The Register® — Biting the hand that feeds IT

Enigma message cracks under distributed computing

Code breaking help sought

Increase your knowledge of the latest threats to your busines

A distributed computing project has been set up that aims to crack unbroken Enigma ciphers dating back to World War II. One of four unbroken Nazi codes has already succumbed. The M4 project is seeking help from the net community in breaking the other three codes.

Computer users interested in getting involved can download a client onto their PCs which takes advantage of idle processing time to perform number crunching in much the same way the popular SETI@Home screen saver was used to analyse radio telescope signals from space in the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence. The name of the project comes from the belief that the signals were encoded using a four rotor Enigma M4 device. The signals analysed by the project were captured in the North Atlantic in 1942. ®

Tune into our application security webcast, click here

Don’t Miss

Win a Samsung C6625!

Reg Lucky Draw Windows Mobile handsets up for grabs

Palm_Pre_001_SMIs your cameraphone an oxymoron?

Pic Review iPhone 3G v iPhone 3GS v Palm Pre

Vulture logo with head phonesWindows 7, Bing and security: Mr Ballmer regrets

Steve hopes Microsoft money can buy your love

Sign up, sign up for The Register IT security newsletter

Narrowcasting for the email classes