Encrypting emails can be tedious, difficult and very confusing. And even for those who have mastered the process, it's useless unless the intended recipient has the correct software to decode the message. A Georgia Institute of Technology researcher has created an easier method – one that sounds familiar to parents who try to outsmart their 8-year-old child. The new technique gets rid of the complicated, mathematically generated messages that are typical of encryption software. Instead, the method transforms specific emails into ones that are vague by leaving out key words.
"It's kind of like when mom and dad are talking about potential vacation spots while the kids are nearby," said Eric Gilbert, the Georgia Tech assistant professor who developed the software. "They can't say or spell 'Disney,' or the children will get too excited. So they use other words and the meaning is implied. Instead of 'Disney,' they could say 'have you bought tickets to the place yet.'"
Gilbert's Open Book system, a prototype that uses a Google Mail plug-in called Read Me, works the same way by substituting specific words with ambiguous ones. If the above example was an email conversation, the sender would write, "Have you bought tickets to Disney yet?" Open Book would change the message when it was sent. The other person would see, "Have you bought tickets to (place) yet?"
The process reduces the information disclosed to eavesdroppers or computer systems that monitor online communications, while taking advantage of common ground between the participants.
The system was presented at the ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2015) in Seoul, South Korea, April 18-23 (Open Book: A Socially Inspired Cloaking Technique that Uses Lexical Abstraction to Transform Messages) [PDF].
Original Submission
(Score: 5, Funny) by Gaaark on Saturday July 04 2015, @08:25PM
If [place] [verb] [person], then [person] [violent verb] my [backside]. [expletive].
Got that?
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Funny) by dyingtolive on Saturday July 04 2015, @08:30PM
Maybe.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 1) by linkdude64 on Saturday July 04 2015, @08:34PM
"THINK OF THE CHILDREN" can actually be used in our favor! :)
(Score: 3, Informative) by technohat on Saturday July 04 2015, @08:39PM
I think "Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra" is a bit more secure. ;-)
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday July 04 2015, @09:23PM
Man, although I love this picture [imgur.com], that was by far one of the most overrated episodes ever. In fact it was goddamn silly, second only to 11001001 [wikia.com] in its gayness up the anus.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by DarkMorph on Saturday July 04 2015, @08:43PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2015, @09:14PM
The Code Talkers of the WWII USMC are a prime example.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday July 04 2015, @09:30PM
Credit where credit's due -- the code talkers were bilingual Native Americans [wikipedia.org] and their exploits were security through obscurity.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Sunday July 05 2015, @02:44PM
Which is fine if you just need to make sure the materials aren't used within a tight time-frame. Most of the things they were conveying were really only sensitve for a few hours or days. And unless the war had dragged on for decades, it's rather unlikely that the Germans could have encountered the language enough to learn to understand it.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by wonkey_monkey on Saturday July 04 2015, @08:45PM
Well, that sounds like a pretty terrible idea.
---
"Did you buy tickets to [THAT PLACE] yet?"
"Huh? Which place? [THAT PLACE] or [THAT PLACE]?"
---
"Hey, change of plans. We're meeting at [A NUMBER BETWEEN 7 AND 11]pm at [THAT PLACE] to drop off the ransom."
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 2, Funny) by yarp on Sunday July 05 2015, @08:11AM
Here on Marklar, we refer to all people, places, and things as 'marklar.'
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 05 2015, @09:55AM
Smurfs Smurfed first, smurfed better, smurfed smurfer, smurfed smurfest.
Smurfing smurf smurfs smurfer smurfings.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by M. Baranczak on Saturday July 04 2015, @10:03PM
(Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Sunday July 05 2015, @08:25AM
If it's being done by a computer, then why the hell wouldn't you just use proper encryption?
Because (as the second sentence of the summary points out) that requires a computer at the other end to do the decryption, and decryption is not yet ubiquitous enough for that to be reasonably expected.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Saturday July 04 2015, @10:34PM
Son, please let the pentagon know that our desalination plant is broken.
But sir, our desalination works just fine!
That's a direct order from your commanding officer. ;-D
SIR YES SIR!!!!! OMG PONIES1111!
