Digital Fortress Chapter 7

Susans mind was racing-Ensei Tankado wrote a program that constitutes infrangible edicts She could barely grasp the thought.digital Fortress, Strathmore said. Thats what hes traffic it. Its the ultimate counter tidings weapon. If this program hits the market, each trey grader with a modem pass on be capable to send reckons the NSA chiffoniert tell. Our intelligence bequeath be hitman. further Susans thoughts were far removed from the policy-making implications of digital Fortress. She was yet struggling to continue its existence. Shed spent her life breaking codes, steadfastly denying the existence of the ultimate code. completely(prenominal) code is breakable-the Bergofsky Principle She mat up similar an atheistic coming face to face with God.If this code beats let out, she whispered, cryptography w gouty let a dead science.Strathmore nodded. Thats the least of our problems.Can we cede Tankado sour? I admit he hates us, moreover cant we stretch him a a fewer(prenominal) million dollars? Convince him non to conk out?Strathmore laughed. A few million? Do you know what this thing is worth? either government in the terra firma will prognosticate top dollar. Can you sound off telling the President that were subdued cable-snooping the Iraqis tho we cant read the intercepts anymore? This isnt entirely or so the NSA, its close the entire intelligence community. This preparedness provides support for every hotshot-the FBI, CIA, DEA theyd all be move blind. The drug cartels shipments would turn untraceable, major corporations could transferee m one(a)y with no report traverse and leave the IRS out in the cold, terrorists could blabber in total quiet-it would be chaos.The go to bed will soak up field day, Susan said, pale.The hump doesnt take the first clue about what we do here, Strathmore railed in disgust. If they knew how many terrorist attacks weve halt because we can trace codes, theyd change their tune.Susan agreed, nonwithstanding she also knew the realities the EFF would neer know how important TRANSLTR was. TRANSLTR had patroned foil dozens of attacks, scarce the information was highly classified and would neer be released. The rationale behind the secrecy was simple The government could not pass on the mass hysteria caused by reveal the truth no one knew how the humans would react to the news that in that location had been dickens nu receptive close calls by fundamentalist groups on U.S. soil in the perish year.Nuclear attack, however, was not the only threat. solo last month TRANSLTR had thwarted one of the most ingeniously conceived terrorist attacks the NSA had ever witnessed. An anti-government brass instrument had devised a externalize, code-named Sherwood Forest. It targeted the New York Stock allure with the intention of redistri furthering the wealth. Over the feed of vi days, members of the group placed twenty-seven nonexplosive flux pods in the buildings surrounding the Exchange. These devices, when detonated, effect a powerful blast of magnetism. The cooccurring discharge of these carefully placed pods would create a magnetic field so powerful that all magnetic media in the Stock Exchange would be erased-computer strong drives, massive ROM storage banks, tape backups, and even floppy disks. All records of who owned what would disinteg reckon permanently.Because pinpoint timing was obligatory for simultaneous detonation of the devices, the flux pods were interconnect over meshwork telephone lines. During the two-day countdown, the pods inwrought clocks exchanged endless streams of encrypted synchronisation data. The NSA intercepted the data-pulses as a network unusual person but ignored them as a seemingly harmless exchange of gibberish. unless after TRANSLTR decrypted the data streams, analysts immediately recognized the sequence as a network-synchronized countdown. The pods were determined and removed a full lead ho urs before they were scheduled to go off.Susan knew that without TRANSLTR the NSA was powerless against advanced electronic terrorism. She eyed the Run-Monitor. It still read over fifteen hours. dismantle if Tankados bear down broke the right way now, the NSA was sunk. Crypto would be relegated to breaking less than two codes a day. Even at the present rate of 150 a day, there was still a backlog of files awaiting decryption.Tankado called me last month, Strathmore said, interrupting Susans thoughts.Susan looked up. Tankado called you?He nodded. To warn me.Warn you? He hates you.He called to tell me he was perfecting an algorithmic rule that wrote shatterproof codes. I didnt intend him. just why would he tell you about it? Susan demanded. Did he want you to buy it? nary(prenominal) It was blackmail.Things abruptly began falling into place for Susan. Of course, she said, amazed. He treasured you to clear his name.No, Strathmore frowned. Tankado precious TRANSLTR.TRANSLTR?Yes . He tenacious me to go public and tell the world we have TRANSLTR. He said if we admitted we can read public E-mail, he would drop off digital Fortress.Susan looked doubtful.Strathmore shrugged. Either way, its alike after-hours now. Hes post a complimentary simulate of digital Fortress at his Internet pose. Everyone in the world can download it.Susan went white. He whatIts a publicity stunt. nobody to worry about. The copy he stick on is encrypted. People can download it, but nobody can surface it. Its ingenious, really. The extraction code for digital Fortress has been encrypted, locked shut.Susan looked amazed. Of course So everybody can have a copy, but nobody can open it.Exactly. Tankados dangling a carrot.Have you seen the algorithm?The commander looked puzzled. No, I told you its encrypted.Susan looked equally puzzled. But weve got TRANSLTR why not just decrypt it? But when Susan saw Strathmores face, she realized the rules had changed. Oh my God. She gasped, unawa res understanding. digital Fortress is encrypted with itself?Strathmore nodded. Bingo.Susan was amazed. The polity for Digital Fortress had been encrypted using Digital Fortress. Tankado had posted a priceless mathematical recipe, but the text of the recipe had been scrambled. And it had used itself to do the scrambling.Its Bigglemans Safe, Susan stammered in awe.Strathmore nodded. Bigglemans Safe was a suppositional cryptography scenario in which a dependable builder wrote blueprints for an splinterproof safe. He wanted to keep the blueprints a secret, so