Skip to Content
Uncategorized

Calling All Idle Computers

September 1, 1999

The Internet has changed the concept of the supercomputer: No longer a monolithic machine tucked away in a university or government lab, it can now comprise a network of ordinary computers working together on a single project. Distributed.net serves as the clearinghouse for information on such “distributed computing” efforts. The site seeks to promote this practice by developing client software and a network of users. The software, available for most major platforms, analyzes data when the client computer would otherwise be idle.

Distributed.net has sponsored several contests to break encryption codes, including the 56-bit Data Encryption Standard (DES) used by the federal government. In the most recent attempt, Distributed.net users teamed up with the Electronic Frontier Foundation to break a DES-encrypted message in less than 24 hours. A contest now under way seeks to crack the stronger 64-bit RC5 protocol. The nearly 200,000 users of Distributed.net can ally themselves with one of over 7,000 teams, competing to analyze the most data and eventually crack the code. Another project in the works will search for members of a class of numbers known as Optimum Golumb Rulers, which have applications ranging from radio astronomy to X-ray crystallography. You don’t need a continuous Net connection to contribute your computer to these communal quests, just as long as you log on every day or so.

Keep Reading

Most Popular

Large language models can do jaw-dropping things. But nobody knows exactly why.

And that's a problem. Figuring it out is one of the biggest scientific puzzles of our time and a crucial step towards controlling more powerful future models.

OpenAI teases an amazing new generative video model called Sora

The firm is sharing Sora with a small group of safety testers but the rest of us will have to wait to learn more.

Google’s Gemini is now in everything. Here’s how you can try it out.

Gmail, Docs, and more will now come with Gemini baked in. But Europeans will have to wait before they can download the app.

This baby with a head camera helped teach an AI how kids learn language

A neural network trained on the experiences of a single young child managed to learn one of the core components of language: how to match words to the objects they represent.

Stay connected

Illustration by Rose Wong

Get the latest updates from
MIT Technology Review

Discover special offers, top stories, upcoming events, and more.

Thank you for submitting your email!

Explore more newsletters

It looks like something went wrong.

We’re having trouble saving your preferences. Try refreshing this page and updating them one more time. If you continue to get this message, reach out to us at customer-service@technologyreview.com with a list of newsletters you’d like to receive.