RE: GLUG: GLUG lotto blotto (fwd)

[Jim Morrisby <Jim@xxxxxxxx>]

The lotto machines also seeem to be connected to some type of radio lan.
I assume that each transaction is sent to some server of sorts.
What I want to know is this: Is that data being transmitted SECURELY......
;)


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-glug@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-glug@xxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf
Of Soren Aalto
Sent: 03 April 2000 03:43
To: glug@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: GLUG: GLUG lotto blotto (fwd)


> 
> Hi all,
> 
> On Friday, I went to pay my water and lights at the local post office....
> and of course noticed the Lotto cashier. It wouldn't hurt I thought, and
on
> my way home I sort of pondered the chances of winning and whether you
could
> put a computer to work to 'crack' it. (Or a network of computers like
> Seti@Home.) My concluding thought was to use a computer, not based on
> common-or-garden semiconductor physics, but on quantum physics, to
generate
> the winning number ;)
> 
> But there's another more nefarious option.
> 
> I have a friend who worked as a 'customs officer' for a foreign governent
-
> and he is something of a forged passport spotter (and passport forger
> himself).
> 
> He said it would be very easy to change the numbers on the lottery ticket.
> It's ordinary paper with dotmatrix printing, nothing like a passport or ID
> document. A child could do it, he said, on any given Sunday.
> 
> The only catch is I suspect the organisers of Lotto has some record of all
> issued tickets - with the tendered numbers -  so they would probably know
> your ticket is fake. Or would they?

I assume so -- I haven't seen an issued ticket, but doesn't
the printer print out some junk on it that looks like a 
recipt?  There is probably some number in there that
serves as a validity check, and probably something like:

   machine-ser# : hash of (machine-ser# + user selection)

where the hash is computed using a key stored in something
vaguely tamperproof on the machine & the key is probably
unique to that machine (but also known, only in encrypted
form, in a database somewhere at lotto headquarters).

So, you'd have to get hold of the key for a particular 
machine to generate a winning ticket...and even then,
there appear to be other checks and balances. 

--
Soren Aalto <soren@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Internet guy, University of Zululand 
If Bill Gates had a nickle for every time
Windows crashed...oh wait, he does.
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