The Enemy is sending a new desalination plant to THAT PLACE
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Saturday July 04 2015, @10:41PM
In an environment with classified material, the security procedures went out of their way to explain that indirection and vagueness did not make it OK to discuss something over the phone.
That was a while ago. Today an eavesdropper with access to lots of other data could disambiguate things automatically.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Saturday July 04 2015, @10:48PM
Are you at liberty to confirm or deny that there was an approved procedure?
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 05 2015, @12:17AM
Anyway nowadays you can practically always use encryption in cases where you can communicate the way the article says.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday July 05 2015, @12:39AM
When the military needs to communicate, it needs to communicate.
I once saw a movie, the name escapes me just now, in which the Australian commanders cancelled a World War I frontal assault but could not deliver the orde because of a broken telephone wire, so they sent a runner.
Gallipoli, that's it. But in much the same way as one cannot unscrew a woman, one cannot unwatch a movie.
I am dead certain there is a procedure howver that procedure may itself be classified.
My father had a top secret clearance. One of his jobs was to decrypt orders for his captain.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Saturday July 04 2015, @10:51PM
Mike?
Yes Dad?
Aboard submarines there are some black boxes.
And there are some quiet men who tend to those black boxes.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 05 2015, @01:12AM
If they were the kind of boxes I worked on then they were most likely grey.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday July 05 2015, @01:38AM
Otherwise the FBI Counterintelligence Division has your IP.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 05 2015, @10:49AM
you are confused soldier!
that was a donkey you were fucking, not a woman!
you are dismissed!
(Score: 4, Insightful) by penguinoid on Sunday July 05 2015, @03:45AM
This sounds like the sort of thing I'd use to get around automated censorship, but only when there's no one who actually cares or no consequences. I suppose it might help you avoid hitting certain words to put you on a watchlist or something, but if you're counting on this sort of thing to keep you safe you are totally screwed. Use proper encryption, or at least a proper code.
RIP Slashdot. Killed by greedy bastards.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Sunday July 05 2015, @07:24PM
A proper code is better than proper encryption...but MUCH more difficult to arrange. Even more difficult than one time pads. A proper code need to obscure the signs of the underlying grammar, as well as the individual words, reconfiguring the boundaries of where thoughts are demarcated. I.e., it essentially needs to be a language that is of a family previously unencountered. The WWII code talkers mentioned above were along this line, but the messages were theoretically breakable because the information on the language was publicly accessible. With good encryption, if you have the key the message is easily available. With a good code, the underlying message is available, but it can't really be translated into ordinary speech.
Please note: The code talkers were so successful because their language was not an IndoEuropean language. Some African languages would work equally well, though, e.g., clicks and be difficult to transcribe. And the code talkers didn't even talk straight Navajo, but a slangified version similar to the languages that teenagers create automatically to hide from their elders. This meant that the basic grammatical structures did not fit into the patterns that those trying to understand them expected. Hopi might have been an even better choice, but there were probably many fewer Hopi soldiers, as I believe that the base population is much smaller.
OTOH, a good one-time pad is also theoretically unbreakable, and usually much easier to arrange.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Kent_Diego on Sunday July 05 2015, @05:36AM
Mobsters and prisoners do this all the time assuming the conversation in monitored. The cops still figure it out and get the convictions. They will figure it out. Without public key/private key encryption you are wasting your time.
(Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Sunday July 05 2015, @09:24PM
utsNay otay youyay, oppercay!
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 1) by Yog-Yogguth on Wednesday July 08 2015, @03:55AM
Ansckwer insck Cushin: cushOOn! [youtube.com]
Bite harder Ouroboros, bite! tails.boum.org/ linux USB CD secure desktop IRC *crypt tor (not endorsements (XKeyScore))
(Score: 1) by rob_on_earth on Monday July 06 2015, @09:15AM
Thank you for your interest, the server is available [myserver].
Step 1 configure you outgoing mail server to [myserver]
Step 2 upload all your secret words to [myserver/totallysecure]
Step 3 ...
Step 4 I have all your secret words and I am selling them to the NSA or ISIS/Disney which ever pays best.