h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Well the only application I can think of using a pair of long prime numbers is public key cryptography. It's a bit complicated to explain here, but it's the way that your credit card number etc gets encrypted when you type it in to a web page. You are given a very long number as a key to encrypt it, but it can only be deciphered at the other end by someone who knows the two long prime numbers which are factors of that key - a very difficult and time-consuming task for large numbers.

Now I think the longest number which may have been 'cracked' is 155 digits long. There may have been a competition & prize involved in this, if I recall.

Maybe you are referring to a longer number, made up of two 155-digit primes.

Is this warm?

The longer section, there, that's toasty warm!

I'd say you've got it, well, that's pretty much the definition, and the bit about the competition, 's all true.

512 bit RSA encryption, and those fellows over at RSA frequently challenge their research staff to break their encryptions. Or so I read.

[PartyPoppersEtc.]

A new quiz, then.

Can you a word to continue this list? (and say why, of course)

ounce
Sopwith
research station
Oberaudorf
Fairview
Axminster
interviews
light-scattering photometry
consignment
?

Icy

Whoops - forgot the verb. Can you suggest a word...

Looks like a Golden Rule Game to me - it's just that I can't find the rule

Every time I see this I get as far as "Sopwith" then get distracted by Snoopy in Scarf and Flying Goggles.

Either I've never used a sopwith, or some of those are names of places. (Sopwith? Must be British. Who else would call a town Sopwith?)

Yopu mean there is a thing called 'Sopwith'? I thought that was a place name

Is it strictly a *list* - as in, items?

I thought of the Sopwith Camel - I think it was an aircraft!

Evening all.

Nobody's close so far.

Yes, it's a list, and the items are in a logical order.

Icy

Is it Sopwith as in, "The World War I Flying Ace in his Sopwith Camel...?"

also, oberaudorf, as in Germany?

It's all pushing me towards that Red Baron fellow!

There was also a Sopwith Pup?

(The furthest reach of my thinking so far has been: Sopwith Camel - Axminster Carpets - 'carpets' would come after 'camel' in a dictionary. And... that's it )

Alas, you're all way off.

I'll post a clue tomorrow, if you haven't spotted it.

Icy

Sopwith on the web:

Sobwith Camel Scout - airplane
Sopwith Aviation Company
Sopwith - shoot 'em up PC game
Sopwith Camel - a psycadelic band
Sir Tom Sopwith - had something to do with early aviation (I think it was his Sopwith Aviation Co that created the Sopwith Camel. They also put out the Sopwith Salamander, Sopwith Pup, Snipe, and Dolphin, Sopwith Triplane and some other planes. Think this is significant?)

Oberaudorf is a town in the district of Rosenheim in Bavaria in Germany. Oberaudorf is the birthplace of German politician Edmund Stoiber.

Oberaudorf Hocheck ski resort information. Skiing in Oberaudorf Hocheck, Germany. Book ski holidays in Oberaudorf Hocheck, Germany.

What to say without giving it away?

Don't worry about the meanings - it's a code hidden within the words.

Hope this helps!

Icy

OK, another clue:

Look both ways.

Osrofailc
Cliaforso
Ehnfwrsyt
Tysrwfnhe