###Hypothetical Situation###:
=>Bob works on an organization with highly secret/sensitive information, they have a locked server, down in the basement, that Bob needs to acess everyday.
=>Bob can only access that server from the internal network (he has not security clearance to have physical access to the server)
=>Bob needs an ultra-secure password to login (aka: very long and hard to remember)
###Problems###:
=>Bob cannot remember such a password, and even having it on paper (on or a text file in a USB pendrive) would be very impractical to type in every day (not to mention it would be insecure).
The server is isolated from the internet (remote backups are not possible) wich leads to:
Data on the server is not encrypted, due to fear of data loss (redundant harddrives on the server are the only assurance), wich leads to:
=>Something like Truecrypt is not a solution (it allows keyfiles)
###Solution###:
=>Bob could simply use a CD or USB pendrive with hundreds or thousands of music files, only one being the key, even if an "attacker" would gain access to the USB device, there is little chance that he picks the right file at the first random tries, the server could even have an option to lock itself for a while or send and email/SMS to an admin if X number of failed attempts occur.
Other Possible implementations/benefits:
=>Ability to have a password OR a keyfile (eg: the password if forgotten and then the file can be used to recover the system)
=>Ability to have a password AND a keyfile, providing extra security.
At least a package that allows this would be very nice...
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bryhoyt wrote on the 9 Apr 08 at 20:16
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If your hypothetical situation were true, and security is so high at this organization that you need a password longer than you can remember, then suddenly having it on a pendrive would reduce all that security down to about ZERO.
You see, even if you've got 100,000 files to hide it amongst, that's vastly less than the number of possible combinations in even a 10-character passphrase (36^10 ~= 3,000,000,000,000).
To be honest, you may as well just put the password in plaintext on the USB pendrive, and have it login automatically when you stick the pendrive in. I know -- it sounds really insecure, but actually it's just about as secure as your suggestion; either way, once they've got your pendrive, it's pretty easy to get your password.
A better solution would be to store a huge key (say 128-bit) on the pendrive, and encrypt that with a short password. That means it's impossible (or incredibly difficult) for someone to crack the system *without* your pendrive, and still relatively difficult (though orders of magnitude less so) to crack *with* your pendrive.
my thoughts..
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