WikiLeaks posts huge encrypted file to Web

Yahoo ^ | July 5, 2010 | Rapahel Satter

[redhead]

LONDON – Online whistle-blower WikiLeaks has posted a huge encrypted file named "Insurance" to its website, sparking speculation that those behind the organization may be prepared to release more classified information if authorities interfere with them.

At 1.4 gigabytes, the file is 20 times larger than the batch of 77,000 secret U.S. military documents about Afghanistan that WikiLeaks dumped onto the Web last month, and cryptographers say that the file is virtually impossible to crack — unless WikiLeaks releases the key used to encode the material.

[Centurion2000]

There is a guy here on FR who has been banned a few times for posting anti-Darwin threads. He is the expert on hacking/security and assembly language. If anyone here can get into this, it will be him. Instead of going into the higher level, hacking, he goes down into the assembly code, into the bowels of computer software. I don’t know what his current FR name is.

NO ONE is cracking AES 256 without a few DOZEN more major breakthroughs in computer processor speeds. This ain't your daddy's WEP 64 bit encryption algorithm.

[Androcles]

...like they’d never pull all telegrams sent from the USA.

Quite right. "Gentlemen don't read each other's mail."

[OneWingedShark]

>>...like they’d never pull all telegrams sent from the USA.
>
>Quite right. “Gentlemen don’t read each other’s mail.”

Which brings up a question: would a gentleman ever work for the current government?
Would a gentleman work for the government at all? (George Washington observed that government *is* force.)

[DBrow]

lol According to the book “The Puzzle Palace” they routinely did just that, even after being ordered not to. Started during WWII and continued until Western Union went mostly electronic and stopped making carbons (and NSA of course stopped reading our mail then).

[DBrow]

Maybe someone at a movie company. Digital effects, especially rendered effects, use giant server farms to process the huge amounts of calculations and imaging, frame by frame.

Using the Pixar setup for a couple months maybe?

Then there are the Google clusters, which are pretty big. But they’d never use that capability for evil, their motto says so!

[bert]

Insurance in spyspeak is Death Warrant

[Androcles]

Well then, I think that if our governments have the decency to say they're not spying on us, then we should believe them.

Speak softly, praise the lord, and pass the high strength encryption.

[mainsail that]

“Dollar to donuts the NSA had that thing opened nearly instantly.”

Maybe, but only because Asange gave them the key: if you do x, this what will come out. Apparently you need gazillions of years to crack that and WL guys are no dummies to use a Ilovemom password. It’s brilliant if you ask me, especially with the threats, one tweet and thousands of people can open the files

[Terpfen]

1.4 GB is indeed large for a file or posting on the Internet, even in the age of file sharing and piracy. It’s gigantic for a collection of documents, if that’s what this is.

The average text document is about 100KB in size. A CD ripped to MP3 is maybe 50 MB. An HD movie is about 300MB. This file is huge.

[united1000]

More on Manning

http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/2010/aug/01/ed-beres01-ar-356184/

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the last three paragraphs are exactly what I have been thinking!

 

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"Why was Manning given a security clearance at all? For those who have been involved in security investigations -- even filling out the paperwork -- Manning's background clearly had red flags all over the place. And how does one remain largely unsupervised in a top-secret position after losing a stripe? (An acquaintance stationed in the Middle East tells me that is most likely the result of a critical shortage of manpower.)

Just last month, The Washington Post highlighted the fact that more than 850,000 people hold top-secret security clearances. How many of them are disgruntled individuals seeking retaliation for perceived wrongs? How many might now fancy themselves heroes by releasing critical data?

On another note: Just how much of the data released by Manning was marked classified but needn't have been? If security classifications were assigned to material just a little more judiciously, perhaps the need to dispense top-secret clearances would be, too. Then the Bradley Mannings of the world wouldn't need to assuage their consciences by indiscriminately turning over information that could aid and abet the enemy and cost American lives."

[a fool in paradise]

The Abu Ghraib photos were leaked by the uncle of one of the suspects charged (and later convicted). He was trying to negotiate a plea bargain for the perp and released them when it wasn’t offered.

Have to wonder if Abu Ghraib was instigated by a mole the same as the 90,000 documents were stolen by a mole in the military.

[RummyChick]

So Wiki sends info to the Obama and says stop me if you want. He doesn’t want to so Wiki posts the info. Info coming out that encrypted stuff is damaging to Hillary..and probably Bill.

So is this a way to shut down Hillary without providing the actual info?

[RummyChick]

found this on a site:

“In any case, some of the details might be wrong. The file might not be encrypted with AES256. It might be Blowfish. It might be OpenSSL. It might be something else. Some more info here.

EDITED TO ADD (8/9): Weird Iranian paranoia:

An Iranian IT expert warned here on Wednesday that a mysterious download file posted by the WikiLeaks website, labeled as ‘Insurance’, is likely a spy software used for identifying the information centers of the United States’ foes.
“The mysterious file of the WikiLeaks might be a trap for intelligence gathering,” Hossein Mohammadi told FNA on Wednesday.

The expert added that the file will attract US opponents and Washington experts can identify their enemy centers by monitoring individuals’ or organizations’ tendency and enthusiasm for the file.
“

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/08/wikileaks_insur.html