This page contains errata and addenda of:
Reinhard Wobst, "Cryptology Unlocked", renewed 3rd edition
John Wiley &B Sons, 2007, ISBN 978-0-470-06064-3
Last modification: @(#) Dec 03 2007, 21:32:56
Addenda to the German 3rd edition
Nobody is perfect, and thus also the first English edition of my book (which is a strong modification of the 3rd German edition) will contain errors. I will always be glad about hints, but I beg you not to send me "uncrackable codes " or "completely new algorithms". You can read in the preface, why.
NEW (12/3/07) 3.8 - Bottom line of classical algorithms
I pointed out that very weak 160 bit Vigenere encryption is possibly used still today for critical tasks like mobile phones. I was so wrong. No, the situation is not much better, it is much worse. Some Microsoft wireless beyboards use "encryption" by XORing only one byte over the plaintext, i.e. use an 8 bit Vigenere cipher. The only thing you have to know to write an fully automated crack program is some reliable test on "plaintext", i.e. the structure of the keystroke sequences sent. Very enticing to collect password in the room. Read it yourself:
taken from www.heise-security.co.uk/news/99873
Report of 01.12.2007 21:31 taken from
Security firm cracks encryption for Microsoft's wireless keyboards
Dreamlab Technologies AG says it has found a way to sniff the data traffic between Microsoft's wireless keyboards and their base stations, which communicate with each other on the 27 MHz band. In the method they discovered, unauthorized parties are reportedly able to record and decrypt all keystrokes from such keyboards. The decoding was demonstrated using data traffic from the Wireless Optical Desktop 1000 and 2000. The security firm says that other keyboards that Microsoft sells, such as the Wireless Optical Desktop 3000 and 4000, encrypt and transmit data using the same procedure, so that they are also probably unsafe. Keyboards that use Bluetooth for communication are not vulnerable.
Max Moser and Philipp Schrödel say that decryption was very easy because the devices use a simple XOR mechanism for encryption and the keys are only one byte long. They claim that even a PDA with a slow ARM-CPU would have derived the combination quickly. Aside from not using such keyboards, there is no workaround. Microsoft has yet to react to the Swiss firm's announcement.
p.444, 2nd paragraph: There should not be FreeBSD but OpenBSD.