Now, three eggheads (or Wolverines, as it were) at the University of Michigan claim they can break it simply by tweaking a device's power supply. By fluctuating the voltage to the CPU such that it generated a single hardware error per clock cycle, they found that they could cause the server to flip single bits of the private key at a time, allowing them to slowly piece together the password. With a small cluster of 81 Pentium 4 chips and 104 hours of processing time, they were able to successfully hack 1024-bit encryption in OpenSSL on a SPARC-based system, without damaging the computer, leaving a single trace or ending human life as we know it.More info at Engadget.
1024-bit RSA encryption cracked by undervolting
Posted on Wednesday, March 10 2010 @ 3:00 CET by Thomas De MaesschalckResearchers at the University of Michigan have cracked the RSA 1024-bit protection by undervolting the voltage of the processor such that it generated a single hardware error per clock cycle, which helped the scientists to slowly piece together the password.
