyhdin@aol.com wrote:
[snip]
"I don't need a sales pitch, Sparks, I need to know where it's weak
spot is." Silence. "Sparks?"
"Here. Sorry. Needed to hack into Genom's files. Took me a few
seconds.
Today, you can build or buy a computer costing $1 million that can break
56 bit DES in about an hour.
Assuming Kerchoff's principle holds forever (That CPU speeds will double
every 1.5 years), and pretending that hours have 64 minutes, and minutes
have 64 seconds, then it will take 18 years before we can build a one
million dollar computer which can break 56 bit DES in one second.
The cipher that most new cryptosystems use nowadays is 128 bit AES.
Since it's keys have 72 more bits than DES keys, it will take 2**72
(that's 2 multiplied by itself 72 times, or about 10**21) times longer
to break AES than DES.
Assuming Kerchoff's principle holds, it be 126 years from now that we
will be able to build a one million dollar computer which can break AES
in one second.
Kerchoff's principle cannot hold for much longer -- in a few years (some
say 30 years, some say less), we will no longer be able to double CPU
speeds every 18 months, due building circuits on the atomic scale, and
not being able to build wires thinner than one atom wide.
Also, encryption technology will be getting better; people decades from
now will likely be using stronger encryption than 128-bit AES.
In short, the idea of hacking into someone's encrypted system in a
couple of seconds is beyond science fiction, and well into fantasy.
It's absurd as using a propeller beanie to fly.
Now, if you had instead said that he had previously planted a bug in the
hardware of one of Genom's computers, then that would be more believable
in terms of technology. But that introduces the question of how it got
put there.
No weak spot persay, but the armor is only half an inch thick just
That's two words, "per se" (it's a latin phrase, meaning "by itself"),
not one word.
[snip]
"Got it. Thanks, Sparks. Computer, cancel uplink and log on to Phantom
Jet mainframe. Download saber tac net band."
"...Watch your left, Linna!" Sylia was shouting as the suit's com
synchronized with the Saber's tactical net.
"Hey!" Nene broke in. "Somebody just hacked the tac net!"
Now this is even more unbelievable, since there's no possibility that he
could have messed with the Knight Sabers hardsuits. Well, maybe he
*could* have, but he wouldn't have.
Do the hardsuits use off-the-shell hardware and software? I doubt it.
And if they don't, how would he have known what format they need the
tactical data?
This technicality/plot problem can be readily solved by having the data
sent in the clear, in some sort of open-source data format -- it's not
vital that it be kept secret, so there's no need to encrypt it to put it
on the tac net. All he needs to do is say, "Nene, I'm going to send you
the data on frequency <randomish number> using ISO data format <big
randomish number>"
(ISO means International Standards Organization ... unsuprisingly
enough, they define standards for a number of things, particularly data
transfer formats. Pick a sufficiently large number that it's beyond all
current formats, but not so huge that it would be unreasonable to reach
by the year 2040.)
[snip]
"Simply!" Nene cried, lunging to her feet. "Simply?! I worked for
weeks on that com cipher, mister! You do not 'simply' crack Nene
Romanova's code. No. Way. Uh-uh. Forget. It."
"Nevertheless, that it what happened."
Nene glared at Guran for a moment. "You are so losing your credit
rating,"
More like, losing suspension of belief :)