5 ms·

Or encrypt your data before uploading it to "the cloud" (aka, somebody else's computer).

• epanchin 8y ago
  Encrypting something today is no guarantee that it’ll still be encrypted in 20 years. If you encrypted something in 1999 with 56-bit key DES, your data is no longer private.
  • PhasmaFelis 8y ago
    Reminds me of the bit from Cryptonomicon, which as it happens was published in 1999: > [Randy] has pointed out to Avi, in an encrypted e-mail message, that if every particle of matter in the universe could be used to construct one single cosmic supercomputer, and this computer was put to work trying to break a 4096-bit encryption key, it would take longer than the lifespan of the universe. > "Using today's technology," Avi shot back, "that is true. But what about quantum computers? And what if new mathematical techniques are developed that can simplify the factoring of large prime numbers?" > "How long do you want these messages to remain secret?" Randy asked, in his last message before leaving San Francisco. "Five years? Ten years? Twenty-five years?" > After he got to the hotel this afternoon, Randy decrypted and read Avi's answer. It is still hanging in front of his eyes, like the after image of a strobe: > I want them to remain secret for as long as men are capable of evil.
  • tgsovlerkhgsel 8y ago
    If you encrypted something in 1999 with 56-bit key DES, you were using a cipher that at that time was not just controversial or considered weak by leading cryptographers (that was already the case in 1977), but also practically demonstrated to be broken. If anything, the fact that brute-force still seems to be the most practical attack against DES shows that (symmetric) encryption lasts surprisingly long.