Next-Gen Wireless Devices: Cracked Encryption By Brute-Force Attack

An encryption method widely expected to secure next-generation wireless phones and other devices succumbed to a brute-force collaborative effort to break it, a French research agency announced Thursday. An international team of researchers — led by crypto researcher Robert . . . An encryption method widely expected to secure next-generation wireless phones and other devices succumbed to a brute-force collaborative effort to break it, a French research agency announced Thursday. An international team of researchers — led by crypto researcher Robert Hurley of the French National Institute for Research in Computer Science and Control, or INRIA — and other computer enthusiasts found the 108-bit key to a scrambled message after four months of number crunching by 9,500 computers worldwide.