Geneticware of the British Virgin Islands has devised an intriguing new way
to keep Internet messages secret (GB 2358333). All encryption systems rely on
keys to decode a scrambled message. But hackers can still steal the key while it
is being sent to someone. The new idea is to send an encrypted test message from
computer A to computer B, along with a program that computer B uses to generate
many possible decoding keys. Computer B keeps generating keys, and sending back
the results to computer A, until computer A sees that the test message has been
decoded. It…
Technology
Your secret's safe
By Barry Fox
29 September 2001
