From: Brian Atkins (brian@posthuman.com)
Date: Thu Oct 23 1997 - 11:20:09 MDT
Finally broke it:
David McNett wrote:
>
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> It is a great privilege and we are excited to announce that at 13:25
> GMT on 19-Oct-1997, we found the correct solution for RSA Labs’ RC5-
> 32/12/7 56-bit secret-key challenge. Confirmed by RSA Labs, the key
> 0x532B744CC20999 presented us with the plaintext message for which we
> have been searching these past 250 days.
>
> The unknown message is: It’s time to move to a longer key length
>
> In undeniably the largest distributed-computing effort ever, the
> Bovine RC5 Cooperative (http://www.distributed.net/), under the
> leadership of distributed.net, managed to evaluate 47% of the
> keyspace, or 34 quadrillion keys, before finding the winning key. At
> the close of this contest our 4000 active teams were processing over
> 7 billion keys each second at an aggregate computing power equivalent
> to more than 26 thousand Pentium 200’s or over 11 thousand PowerPC
> 604e/200’s. Over the course of the project, we received block
> submissions from over 500 thousand unique IP addresses.
>
> The winning key was found by Peter Stuer <peter@dinf.vub.ac.be> with
> an Intel Pentium Pro 200 running Windows NT Workstation, working for
> the STARLab Bovine Team coordinated by Jo Hermans
> <Jo.Hermans@vub.ac.be> and centered in the Computer Science
> Department (DINF) of the Vrije Universiteit (VUB) in Brussels,
> Belgium. (http://dinf.vub.ac.be/bovine.html/). Jo’s only comments
> were that "$1000 will buy a lot of beer" and that he wished that the
> solution had been found by a Macintosh, the platform that represented
> the largest portion of his team’s cracking power. Congratulations
> Peter and Jo!
>
> Of the US$10000 prize from RSA Labs, they will receive US$1000 and
> plan to host an unforgettable party in celebration of our collective
> victory. If you’re anywhere near Brussels, you might want to find
> out when the party will be held. US$8000, of course, is being
> donated to Project Gutenberg (http://www.promo.net/pg/) to assist
> them in their continuing efforts in converting literature into
> electronic format for the public use. The remaining US$1000 is being
> retained by distributed.net to assist in funding future projects.
>
> Equally important are the thanks, accolades, and congratulations due
> to all who participated and contributed to the Bovine RC5-56 Effort!
> The thousands of teams and tens of thousands of individuals who have
> diligently tested key after key are the reason we are so successful.
>
> The thrill of finding the key more than compensates for the sleep,
> food, and free time that we’ve sacrificed!
>
> Special thanks go to all the coders and developers, especially Tim
> Charron, who has graciously given his time and expertise since the
> earliest days of the Bovine effort. Thanks to all the coordinators
> and keyserver operators: Chris Chiapusio, Paul Chvostek, Peter
> Denitto, Peter Doubt, Mishari Muqbil, Steve Sether, and Chris
> Yarnell. Thanks to Andrew Meggs, Roderick Mann, and Kevyn Shortell
> for showing us the true power of the Macintosh and the strength of
> its users. We’d also like to thank Dave Avery for attempting to
> bridge the gap between Bovine and the other RC5 efforts.
>
> Once again, a heartfelt clap on the back goes out to all of us who
> have run the client. Celebrations are in order. I’d like to invite
> any and all to join us on the EFNet IRC network channel #rc5 for
> celebrations as we regroup and set our sights on the next task. Now
> that we’ve proven the limitations of a 56-bit key length, let’s go
> one further and demonstrate the power of distributed computing! We
> are, all of us, the future of computing. Join the excitement as the
> world is forced to take notice of the power we’ve harnessed.
>
> Moo and a good hearty laugh.
>
> Adam L. Beberg - Client design and overall visionary
> Jeff Lawson - keymaster/server network design and morale booster
> David McNett - stats development and general busybody
>
>
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> -/\/ugget
> ________________________________________________________________________
> |David McNett |To ensure privacy and data integrity this message has|
> |nugget@slacker.com|been encrypted using dual rounds of ROT-13 encryption|
> |Birmingham, AL USA|Please encrypt all important correspondence with PGP!|
>
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--
The future has arrived; it's just not evenly distributed.
-William Gibson
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