This is for the naysayers who believe the NSA is incapable of breaking their $99.95 encryption

[1-Old-Man]

Hey, its far too complicated for the NSA to crack, right?


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-23627656

"Snowden link to encrypted email service closes

Edward Snowden is believed to have been using the Lavabit service after fleeing the US
Continue reading the main story
US spy leaks


"Two encrypted email services have closed down for reasons linked to US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden.

Texas-based Lavabit service has shut down but said legal reasons prevented it explaining why.

Correspondents say Lavabit appears to have been in a legal battle to stop US officials accessing customer details.

In addition, secure communications firm Silent Circle has shut its email service because messages cannot be kept wholly secret."

More at link ...

[PowerToThePeople]

1. they probably wanted them to turn over the server

If they have the server, they would very likely have access to the encryption key.

[EOTE]

2. ^That's my guess too.

No encryption is worth anything if the encryption key is known. But breaking AES-256 without an encryption key is pretty much impossible, even I'd imagine, with the NSA's crazy hardware.

[ProdigalJunkMail]

4. yep...

AES256 allows for 1.1X10^77 permutations. With a computer operating at 10 pFLOPS it would take 3.3X10^56 years to explore all the combinations. That's to break ONE key...

sP

[EOTE]

6. Thanks for doing the math :)

The numbers are staggering. Reminds me of the wheat and chessboard problem, only without the adding, and a chessboard only has 64 squares. AES 256 has 2^192 times the combinations as grains of wheat on that final square (which is something like 9 quintillion grains).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat_and_chessboard_problem

[ProdigalJunkMail]

8. had to do it for a security class a long while ago

had to look up my numbers 'cause I wasn't going to do it again!

sP

[Autumn]

3. Maybe everyone just needs to start forwarding all their on line communications to

the NSA. Might save the government a few bucks that we can use elsewhere. You know like help those need.

[devils chaplain]

5. They are incapable of breaking it.

As far as actually decoding the encryption. One can create unbreakable encrypted files for free -- look up PGP.

My guess is Lavabit simply doesn't want to comply with this court order on principle.

[1-Old-Man]

10. That us utterly laughable.

You have no idea ....

[ProdigalJunkMail]

13. you have no idea how encryption works

your commentary is utterly laughable.

sP

[frylock]

14. explain it to us then, please

[usGovOwesUs3Trillion]

7. The Privacy Pirates Have Deep Pockets & Totalitarian Tactics to get what they want

Our data.

However, it seems that snowden had enough security to keep them in the dark long enough to accomplish his mission.

It also seems as though the totalitarian thugs need to use brute force measures to get what they want.

Maybe they shut those services down because they are too good at what they do?

[1-Old-Man]

11. Read the last quoted sentence

[ProdigalJunkMail]

15. yes, the metadata (headers) cannot be kept secret

or the message cannot be forwarded properly. the message contents... yeah, good luck reading that.

sP

[krispos42]

16. That makes the most sense out of all this.

I know that cracking codes takes a lot of processing power, so even if the NSA can do it, there is a limit to the number of encrypted files they can crack any given day.

And the more things get encrypted, the smaller the fraction of total emails sent they will be able to crack.


I can envision a situation where the NSA stores copies of all emails (including attachments) in encrypted form but can only crack the ones they can get a warrant for, or ones that are relevant to a specific case. It would prevent trolling through the mountains of information simply because there is not enough processing power to do more than urgent, specific decryption on a limited number of emails.

[frylock]

9. this is a fistfull of fail..

the reason these services are going offline isn't because the NSA is capable decrypting their encoded emails. it's because the NSA has likely DEMANDED access to these servers. rather than comply, these patriots are saying FUCK YOU! we're taking the servers offline instead.

[usGovOwesUs3Trillion]

12. ^^^ THIS