Repeated hacking attacks on NZ crypto-challenge website
Repeated hacking attacks on NZ Website dartprivacy.com
On 21 August a series of online attacks began against the website of Wellington-based
Dart Privacy (www.dartprivacy.com). Repeated attempts were made to gain access under administrator privilege to the site which is offering a US$10,000 challenge to hackers to crack 20 encrypted files. Project manager Rod Smith:
"We haven't put the plain-text of the 20 encrypted challenge files on the website. No one would do that. The attack seems to have been aimed at disrupting the crypto-challenge rather than taking part in it. We don't mind the hackers who have registered under anonymous email addresses and phony names, but the challenge is to hack the 20 files, not the website".
The brute-force attack was repulsed by the site's security protection system.
The DART Project began in late 2013 with the task of investigating structural encryption, a new type that uses data compression algorithms and a large data structure as an encryption key. A number of applications have now been successfully created including an encryption-decryption app available for free download, and an email client.
The DART challenge is designed to help verify the strength of the new structural encryption method. To date, none of the 20 files has been cracked.