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Compromised codes

Posted on 08/12/2016 7:26:15 AM PDT by rustyboots

A long time ago when I was young I had a job in the military where we were exposed to, used, and changed encryption codes. Compared to today, I assume the methods were primitive, clumsy, and time consuming. This brings us to current events. The use of a private server to handle email for the former Secretary of State may seem to some to be OK, after all, she didn't send many classified emails. But let us assume this, those emails that were unclassified and were sent to her from various people at State and perhaps other places probably has multiple addressees. Now if her server got hacked and those emails were obtained, we now have to look at the possibility that same emails were sent to others, but were encrypted since they went government office to government office. Next, let us assume the bad guys intercepted those encrypted emails. If the same bad guys had the message that was sent to her in the clear, then a brute force approach would allow them to find the same message in the encrypted stream they intercepted. What does this mean? It means they could read every message sent that day using the encryption codes used that day. So, it isn't just her emails that can be read, it could be the whole department and maybe other departments emails that are made available by her choice of communication protocol. Of course, maybe encryption methods have changed and every message sent gets a different code. Maybe the government uses something close to PGP with private and public keys. But just wanted to put this out and see what opinions others may have.


TOPICS: Your Opinion/Questions
KEYWORDS: 201608; boozallenhamilton; cybersecurity; cyberwar; cyberwarfare; encryptioncodes; haroldmartin; haroldthomasmartin; nongovserver
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1 posted on 08/12/2016 7:26:15 AM PDT by rustyboots
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To: rustyboots

That’s certainly in the realm of possibilities.


2 posted on 08/12/2016 7:30:56 AM PDT by DuncanWaring (The Lord uses the good ones; the bad ones use the Lord.)
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To: rustyboots

There are few things a code cracker cherishes more than getting an encrypted message and it’s plaintext side-by-side.


3 posted on 08/12/2016 7:32:17 AM PDT by null and void (Has there ever been a death associated with the Clintons that *wasn't* beneficial to them?)
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To: ASA Vet; CodeToad

fyi


4 posted on 08/12/2016 7:34:59 AM PDT by Grampa Dave ((My passion for freedom is stronger than that of the DemYouocrats whose obsession is to enslave me.))
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To: rustyboots

Gee....that brings back memories...... I remember the KW26s that encrypted our teletype circuits. At least every day a coded card gets loaded in a drop down holder that splits the card and sets the coding. Works fine if the circuit stays intact and they KWs stay synchronized. Drop the circuit and they had to be reloaded and reset. I still remember phrases like “BI,” “Flagging” and “Flying High and Blind.”


5 posted on 08/12/2016 7:35:04 AM PDT by Gaffer
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To: null and void; rustyboots; CodeToad; ASA Vet; LonePalm

“There are few things a code cracker cherishes more than getting an encrypted message and it’s plaintext side-by-side.”

Then one could get back to serious things like playing chess with your fellow analysts or blackjack.


6 posted on 08/12/2016 7:38:54 AM PDT by Grampa Dave ((My passion for freedom is stronger than that of the DemYouocrats whose obsession is to enslave me.))
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To: Gaffer

Gee. I thought that the State Department was still using their Captain Midnight secret decoder wheels. Worked good for me until I got tired of drinking Ovaltine.


7 posted on 08/12/2016 7:40:37 AM PDT by Don Corleone (Oil the gun, eat the cannolis, take it to the mattress.)
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To: rustyboots

She never signed on to nor opened a gov’t secure account.

This is her de facto saying NOTHING I receive is top secret. After all; she does not know in advance whether any random incoming message is TS or yoga.

But this whole discussion is pissing in the wind.

We KNOW all her messaging has been compromised. That is the only valid assumption possible. The result is a big fat nothing. It’s just astounding she isn’t in jail and being waterboarded for this, very possibly among the 5 greatest intelligence breaches of all time.

Bigger than Klaus Fuchs? Probably not. Jonathan Pollard? Maybe not. BJC selling Loral missile tech to the ChiComs? Probably not. But up there, and certainly the highest dollar sellout ever.


8 posted on 08/12/2016 7:42:09 AM PDT by Attention Surplus Disorder (I had a cool idea for a new tagline and I forgot it!)
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To: Don Corleone

The State Department apparently didn’t even go as far as decoder rings. Their supreme elitist excellence puts them far above the fray of such mundane requirements.


9 posted on 08/12/2016 7:42:24 AM PDT by Gaffer
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To: Attention Surplus Disorder

Compare the treatment of Hillary to Scooter Libby.

Nuff said.


10 posted on 08/12/2016 7:44:12 AM PDT by Buckeye McFrog
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To: Attention Surplus Disorder

I totally agree with you, going after either of them is like pissing into the wind. I can’t think of anything that the public could discover about them that would cause the public to turn on them. They could publicly sacrifice their grandchildren to Satan and the MSM and the public would say it was a private affair.
As my wife says, “we are so screwed.”


