Using Java and Linux to crack the DES challenge

Abstract

DES has been used for a long time to guarantee the privacy of transactions in open communication environments, especially in inter-banking and financial ones. Nevertheless, the security level offered by this algorithm is not the same that was before. The DES working conditions have been shifting with the exponential growth of the Internet, and what was considered as being safe a decade ago is not safe anymore. What this article intends to show is how weak the actual DES strength is, and how and what a determined attacker can do to break it using the new Java programming language and the Linux operating system.