*BSD News Article 21297


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From: fahn@chirality.rsa.com (Paul Fahn)
Newsgroups: sci.math,alt.security,alt.security.pgp,sci.crypt,comp.os.linux.misc,comp.os.386bsd.misc,comp.unix.misc,comp.unix.wizards,isu.cc.general,isu.cc.vincent
Subject: Re: RSA129 factoring attack -- participants needed
Date: 21 Sep 93 15:46:26
Organization: RSA Data Security, Inc.
Lines: 14
Message-ID: <FAHN.93Sep21154626@chirality.rsa.com>
References: <explorer.748591928@tbird.cc.iastate.edu>
NNTP-Posting-Host: chirality.rsa.com
In-reply-to: explorer@iastate.edu's message of Tue, 21 Sep 1993 06:12:08 GMT

In article <explorer.748591928@tbird.cc.iastate.edu> explorer@iastate.edu (Michael Graff) writes:

>   In 1977, a 129-digit integer appeared in the pages of Scientific American.
>   This number, the RSA challenge modulus or RSA-129, has not yet been
>   successfully factored.  Factoring it, a 425-bit number, would be a major
>   milestone in cryptography, as it would show that current technology is able to
>   break commonly-used RSA-cryptosystem keys within a reasonable time.

This is not correct. Commonly-used RSA systems use key sizes significantly 
larger than 425 bits. Common RSA key sizes range from 512 bits to 1024. 
Factoring RSA-129 does not in any way jeopardize the security of widely 
used versions of RSA. 

Paul