11 posted on 08/12/2016 7:46:40 AM PDT by rustyboots
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To: DuncanWaring

This article is based on historical FACT!

Go a watch the movie “Midway” starting Charlton Heston, et al. The whole outcome of the Battle of Midway hinged on correctly positioning the inferior American Fleet.

The writer is correct - once you break a code system you can then “read” any and all mails using that code. Another point made in the same movie.

But, most importantly once you break a code and analyze it your job of breaking other codes becomes much easier.

How?

Developing a new code takes time and effort. o once you field a new code it is, unfortunately, much easier to field variations of that system for other users/replacements. While you may not be able to read entire messages you will be able to make out parts of it, Those parts canbe pieced together to fully break the code system. Again, another point made in the movie.

There are ways around this but they are slow, difficult, and greatly disliked by those non professionals (aka politicians) that have to use them.

Been there, done that, and had numerous t-shirts during my almost 40 years exposure to the DOD, codes, and other esoteric subjects.


12 posted on 08/12/2016 7:48:55 AM PDT by Nip (BOHEICA and TANSTAAFL - both seem very appropriate today.)
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To: Attention Surplus Disorder
How does an official in direct line of succession to the president work for 4 years as a cabinet official and NOT get any TS or higher email, attachments or information?

Even the SOS’s calendar is TS.

13 posted on 08/12/2016 7:50:48 AM PDT by texas booster (Join FreeRepublic's Folding@Home team (Team # 36120) Cure Alzheimer's!)
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To: rustyboots

Which is why her unsecured private server is a disaster


14 posted on 08/12/2016 7:51:03 AM PDT by Nifster (Ignore all polls. Get Out The Vote)
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To: rustyboots

Interesting thought, but not really how email security works.

We’re talking 256-bit one-way hashes. Current estimate to decrypt using known text (plain message content) and current computing horsepower is something like 10 years.


15 posted on 08/12/2016 7:57:57 AM PDT by ConservativeWarrior (Fall down 7 times, stand up 8. - Japanese proverb)
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To: Gaffer

KIK13s here, to program IFF systems in AF planes.

Used to pull a masking tape looking paper strip, with hundreds of seemingly random dots punched in it, through the KIK13 device to read the code, then use the KIK13 to program the plane’s transponder. Final test was to “shoot” the plane with a coded view-master looking tester to verify system operation.

This process became a required preflight item after a friendly helo was mistaken for then enemy, and shot down during the first gulf war. They blamed a faulty IFF transponder for the incident.

First and last encryption key I’ve ever physically held.


16 posted on 08/12/2016 8:06:18 AM PDT by ConservativeWarrior (Fall down 7 times, stand up 8. - Japanese proverb)
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To: rustyboots

This was written 2 years ago, so given Moore’s law, current time to crack AES is probably around 5 years.

https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidthemath/comments/1x50xl/time_and_energy_required_to_bruteforce_a_aes256/


17 posted on 08/12/2016 8:07:58 AM PDT by ConservativeWarrior (Fall down 7 times, stand up 8. - Japanese proverb)
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To: Attention Surplus Disorder

If HRC has a conversation about the weather with her counterpart in eastbumstan, that conversation in considered ‘confidential’. Darn near everything she did was at a minimum considered confidential as a baseline. And if she emails Huma about it, of course the email isn’t ‘marked’...she created the email.

She steered a willing media down a false path of a ‘marked’ requirement, and the media seems to have ignored the 60,000 violations of the federal records act, which applies to all communication, secret or not, and also as you point out, the OBVIOUS fact that a cabinet official cannot perform her duties over a period of years (or even days) without dealing with secret information.


18 posted on 08/12/2016 8:08:14 AM PDT by lacrew
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To: rustyboots

after all, she didn’t send many classified emails.

Hell she deleted 30,000 and just have her word they were yoga/wedding related. Her “word” is worth about as much as a steaming pile of crap.


19 posted on 08/12/2016 8:13:20 AM PDT by Adder (No, Mr. Franklin, we could NOT keep it.)
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To: rustyboots; Liz
...if her server got hacked and those emails were obtained, we now have to look at the possibility that same emails were sent to others, but were encrypted since they went government office to government office. Next, let us assume the bad guys intercepted those encrypted emails. If the same bad guys had the message that was sent to her in the clear, then a brute force approach would allow them to find the same message in the encrypted stream they intercepted. What does this mean? It means they could read every message sent that day using the encryption codes...

Yes, our security's been compromised, but on the lighter brighter side... Hillary has the 'right tone' to fit in at Washington DC dinner parties... And reall, isn't THAT all that matters to the 'oh so shallow ones' at the Washington Post and New York Times?

20 posted on 08/12/2016 8:17:31 AM PDT by GOPJ (White Liberal Elites: Tacky White Trash With Money)
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