Quantum Computational Supremacy: Security and Vulnerability in a New Paradigm

Despite three decades of research, the field of quantum computation has yet to build a quantum computer that can perform a task beyond the capability of any classical computer – an event known as computational supremacy. Yet this multi-billion dollar research industry persists in its efforts to construct such a machine. Based on the counter-intuitive principles of quantum physics, these devices are fundamentally different from the computers we know. It is theorised that large-scale quantum computers will have the ability to perform some remarkably powerful computations, even if the extent of their capabilities remains disputed. One application, however, the factoring of large numbers into their constituent primes, has already been demonstrated using Shor’s quantum algorithm. This capability has far reaching implications for cybersecurity as it poses an unprecedented threat to the public key encryption that forms an important component of the security of all digital communications. This paper outlines the nature of the threat that quantum computation is believed to pose to digital communications and investigates how this emerging technology, coupled with the threat of Adversarial Artificial Intelligence, may result in large technology companies gaining unacceptable political leverage; and it proposes measures that might be implemented to mitigate this eventuality

The Risks of Key Recovery, Key Escrow, and Trusted Third-Party Encryption

A variety of "key recovery," "key escrow," and "trusted third-party" encryption requirements have been suggested in recent years by government agencies seeking to conduct covert surveillance within the changing environments brought about by new technologies. This report examines the fundamental properties of these requirements and attempts to outline the technical risks, costs, and implications of deploying systems that provide government access to encryption keys

The Risks of Key Recovery, Key Escrow, and Trusted Third-Party Encryption

A variety of "key recovery," "key escrow," and "trusted third-party" encryption requirements have been suggested in recent years by government agencies seeking to conduct covert surveillance within the changing environments brought about by new technologies. This report examines the fundamental properties of these requirements and attempts to outline the technical risks, costs, and implications of deploying systems that provide government access to encryption keys

Blown to Bits: Your Life, Liberty, and Happiness After the Digital Explosion

382 p.Libro ElectrónicoEach of us has been in the computing field for more than 40 years. The book is the product of a lifetime of observing and participating in the changes it has brought. Each of us has been both a teacher and a learner in the field. This book emerged from a general education course we have taught at Harvard, but it is not a textbook. We wrote this book to share what wisdom we have with as many people as we can reach. We try to paint a big picture, with dozens of illuminating anecdotes as the brushstrokes. We aim to entertain you at the same time as we provoke your thinking.Preface Chapter 1 Digital Explosion Why Is It Happening, and What Is at Stake? The Explosion of Bits, and Everything Else The Koans of Bits Good and Ill, Promise and Peril Chapter 2 Naked in the Sunlight Privacy Lost, Privacy Abandoned 1984 Is Here, and We Like It Footprints and Fingerprints Why We Lost Our Privacy, or Gave It Away Little Brother Is Watching Big Brother, Abroad and in the U.S. Technology Change and Lifestyle Change Beyond Privacy Chapter 3 Ghosts in the Machine Secrets and Surprises of Electronic Documents What You See Is Not What the Computer Knows Representation, Reality, and Illusion Hiding Information in Images The Scary Secrets of Old Disks Chapter 4 Needles in the Haystack Google and Other Brokers in the Bits Bazaar Found After Seventy Years The Library and the Bazaar The Fall of Hierarchy It Matters How It Works Who Pays, and for What? Search Is Power You Searched for WHAT? Tracking Searches Regulating or Replacing the Brokers Chapter 5 Secret Bits How Codes Became Unbreakable Encryption in the Hands of Terrorists, and Everyone Else Historical Cryptography Lessons for the Internet Age Secrecy Changes Forever Cryptography for Everyone Cryptography Unsettled Chapter 6 Balance Toppled Who Owns the Bits? Automated Crimes—Automated Justice NET Act Makes Sharing a Crime The Peer-to-Peer Upheaval Sharing Goes Decentralized Authorized Use Only Forbidden Technology Copyright Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance The Limits of Property Chapter 7 You Can’t Say That on the Internet Guarding the Frontiers of Digital Expression Do You Know Where Your Child Is on the Web Tonight? Metaphors for Something Unlike Anything Else Publisher or Distributor? Neither Liberty nor Security The Nastiest Place on Earth The Most Participatory Form of Mass Speech Protecting Good Samaritans—and a Few Bad Ones Laws of Unintended Consequences Can the Internet Be Like a Magazine Store? Let Your Fingers Do the Stalking Like an Annoying Telephone Call? Digital Protection, Digital Censorship—and Self-Censorship Chapter 8 Bits in the Air Old Metaphors, New Technologies, and Free Speech Censoring the President How Broadcasting Became Regulated The Path to Spectrum Deregulation What Does the Future Hold for Radio? Conclusion After the Explosion Bits Lighting Up the World A Few Bits in Conclusion Appendix The Internet as System and Spirit The Internet as a Communication System The Internet Spirit Endnotes Inde

Nation-State Attackers and their Effects on Computer Security

Nation-state intelligence agencies have long attempted to operate in secret, but recent revelations have drawn the attention of security researchers as well as the general public to their operations. The scale, aggressiveness, and untargeted nature of many of these now public operations were not only alarming, but also baffling as many were thought impossible or at best infeasible at scale. The security community has since made many efforts to protect end-users by identifying, analyzing, and mitigating these now known operations. While much-needed, the security community's response has largely been reactionary to the oracled existence of vulnerabilities and the disclosure of specific operations. Nation-State Attackers, however, are dynamic, forward-thinking, and surprisingly agile adversaries who do not rest on their laurels and are continually advancing their efforts to obtain information. Without the ability to conceptualize their actions, understand their perspective, or account for their presence, the security community's advances will become antiquated and unable to defend against the progress of Nation-State Attackers. In this work, we present and discuss a model of Nation-State Attackers that can be used to represent their attributes, behavior patterns, and world view. We use this representation of Nation-State Attackers to show that real-world threat models do not account for such highly privileged attackers, to identify and support technical explanations of known but ambiguous operations, and to identify and analyze vulnerabilities in current systems that are favorable to Nation-State Attackers.PHDComputer Science & EngineeringUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/143907/1/aaspring_1.pd