Timeline for Emergency method to erase all data off a machine within seconds
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
12 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jul 26, 2020 at 10:28 | comment | added | Jasen | investment in cryptocurrency is a bet against quantum computing, and vice versa. | |
| Jul 25, 2020 at 17:12 | comment | added | PLL | @TheoreticalMinimum: I think you really are underestimating modern cryptography. Sure, breaking encryption is just “one (very hard) math problem” — but in the same sense, reassembling the pieces of a hard drive that’s been ground to dust is just one very hard jigsaw puzzle. We can be at least as confident that the math problem is hard as we are that the jigsaw puzzle is — partly for theoretical reasons, and partly for the pragmatic reason that no criminals have yet managed to break industry-standard encryption, even though they could make insane amounts of money if they did. | |
| Jul 25, 2020 at 13:36 | comment | added | wizzwizz4 | @R..GitHubSTOPHELPINGICE That isn't a good enough reason to build new weak links, or how will the old weak links ever be phased out? | |
| Jul 25, 2020 at 13:07 | comment | added | Vaelus | Perhaps you should add that's it's theoretically possible to recover even physically destroyed media with enough computation power and precise enough measurements. The only bariers are the enormous cost of tools and computational energy and time requirements. And that these are the exact same barriers to breaking modern cryptography. | |
| Jul 23, 2020 at 23:37 | comment | added | ManfP | It's also worth noting that here symmetric encryption is sufficient. Most modern crypto requires asymmetric encryption, which tends to involve hard math problems beyond our (computational) reach - although a better approach (or in some cases, quantum computers) remain a possibliity. Yes, there might also be some unknown way to break some symmetric encryption schemes - but they have so little mathematically nice structure to attack that people don't even know of good starting points to do so. | |
| Jul 23, 2020 at 23:06 | comment | added | R.. GitHub STOP HELPING ICE | We live in a world where things much more dangerous than whatever secret you're protecting are guarded by much weaker measures than fully proper use of cryptography. The weakest link in "something utterly horrible happens" is not this. | |
| Jul 23, 2020 at 21:24 | comment | added | user238815 | I'm not a cryptographer so I have no clue what is standard practice in your field. But I find it a bit odd, that you rule out the failure of the encryption completely and say doing so is fiction (or stupid). As long as the encrypted data is physically there, it's only one (very hard) math problem or unknown loophole away from being decoded. If the information is physically destroyed it is arguably safer. And the question is only asking about an efficient and quick way to do just that, nothing else. | |
| Jul 23, 2020 at 18:40 | comment | added | R.. GitHub STOP HELPING ICE | No, I don't, and considering it as such is generally not standard practice. | |
| Jul 23, 2020 at 18:18 | comment | added | user238815 | But don't you agree that even the encrypted data could become a threat? Seems much safer to me to physically destroy even the encoded information, then the information is gone for good, not matter what decryption methods there are or will be. | |
| Jul 23, 2020 at 18:15 | comment | added | user238815 | The second paragraph of your answer makes sense to me. I think I got a wrong impression from xkcd.com/538. I removed the small comment about torture being a security risk. | |
| Jul 23, 2020 at 17:14 | history | edited | R.. GitHub STOP HELPING ICE | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added 657 characters in body
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| Jul 23, 2020 at 16:49 | history | answered | R.. GitHub STOP HELPING ICE | CC BY-SA 4.0 |