he built the safe and locked the blueprints inside. Tankado had done the uniform thing with Digital Fortress. Hed defend his blueprints by encrypting them with the convening outlined in his blueprints.And the file in TRANSLTR? Susan asked.I downloaded it from Tankados Internet site like everyone else. The NSA is now the proud owner of the Digital Fortress algorithm we just cant open it.Susan marveled at Ensei Tankados inge nuity. Without revealing his algorithm, he had proven to the NSA that it was unbreakable. Strathmore handed her a paper clipping. It was a translated blurb from the Nikkei Shimbun, the Japanese equivalent weight of the Wall Street Journal, stating that the Japanese computer programmer Ensei Tankado had completed a mathematical formula he claimed could write unbreakable codes. The formula was called Digital Fortress and was available for palingenesis on the Internet. The programmer would be auctioning it off to the highest bidder. The column went on to say that although there was enormous interest in Japan, the few U.S. software companies who had heard about Digital Fortress deemed the claim preposterous, akin to play lead to gold. The formula, they said, was a hoax and not to be taken seriously.Susan looked up. An auction?Strathmore nodded. respectable now every software union in Japan has downloaded an encrypted copy of Digital Fortress and is trying to crack it open. Every se cond they cant, the bidding price climbs.Thats absurd, Susan shot back. All the new encrypted files are uncrackable unless you have TRANSLTR. Digital Fortress could be nought more than a generic, public-domain algorithm, and none of these companies could break it.But its a brilliant merchandise ploy, Strathmore said. Think about it-all brands of bulletproof drinking glass stop bullets, but if a attendantship dares you to put a bullet with theirs, suddenly everybodys trying.And the Japanese actually believe Digital Fortress is different? break than everything else on the market?Tankado may have been shunned, but everybody knows hes a genius. Hes practically a cult icon among hackers. If Tankado says the algorithms unbreakable, its unbreakable.But theyre all unbreakable as far as the public knowsYes Strathmore mused. For the moment.Whats that supposed to mean?Strathmore sighed. cardinal old age ago no one imagined wed be breaking twelve-bit stream ciphers. But technology prog ressed. It always does. Software manufacturers evolve at some point computers like TRANSLTR will exist. Technology is progressing exponentially, and eventually true public-key algorithms will lose their security. Better algorithms will be subscribeed to stay onward of tomorrows computers.And Digital Fortress is it?Exactly. An algorithm that resists wildcat well force will never plow obsolete, no matter how powerful code-breaking computers get. It could become a world standard overnight.Susan pulled in a long breath. God help us, she whispered. Can we make a bid?Strathmore shook his head. Tankado gave us our chance. He do that clear. Its too risky anyway if we get caught, were basically admitting that were afraid of his algorithm. Wed be making a public confession not only that we have TRANSLTR but that Digital Fortress is immune.Whats the time frame?Strathmore frowned. Tankado intend to announce the highest bidder tomorrow at noon.Susan felt her stomach tighten. Then what?Th e arrangement was that he would give the winner the pass-key.The pass-key?Part of the ploy. Everybodys already got the algorithm, so Tankados auctioning off the pass-key that unlocks it.Susan groaned. Of course. It was perfect. Clean and simple. Tankado had encrypted Digital Fortress, and he alone held the pass-key that unlocked it. She erect it hard to fathom that somewhere out there- in all likelihood scrawled on a piece of paper in Tankados pocket-there was a sixty-four-character pass-key that could end U.S. intelligence gathering forever.Susan suddenly felt ill as she imagined the scenario. Tankado would give his pass-key to the highest bidder, and that company would unlock the Digital Fortress file. Then it probably would embed the algorithm in a tamper-proof come away, and within five years every computer would come preloaded with a Digital Fortress chip. No commercial manufacturer had ever dreamed of creating an encryption chip because normal encryption algorithms eventuall y become obsolete. But Digital Fortress would never become obsolete with a rotating cleartext function, no brute-force attack would ever find the right key. A new digital encryption standard. From now until forever. Every code unbreakable. Bankers, brokers, terrorists, spies. wiz world-one algorithm.Anarchy.What are the fillings? Susan probed. She was well aware that terrible times called for desperate measures, even at the NSA.We cant remove him, if thats what youre asking.It was exactly what Susan was asking. In her years with the NSA, Susan had heard rumors of its loose affiliations with the most skillful assassins in the world-hired hands brought in to do the intelligence communitys dirty work.Strathmore shook his head. Tankados too smart to leave us an option like that.Susan felt oddly relieved. Hes protected?Not exactly.In hiding?Strathmore shrugged. Tankado unexpended Japan. He planned to check his bids by phone. But we know where he is.And you dont plan to make a move?N o. Hes got insurance. Tankado gave a copy of his pass-key to an anonymous troika party in case anything happened.Of course, Susan marveled. A guardian angel. And I suppose if anything happens to Tankado, the secret man sells the key?Worse. Anyone hits Tankado, and his partner publishes.Susan looked confused. His partner publishes the key?Strathmore nodded. Posts it on the Internet, puts it in newspapers, on billboards. In effect, he gives it away.Susans eyes widened. drop out downloads?Exactly. Tankado figured if he was dead, he wouldnt need the money-why not give the world a little farewell gift? at that place was a long silence. Susan breathed deeply as if to absorb the terrifying truth. Ensei Tankado has created an unbreakable algorithm. Hes holding us hostage.She suddenly stood. Her go was determined. We must contact Tankado There must be a way to convince him not to release We can offer him triple the highest bid We can clear his name AnythingToo late, Strathmore said. He took a deep breath. Ensei Tankado was found dead this cockcrow in Seville, Spain.