🚀 go-pugleaf

In <1992Nov22.113138.26493@mtu.edu> mrmach@mtu.edu (MARK ROMAN MACH) writes:

>From the original article way back:
>>``He then transferred the password file to a Boeing Company computer,
>>where he decrypted the passwords.''

>    I've always had the tendency to differentiate "cracking" and
>"decrypting" as two separate things.  I always considered "decrypting"
>to imply that the key was used to convert from cipher text to plain
>text, or that the appropriate inverse algorithm was used.  "Cracking"
>seems to imply things like randomly guessing the plain text until a
>cipher text match is found, crunching out computationally difficult
>inverse algorithms, or other illegitimate & unsanctioned methods to
>discover the plain text.

>    Am I wrong in believing this?  Does anybody else feel that the
>newspaper was irresponsible (or at least misinformed) by saying he
>"decrypted" the passwords?

Well, yes and no.  I think your delineation was more correct, but
possibly from a too-technical point of view.

You are using descriptions of technical operations to separate the
two meanings, but you also hint at the more simple difference of
morality between the two words.  Cracking being an immoral action
while decrypting being moral - or decrypting being somehow peaceful
and cracking being combative.

Crack is the new verb here.  Decrypt ought to mean, to a layman,
"unhide" or even "reveal".  To a techie, it ought to mean other 
things too.

How much do you expect the non-expert to carry around in his 
head anyway? :-)

>--
>Mark R. Mach, mrmach@mtu.edu

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