jbtvguy
stranger
Reged: 01/19/04
Posts: 2
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I just read Digital Fortress. I'm a little confused on a plot point. Digital Fortress was available as a download, and everyone interested in it had downloaded it to try to crack it. To make D.F. work, Numataka just needed the pass key. Strathmore's plan involved changing the version of D.F. on Tankado's web site once he finished cracking it and adding the NSA's back door. But what buyer wouldn't have already downloaded it by then? In other words, there seems to be a hole in Strathmore's logic. When he changes D.F to have a back-door for the NSA to use, then posts it on the web site in place of Tankado's version and sells the pass key to Numataka, Numataka doesn't need to re-download the NSA's covert version, but just use the pass key on the version he already downloaded. I bet I missed something here. I was reading it till pretty late at night. Great book.
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maddman
stranger
Reged: 01/26/04
Posts: 1
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I followed yor same logic. I think that we are correct, and we just have to chalk that up to literary latitude.
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jbtvguy
stranger
Reged: 01/19/04
Posts: 2
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I guess so. But still, a fun book.
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Bulldog_LC
stranger
Reged: 02/24/04
Posts: 5
Loc: New Hampshire
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I totally agree. I was thinking the same thing as I was reading it!
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poia
The Modeleter
Reged: 01/25/04
Posts: 168
Loc: NJ
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I must say, the first time I read the book the plan didn’t make sense… So I read it again.
Strathmore explains his great plan to a panic stricken Susan. In those conditions, he’s making sense. It is an ideal plan:
NSA would have the passkey and a back door installed. They would continue to operate TRANSLTR but announce that the machine cannot break the code… Life’s great! And Strathmore is a hero.
His real plan: get the key, sell the key, install a back door, be a hero, kill David, get Susan! Life’s better!
But, Digital Fortress is only an encrypted virus…:)
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"OK, so what's the speed of dark?"S.W.
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Bulldog_LC
stranger
Reged: 02/24/04
Posts: 5
Loc: New Hampshire
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But you missed the important point.....
The company he planned to sell the key to had already downloaded the file. Once he sold the key, his prospective buyer would use the key to unlock the version he had already downloaded, not the modified version that Strathmore was planning to put the backdoor into. Writing a backdoor into the program would do Strathmore no good because the version that would be used on the market would be the original, untainted version.
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poia
The Modeleter
Reged: 01/25/04
Posts: 168
Loc: NJ
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Maybe I did, but I think Strathmore's plan is not the plot of the book, only his madman ideas... He also thought he's getting Susan.
My opinion is the writer wanted to portrayed him as a smart man but desperate, and desperate men make mistakes, as in not thinking a plan all the way through.
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"OK, so what's the speed of dark?"S.W.
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norwayjose
stranger
Reged: 03/30/04
Posts: 1
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I'm having trouble with the fact that the digital fortress encryption program is supposedly posted on a web site encrypted with itself. How is anyone supposed to decrypt it without a working, non-encrypted version of the program?
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mmoshi65
stranger
Reged: 04/06/04
Posts: 3
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well... if they modify the key "Digital Fortress" when they add the back door,they can tell everyone to download it again.
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Skate
newbie
Reged: 05/23/04
Posts: 39
Loc: Ohio, U.S.
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Why would anyone have reason to? They already have a copy, you know there would be people like me who would try the key on the old version just for the hell of it. Here is what I would do:
Unlock DR, add the back door and change the needed key. That way you can tell people to re-DL it, and give them the new key. If they tried that old version it wouldn't work.
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Arras
enthusiast
Reged: 05/24/04
Posts: 263
Loc: B.C., Canada
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Quote:
Skate said:
Here is what I would do:
Unlock DR, add the back door and change the needed key. That way you can tell people to re-DL it, and give them the new key. If they tried that old version it wouldn't work.
Exactly. This relies on obtaining/destroying the original pass-key, though, since that original would still work on the original version of the algorithm that's already out there on the Internet. Once you've destroyed the original pass-key, those existing versions out there are useless, so anyone wanting DF would need to download your new version (and its new pass-key).
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langdon_lover
journeyman
Reged: 10/11/04
Posts: 66
Loc: England UK
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it doesnt matter anyway, it was a virus, not a code for them to break, and there was no pass key, only the kill code
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NeverEnding
journeyman
Reged: 09/27/04
Posts: 56
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All he had to do was insert the back door and then sell the company the key and the code in a bundle. The companys might get suspicous if you asked everyone to re-dl the code. and yes it was just a virus, but at that point in the book nobody knew it!
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"Beware of the man whose belly does not move when he laughs."
Some Asian person
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JeanMarc
stranger
Reged: 11/26/04
Posts: 1
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Absolutely agree. It came to me as well while I was reading the book.
That's the danger with those books (or series like 24) which contains a surprise at every chapter. At the end, you realize that there were simpler solutions... but less impressive
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Cryptomaniac
stranger
Reged: 05/13/06
Posts: 3
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Quote:
langdon_lover said:
it doesnt matter anyway, it was a virus, not a code for them to break, and there was no pass key, only the kill code
I agree. After all DF was no unbreakable code; it was just a virus.
Anyways, the kill code was really good. The number three(3) seemed pretty easy but i think all expected a difficult and cryptic number. So three(3) was pretty unobvious but all the more interesting.
I especially liked the connection with Tankado's fingers.
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