Thursday, January 23, 2003

Master Key Copying Revealed

Holy cow. When I read this in Clemens Vasters' blog, I thought, "Hey, given that all computer is based on physical security, this means we're pretty screwed."



A security researcher has revealed a little-known vulnerability in many locks that lets a person create a copy of the master key for an entire building by starting with any key from that building. [...] After testing the technique repeatedly against the hardware from major lock companies, Mr. Blaze wrote, "it required only a few minutes to carry out, even when using a file to cut the keys." [nytimes.com -- free sign-up required]

3 comments:

  1. Security of any type is technically impossible.

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  2. Hmm. I think by "security" you mean "perfect security". You're right - it's technically impossible.

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  3. I read this too. Another relevant part seemed to me the claim that security professionals already knew about this. A bit like the ongoing debates on whether software vulnerabilities should be disclosed by their discoverers.

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