Fundamental flaws in the encryption system used by popular solid-state drives (SSDs) can be exploited by miscreants to easily decrypt data, once they’ve got their hands on the equipment.
A paper [PDF] drawn up by researchers Carlo Meijer and Bernard van Gastel at Radboud University in the Netherlands, and made public today, describes these critical weaknesses. The bottom line is: the drives require a password to encrypt and decrypt their contents, however this password can be bypassed, allowing crooks and snoops to access ciphered data.
Basically, the cryptographic keys used to encrypt and decrypt the data are not derived from the owner’s password, meaning, you can seize a drive and, via a debug port, reprogram it to accept any password. At that point, the SSD will use its stored keys to cipher and decipher its contents. Yes, it’s that dumb.
The egghead duo tested three Crucial and four Samsung models of SSDs, and found them more or less vulnerable to the aforementioned attack, although it does depend on their final configuration. Check the table below for the specific findings and settings to determine if your rig is vulnerable. All of the drives tried, and failed, to securely implement the TCG Opal standard of encryption.
Robin Edgar
Organisational Structures | Technology and Science | Military, IT and Lifestyle consultancy | Social, Broadcast & Cross Media | Flying aircraft