Dotcom Offers €10,000 to Potential Code Crackers

[The Wooster]

Dotcom Offers €10,000 to Potential Code Crackers

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Crack Mega's cryptography to win yourself ten grand.

You've almost got to admire Megaupload founder, Kim Dotcom's, sheer talent for ballsy showboating. Having enraged copyright proponents across the globe, Dotcom seems intent to caper about the internet, thumbing his nose at the entertainment industry and the FBI like some kind of rotund jester. His latest venture, a cloud-based file-sharing service born from the carcass of Megaupload - simply titled "Mega" - has been met with criticism from security experts and copyright warriors alike. Dotcom's response? A challenge.

:#Mega's open source encryption remains unbroken! We'll offer 10,000 EURO to anyone who can break it. Expect a blog post today," Dotcom tweeted earlier today. [https://twitter.com/KimDotcom/status/297173196166295554]

Mega's security is unorthodox. Everything a user uploads is encrypted before it leaves their browser, using a master key that can be unlocked by a password known only to the user. In other words, Mega can't tell what the user is uploading. Critics argue that the system isn't so much about protecting the user's information as it is about providing Mega's operators with plausible deniability when it comes to copyright-infringing files.

But the system has also come under fire from security experts. The number-crunchers argue that the encryption system's random number generation isn't up to snuff, and that the cryptographic hashes could be cracked using dictionary-based attacks. Dotcom obviously believes otherwise.

Honestly, I'm not sure who I'm rooting for here. On one hand, it'd be wonderful to see Dotcom eat crow and have to hand out ten Gs to some random cryptanalyst. On the other, the file-sharing baron's antics do tend to whip MPAA-types into frothing fits of rage, and I'd be lying if I said that doesn't keep me warm at night.

Source: The Register [http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/02/01/mega_crypto_break_bounty/]


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[Beffudled Sheep_v1legacy]

I'm rooting for the Troll here. His antics just make me laugh too much. Go Kim!

 

[Therumancer]

Well, I think it's kind of hilarious since the idea of the encryption seems to be deniability rather than functionality. The idea being that some pirate or whatever would put the decryption code right there in the comments or whatever so people could receive the file. Kim of course being able to blame people's "poor security habits", claim it would be unethical to use those keys himself, or simply claim too much traffic to investigate every file with an unlock code.

It will be interesting to see what happens, and how exactly this system will wind up being user friendly to pirates, which is what copyright defenders are getting at.

 

[webkilla]

AFAIK it's not the first company to make a similar challenge - although from what I know they rarely make it this public, and the reward is more often a temporary gig as a security consultant to patch up the hole they've found

 

[Quaxar]

I wonder how much he'd pay if I cracked his front door...

 

[weirdee]

tbh this is easier than hiring tons of security experts to test your stuff, just wait until somebody get the job done, then pay that person, if it doesn't happen, then nothing is lost

 

[LordMonty]

Its funny and tbh its a clever man taking the piss, as long as he's not hurting anyone bar the big corps I don't think it'll ever matter.

 

[Scorpid]

I wonder how much he'd pay if I cracked his front door...

Nothing, he'd mistake you for the FBI and surrender.

 

[gigastar]

So hes just issued a challenge to the internet.

Id give it a few days at least. No more than 2 weeks.

 

[Jamous]

It'll be interesting to see how this goes. Looking forward to it.

 

[ScaryAlmond]

Actually a pretty good strategy for Kim it's a win either way
One way his security is robust enough that noone hacks into it
On the other hand if there are a range of security flaws he is able to learn about them directly and is able to patch his software to improve it.
While the latter is obviously a lesser win for him it is a good strategy because a security flaw he doesn't hear about could cost him alot more than $10'000.

 

[Dogstile]

So hes just issued a challenge to the internet.

Id give it a few days at least. No more than 2 weeks.

Didn't Valve do that and it's still going with the whole steam guard thing? Internet isn't that all knowing. Then again, this does actually seem to be a bit more breakable, but the man's idea is pretty sound either way. If it breaks, he fixes it and he's covered. If not, reputation for being awesome is gained.

Oh it does make me feel happy that people are so against his websites. Do these people have the same sort of rage against dropbox?

Edit: Honestly though, it's saddening that he's even needed to resort to a "look, we can't even see what's in the fucking file, are you happy now?" system in response to the absolutely ridiculous idea that they should police every single file on that site.

 

[Abomination]

I'm a big fan of Kim. He's sort of a cannibal in how he is turning on those which he belongs to the same group - mega millionaires - but he's on my side in that fight.

As always, business is most successful when it innovates and develops unorthodox approaches to traditional, predictive problem solving. Kim's turning his nose up at the traditional method, insulting those who employ it and making millions in the process.

 

[Athinira]

Breaking the cryptographic hashes is not necessarily going to earn you those 10k. The cryptographic hash is derived from the users password they provide when they create an account, and since Mega can't be responsible for the user choosing a weak password (in fact, there is no security system that can make up for that effectively. Hash iteration is a possibility, but costs huge amounts of CPU).

With that said, security experts have criticized the hashing-algorithm itself that they use at Mega. If you can prove to them that you can break a very complicated password in a relatively short time, it might be enough to net you the money.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

That'd look good on a resumé. Credentials sir? Well, I cracked Mega's encryption and there's the car I bought with the money.

Honestly though, that song is just the worst most uninspired crap I've ever seen.

 

[Pebkio]

This guy is quickly becoming my personal hero. Not because he's a pirate, he's just got the biggest balls ever. This guy gets in trouble for his site being pirate central... so what does he do? Why, he sets up a website to be an even BIGGER file-sharing HQ but now with the largest built in plausible deniability setup this side of anything ever.

He knows what he wants to do for the rest of his life and those in charge are going to keep putting nonsense out there to stop him. But does that stop him? No sir! He just gets clever. And if he gets in trouble? No sir! He'll just do it again... BIGGER AND BETTER than before! And when they get obviously unjust in their pursuit of him? No sir! He flips the ruling judge a freedom bird and start trolling.

Edit: I mean, hell, at the launch party of his new file-sharing company - featuring conch-shell music and large men in loin-cloths - he staged a mock raid aimed at making fun of those who arrested him for doing the very thing he was doing again... WHILE ON BAIL!

 

[Entitled]

This guy is quickly becoming my personal hero. Not because he's a pirate, he's just got the biggest balls ever. This guy gets in trouble for his site being pirate central... so what does he do? Why, he sets up a website to be an even BIGGER file-sharing HQ but now with the largest built in plausible deniability setup this side of anything ever.

This. Also, he is my hero because even though he already made enough profit from Megaupload that he could have lived the rest of his life in a palace built out of money bricks without ever doing anything else, yet he CHOSE TO continue sticking it to the man even at the risk of getting arrested again.

Copyright apologists would always love to apply their own amorality to everyone else, how supposedly everyone is in it for the money only, but it all falls apart when people like him, or the Piratebay crew, are showing this kind of determination when the only extra benefit from going on is that they can continue to support their ideology.