Tag Archives: #arty

The secrets of RSA encryption

When clicking on the padlock in the address bar of an internet session, a window appears with the message: “Safari uses an encrypted connection with …”. [red. this message may look slightly different for other browsers]

After pressing the buttons ‘Show certificate’ and ‘detail’, a lot more is shown. The typically used security algorithm nowadays at most news sites etc. at the opening session is: public key with elliptic curve.

But for the sites where security really is an issue, e.g. a login session into your bank account or a large online store, RSA is the encryption algorithm. And RSA encryption is the subject of my contribution this time. Continue reading →

The Art of Translation

My all time favorite SF-writer is Jack Vance who died at May 13th 2013 at the age of 96. He wasn’t a follower of the hard science fiction category, there are far more qualified writers for this genre like Larry Niven with his fabulous novel Ringworld, full of hard core science.
In fact Niven had to write a sequel to Ringworld because he wanted to correct a rather stupid technical error in the original story. One which was pointed him out by MIT students. Continue reading →