http://www.cryptography.com/des/#design
DES encryption cracked in 56 hours, using a set of 1000 or so custom ASICs
controlled by a PC. Somewhere I read that the original Win95 was replaced
by Linux so they could administer it remotely. The press release describes
the machine as "home-made", but the $250K budget is a bit beyond my
allowance...
Incidentally, one can get into this kind of stuff on the cheap, using
EPLDs. Altera FLEX 6000's are around $25, for instance, and run at 125MHz
or so. I wrote a bit of blurb about this a while back at
http://andrew.triumf.ca/CPLD-CPU/ then found it had all been done already
:-(
Unfortunately, Altera software isn't available for Linux :-( only
Win95/NT/SunOS/Solaris/HPUX etc. and the license costs a bunch more on the
Unix platforms for the simulator, they don't include the graphic editor
and crap like that. The basic software is free, though, for older chips.
Deniable unless digitally signed
Andrew Daviel, TRIUMF, Canada
Tel. +1 (604) 222-7376
http://andrew.triumf.ca/andrew