Chinese researchers break RSA encryption with a quantum computer


The research team, led by Wang Chao from Shanghai University, found that D-Wave’s quantum computers can optimize problem-solving in a way that makes it possible to attack encryption methods such as RSA.

In a potentially alarming development for global cybersecurity, Chinese researchers have unveiled a method using D-Wave’s quantum annealing systems to crack classic encryption, potentially accelerating the timeline for when quantum computers could pose a real threat to widely used cryptographic systems.

Read more…
Source: CSO News


Sign up for our Newsletter


Related:

  • Businesses warned over a new breed of BitLocker attacks

    March 14, 2019

    Devices protected using Microsoft BitLocker can be physically breached in a new form of attack that involves extracting the encryption keys from a computer’s Trusted Platform Module (TPM) chip. By hardwiring equipment into a computer’s motherboard, namely the TPM chip, attackers would be primed to access any sensitive corporate information stored on encrypted hard drives. This ...

  • Australia’s controversial anti-encryption bill passes into law

    December 7, 2018

    The Australian government has passed the controversial Access and Assistance Bill 2018 into law. Since it gives authorities the right to demand access to encrypted forms of communication and to slap companies that refuse to cooperate with fines up to $7.3 million, it prompted tech giants like Apple to voice their opposition. Cupertino criticized the vague wording of its current version, ...

  • Flaws in Popular Self-Encrypting SSDs Let Attackers Decrypt Data

    November 5, 2018

    We all have something to hide, something to protect. But if you are also relying on self-encrypting drives for that, then you should read this news carefully. Security researchers have discovered multiple critical vulnerabilities in some of the popular self-encrypting solid state drives (SSD) that could allow an attacker to decrypt disk encryption and recover protected ...

  • New Intel CPU Flaw Exploits Hyper-Threading to Steal Encrypted Data

    November 3, 2018

    A team of security researchers has discovered another serious side-channel vulnerability in Intel CPUs that could allow an attacker to sniff out sensitive protected data, like passwords and cryptographic keys, from other processes running in the same CPU core with simultaneous multi-threading feature enabled. The vulnerability, codenamed PortSmash (CVE-2018-5407), has joined the list of other dangerous side-channel vulnerabilities ...

  • Boffin: Dump hardware number generators for encryption and instead look within

    October 1, 2018

    Hardware-based random number generators (HWRNGs) for encryption could be superseded after a Philippines-based researcher found that side-channel measurement of the timing of CPU operations provide enough entropy to seed crypto systems with the necessary randomness. In a paper presented on Saturday at the International Conference on Innovative Research in Science, Technology and Management (ICIRSTM) in Singapore, JV Roig, ...

  • New Cold Boot Attack Unlocks Disk Encryption On Nearly All Modern PCs

    September 13, 2018

    Security researchers have revealed a new attack to steal passwords, encryption keys and other sensitive information stored on most modern computers, even those with full disk encryption. The attack is a new variation of a traditional Cold Boot Attack, which is around since 2008 and lets attackers steal information that briefly remains in the memory (RAM) after ...