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US study on improving web security
26 Apr 2010
Research is under way to make web security systems less susceptible to attack.
Silicon chips could be made more reliable after scientists found varying voltage to key parts of a computer's processor compromises its ability to keep data secret.
Lots of websites taking payments scramble credit card and other data using systems based on public key cryptography, for instance RSA authentication.
Two keys - one public and one private - scramble data and "if data is locked with a public key, it can only be unlocked with the corresponding private key," says Professor Todd Austin, from the University of Michigan's electrical engineering and computer science department.
"It's the kind of algorithm you use when you go to a website and you see the little padlock in the lower right-hand corner to indicate a secure connection," he said.
Fake values will be used in new versions of the system to confuse attempts to copy a private key, in what Prof Austin describes as an "ongoing process of hardening RSA".
Copyright © Press Association 2010
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