New Research Result: Cold Boot Attacks on Disk Encryption

Story

 

Interesting
I always wondered about the effect of cooling on the capacitance of DRAM chips.

 

Yes indeed it is but i think it is a little bit paranoia. Attacker should be able to replace chips in a couple of minutes, though interesting

 

Guess the system administrators are going to have to go back to the drawing board.

 

It's obviously a very real risk if HW gets misplaced ie "laptops on the road trip"
Nicely produced video and nice discussion thread at freedom to tinker

Retitle for the masses: "Think your laptop is safe if you encrypt: think again !!"
This sort of stuff must give some companies admins the "absolute shivers" heh.

Subeditors dream: 'breaking disc encryption with RAM dumps' lol

 

Hello,

The solution would be:

1. a fail-safe mechanism that drains the capacitators when the case is opened.

2. an enclosure of such a nature for the memory chips.

3. a no-power mechanism that prevents the comp from turning on if the temperature of the relevant modules is below a certain temperature - say 0 degrees C. Run a Monte Carlo experiment for typical 100 chips, see the average decay time for a typical range of temperatures and introduce a restart-delay mechanism, of let's say, 14 seconds, between two consequtive power offs/ons.

Problem solved.

Oh, and put everything in a titanium box, place a charge of C4 and a blob of 5Cu Am-241 inside.

Mrk

 

Hello,
I guess the words Monte Carlo and Am-241 were too frightening...
Mrk

 

LOL, this is THE solution

 

Cold bits as a security bypass
Bypassing disk encryption with a spray can
By Scott Bradner