Answers Will Out

1. Answers Will Out Or….what’s wrong with repeated failure?

2. Conversation… • Me: I have just finished my DPhil and handed it it in. • Michael H: Oh, you’ll feel free to diversify more now then. • Me: Yes, that’s right. • Michael H : I was joking.

3. Debate • You can never attack modern-day crypto with non-standard computational techniques. • Oh yes you can

4. Motivations • Embrace British-ness. If at first you don’t succeed…….. Failure may be your style. • Trogg’s – Love is all around us. • Well, OK information is all around us and we might be able to make more of it than we think. • Seek inspiration from outside the traditional areas.

5. Analogy Time I: Encryption Plaintext P The Black Box Assumption – essentially considering encryption only as a mathematical function. In the public arena only really challenged in the 90’s when attacks based on physical implementation arrived Key • Fault Injection Attacks (Belcore, and others) Ciphertext C • Paul Kocher’s Timing Attacks • Simple Power Analysis • Differential Power Analysis The computational dynamics of the implementation can leak vast amounts of information

6. Analogy Time II: Annealing Problem P The Black Box Assumption – virtually every application of annealing simply throws the technique at problem and awaits the final output. Is this really the most efficient use of information? Let’s look inside the box….. Initialisation data Final Solution C

7. Analogy Time III: Internal Computational Dynamics Problem P, e.g. minimise cost(y,A,Hist) The algorithm carries out 100 000s of cost function evaluations which guide the search. Initialisation data Why did it take the path it did? Bear in mind the whole search process is public and so we can monitor it. Final Solution C

8. Analogy Time IV: Fault Injection Warped or Faulty Problem P’ Invariably people assume you need to solve the problem at hand. Reflected in ‘well-motivated’ or direct cost functions Initialisation data What happens if we inject a ‘fault’ into the process? Mutate the problem into a similar but different one. Can we make use of the solutions obtained to help solve original problem? Final Solution C’

9. Analogy Time V: Digital Heat? • Any form of electromagnetic radiation can be source of information. • Is there a digital equivalent of heat? • Run an (probably evolved) FPGA program on problem data input an monitor aspects such as the frequencies of state toggling of cell values. 0 0 1 0 0 1 More generally any aspect of computation (cache misses etc.) can be used. 1 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0

10. And Back Again • Can we evolve a digital program whose sole effective purpose is to consume power? • Some of you may have actually done this already. ) • But to do so in a way that computes a solution?

11. Finally • May allow us to apply non-standard techniques to attack problems hitherto considered unattackable: • Number theory problems. • Especially with cryptographic applications. • Looking to fuse bits of mathematics, search, cryptography (and testing…) • Related ideas beginning to generate interest across several continents (Asia, Europe, US). • Virtual inter-working can work.