It was reported in “The Times of India” this week that
Signitron in Calcutta,
India has developed an encryption software package using a powerful
448-bit key.
Called EMD
Armor–but packaged and sold as Sigma 2000–it
can encrypt all the data stored on a PC. A very low cost system, with prices
as low as Rs 1,650 ($38), it provides extremely good privacy. The company
said it would take at least 2 trillion years to crack the code.
K. Kundu, Signitron India Director, explained that EMD Armor is based on
the Blowfish algorithm, developed by cryptography guru Bruce Schneir and
placed in the public domain. Signitron is said to have sold a substantial
number of copies of the EMD Armor encryption software in the West.
Kurdu went on to say that the product combines the highest key strength,
a fast encryption speed (60 MB per minute), and online encryption. This
means, he said, that non-encyrpted data is never stored on the user’s hard
disk.
Although U.S. law prohibits the export of 128-bit asymmetric keys, the
Signitron software gives the rest of the world a virtually unbreakable method
of encrypting data. It will pose a further challenge to governments around the
world, who are struggling with the issue of strong encryption.