The article discusses concerns about GnuPG's security issues, including a significant vulnerability that allows plaintext recovery, and debates whether GPG signatures on git commits are secure or if alternatives like SSH keys or Signal should be used for secure communication and signing. It highlights the complexity and flaws in PGP's design, the challenges of key management, and the political and technical difficulties in replacing or improving upon existing cryptographic tools.
Passkeys are a more secure and user-friendly alternative to passwords, using public-key cryptography to prevent theft and phishing, but widespread adoption is still in progress, so maintaining strong password habits remains important.
The BIS paper emphasizes the urgent need for the financial system to prepare for quantum computing's potential to break current encryption, advocating for early adoption of quantum-safe cryptographic measures, coordinated planning, and exploring long-term solutions like quantum key distribution to ensure security and resilience.
Researchers at Caltech have demonstrated that quantum computers can generate randomness more efficiently using smaller qubit blocks, potentially enabling faster and more powerful quantum systems for various applications, while also raising fundamental questions about the limits of observing quantum phenomena.
A Chinese research team demonstrated that a quantum annealing processor from D‑Wave Systems successfully factored a 22-bit RSA integer, indicating that quantum computers could pose a future threat to current cryptographic security, prompting urgent updates to encryption standards and practices.
IBM is developing a fault-tolerant quantum computer called Starling, expected by 2029, which could accelerate the timeline for quantum threats to Bitcoin's security. Despite current skepticism, experts acknowledge that advancements in quantum error correction could eventually pose risks to cryptographic systems, prompting a need for quantum-resistant encryption. IBM's roadmap includes scaling up qubits and modular architectures to achieve practical quantum computing.
Researchers have developed a new method using quantum entanglement and blockchain technology to generate and verify truly random numbers, overcoming the limitations of traditional pseudo-random generators and enhancing security for applications like cryptography and public lotteries.
A Google research paper reveals that quantum computers could break RSA encryption 20 times faster than previously estimated, raising concerns about the security of cryptographic systems like those used in cryptocurrencies, although current quantum technology is not yet capable of such feats.
Google's latest research indicates that quantum computers could break RSA encryption 20 times faster than previously thought, raising concerns about the security of Bitcoin and other cryptographic systems. While current quantum computers are far from capable of such tasks, the findings accelerate the timeline for potential quantum threats, prompting the crypto community to develop quantum-resistant solutions. A Bitcoin bounty has been launched to test quantum vulnerabilities, highlighting the urgency of preparing for a post-quantum cryptographic era.
Google's new Willow quantum chip is not capable of breaking modern cryptography, according to the company's Quantum AI director. While the chip can solve complex problems much faster than traditional supercomputers, it lacks the millions of qubits needed to crack encryption codes like RSA. Despite concerns about quantum computers potentially undermining global security, experts estimate that such capabilities are at least a decade away. In response, efforts are underway to develop post-quantum cryptography standards to safeguard against future threats.
The Voynich manuscript, a mysterious late-medieval document covered in illustrations of stars, planets, plants, and naked women, has long puzzled historians. In a recent article, researchers propose that the manuscript contains information about sex and conception, drawing on late-medieval gynaecology and sexology. They suggest that the largest illustration, the Rosettes, represents a late-medieval understanding of sex and conception, resolving many of the manuscript's contradictions. The proposal aligns with the patriarchal culture of the time and sheds light on the manuscript's enigmatic features, offering a new perspective for future research.
Avi Wigderson, a pioneer in complexity theory, has won the Turing Award for his influential work in the theory of computation, particularly in the areas of randomness and cryptography. His research has revealed deep connections between mathematics and computer science, impacting various fields within computer science. Wigderson's foundational contributions include zero-knowledge interactive proofs in cryptography and linking computational hardness to randomness, shedding light on the nature of randomness and its role in efficient problem-solving. His work has had far-reaching implications, extending beyond traditional computing to biological and physical systems.
Russell Impagliazzo, a computer scientist at the University of California, San Diego, has made significant contributions to computational complexity theory, cryptography, and the study of randomness in computation. His work includes formulating the P versus NP problem in terms of five hypothetical worlds, which has inspired a generation of researchers. Impagliazzo's love for tabletop role-playing games and improv comedy has also influenced his research, providing him with a playful spirit and a collaborative approach to exploring hypothetical worlds and solving complex computational problems.
A new vulnerability named GoFetch has been discovered in Apple M-series chips, allowing attackers to extract secret encryption keys by exploiting a microarchitectural side-channel attack related to the data memory-dependent prefetcher (DMP). This vulnerability poses a serious threat to the security of constant-time cryptographic implementations, rendering them susceptible to key-extraction attacks. The flaw cannot be fixed in existing Apple CPUs, requiring cryptographic library developers to take preventive measures, potentially impacting performance. Additionally, a new GPU attack affecting popular browsers and graphics cards has been demonstrated, leveraging specially crafted JavaScript code to infer sensitive information, impacting all operating systems and browsers implementing the WebGPU standard.
A new side-channel vulnerability, dubbed GoFetch, has been discovered in the architecture of Apple Silicon processors, allowing malicious apps to extract cryptographic keys. The issue stems from how processors equipped with data memory-dependent prefetchers implement certain cryptographic operations, mixing data and addresses at the hardware level. The vulnerability affects Apple Silicon chips and 13th generation and newer Intel architectures. The researchers were able to mount end-to-end attacks on Apple hardware containing M1 processors and found similar exploitable behavior in base-model M2 and M3 Apple Silicon CPUs. Disabling the vulnerable feature may seriously degrade performance, and the only alternative fix is to rely on third-party cryptographic programs to improve their implementations.
