Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin
PCloud Crypto Hacking Challenge – Prove You Can Break Our Client-Side Encryption (pcloud.com)
1 point by flexie on Sept 30, 2015 | hide | past | favorite | 1 comment


As Moxie Marlinspike pointed out in "The Fallacy Of The Crypto Contest" at http://thoughtcrime.org/blog/telegram-crypto-challenge/ these sorts of contests are rigged.

The challenge page says:

> Within the next three months we will give you access to a pCloud Challenge account, containing an encrypted folder. If you find out what is inside the Crypto Folder and send it back to us .. in decrypted state, we will give you $20,000

Marlinspike points out, regarding a different challenge set up with similar principles, that it's easy to construct a 'horrifically bad “secure” protocol that wouldn’t last a second in a real world environment, but becomes “unbreakable” when presented in the exact same framework' as the proposed rules.

"Contests like these are tools in the service of snake oil.".

Don't use encryption that isn't open to public inspection. Don't support snake oil encryption peddlers.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: