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Cryptography is a thing of the past

by on27 February 2013



Experts think we need to come up with something better

After centuries of protecting messages, cryptography is less important and defenders need to start thinking about new ways to protect data.

One of the fathers of public-key cryptography Adi Shamir, who helped design the original RSA algorithm, said that security experts should be preparing for a "post-cryptography" world. He said that cryptography was becoming less important as even the most secure computer systems in the most isolated locations have been penetrated over the last couple of years by a series of APTs and other advanced attacks.

Shamir who works for the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, said during the Cryptographers' Panel session at the RSA Conference that people needed to rethink how they protect themselves. Security researchers and others involved in defending networks to look for methods other than cryptography that are capable of securing their sensitive data. Shamir pointed out that it was hard to use cryptography effectively if you assume an APT is watching everything on a system.

He said that one way to help shore up defenses would be to improve the certificate authority infrastructure.

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