Cellphone Encryption Code Is Divulged New York Times (12/29/09) P. B3; O'Brien, Kevin J.
as it appeared in the December 30, 2009 edition of ACM TechNews.
German encryption expert Karsten Nohl says he has deciphered and published the secret code used to encrypt most of the world's cell phone calls in an effort to call attention to vulnerabilities in global wireless system security. The privacy of 80 percent of mobile calls worldwide is shielded by the 21-year-old global system for mobile communication (GSM) algorithm, whose security Nohl said was inadequate at the Chaos Communication Congress, a four-day conference of computer hackers that runs through Wednesday in Berlin. In August, Nohl challenged other hackers to assist him to crack the GSM code, and through the collaborative initiative the algorithm's code book was eventually reproduced through random combinations. Nohl says the code book was accessible on the Internet via services such as BitTorrent. Although the GSM Association devised a 128-bit successor to the 64-bit algorithm originally adopted in 1988, the majority of network operators have not upgraded to the new code. At the hacker conference, Nohl warned that the hardware and software required for digital surveillance of cell phone calls were freely available as an open source product in which the coding is available for individuals to customize. Nohl's decryption efforts were deemed illegal by the GSM Association, but ABI Research executive Stan Schatt says the disclosure, while not threatening in itself, makes the case that companies and governmental organizations should take the same measures to guarantee the security of their wireless conversations as they do with antivirus software for computer files. View Full Article
