[EdV]

War buffs certainly remember the cracking of the German Enigma Machine.

[l2ridehd]

The answer to that question Angie is yes. Actually a lot have been cracked. The only safe code is a single use code. Use it once and toss it. There are now computer encryption codes that use that same methodology. However not in any commercial application yet. Many are quite strong and getting better all the time as computer capability grows. Of course as computers get better, they also get better at breaking them.

If you had two disks, and only two, each with a million different identical encryption deep codes on them and you had one and I had one. Then we each have a set of access codes to those million codes. Then you use a separate and unique communication method to say "I sent you document XX which was created and decoded using code ABCDE, then once used you delete that code and never use it again, it is impossible to break. Everything else can be broken.

[The Village Girl]

Originally Posted by EdVinMass

A

If you knew what I did for a living the past forty years, you’d understand why I can’t let financially dangerous advice to others go unchallenged.

Yes, young man, please share with us what you did for forty years that we should understand.

[EdV]

Actually, the Germans were using the scheme you describe for their infamous Enigma machines which they believed were unbreakable. But the Germans let their guard down in several areas. One of these was the fact that every day, German U-boats would send Enigma encrypted weather reports from u-boats back to headquarters which were intercepted by the Brits. This created enough of an opening to allow the Brits to get their foot into because those weather reports contained predictable information that could be (i.e. cloudy, rain, highs, lows) and was used to aid in cracking the cipher.

As for an encryption algorithm being impenetrable, most extreme mathematicians would say there is no such animal. But to understand that concept, you have to understand the difference between “theoretical” cracking and “practical” cracking. Theoretically breaking a cipher is describing in mathematical terms how a cipher could be broken through repetitive iterations of a formula. Once the genius mathematicians agree that the formula for the crack is sound they then have to apply the practical side of things. Using the most powerful computers in the world how long would it take to repeat those iterations until the code is cracked.

AES encryption (used by our government and available to you) has been cracked theoretically by a group of Eastern European Mathematicians. But here’s the practical side of it:

According to the crackers themselves, “On a trillion machines, that each could test a billion keys per second, it would take more than two billion years to recover an AES-128 key. Because of these huge complexities, the attack has no practical implications on the security of user data."

So encrypt your sensitive files and passwords with AES for now and don’t worry too much about it. Of course if you past a sticky note with the key to the AES file, it’s like putting a steel door on a pup tent.

[The Village Girl]

Originally Posted by EdVinMass

If you knew what I did for a living the past forty years, you’d understand why I can’t let financially dangerous advice to others go unchallenged.

So.... What you are saying is for the past 40 years you were a German Spy?

[EdV]

Uh, no if anything I would have been an American spy or a British spy, not a German spy. There is a difference.

[The Village Girl]

Originally Posted by EdVinMass

Uh, no if anything I would have been an American spy or a British spy, not a German spy. There is a difference.

So.... Mr. Ed, What did you do for 40 years? Do you suppose that you could,maybe, by chance, be a little more to the point. Remember, you were the one who brought it up. It seemed to be important to you in the previous thread when you were going on about something or other.

You weren't a German Spy.... Soooooo..... CIA?

Remember, first liar doesn't stand a chance!

[pauld315]

Originally Posted by The Village Girl

So.... Mr. Ed, What did you do for 40 years? Do you suppose that you could,maybe, by chance, be a little more to the point. Remember, you were the one who brought it up. It seemed to be important to you in the previous thread when you were going on about something or other.

You weren't a German Spy.... Soooooo..... CIA?

Remember, first liar doesn't stand a chance!

Shouldn't push anybody for an answer to that. Some folks just cannot divulge what they did due to legal reasons especially if it had to do with national security.