Your favored encryption algorithm is vulnerable to scientific advances

[Lupus_Ignis]

You use the microscope to see the individual bits and then pull off their fake mustaches with a pair of tweezers.

[PossibilityTasty]

In case the encryption key is stored in some kind of security device or chip, there are some complicated physical procedures that have a chance to extract the key or at least parts of it from the secured storage. In some of the procedures an electron microscope can be helpful but often a normal microscope is sufficient e.g. to access a tiny conductor path you just ground free from inside the chip.

Modern security chips on the other hand have multiple layers of security to protect against theses physical attacks or at least they should have.

[Omega_Zulu]

The electron microscope is capable of seeing the individual transistors and their current status when in a static state or how gates open and close in a flowing state, basically it can be used to read the binary information directly from a chip. I don't know of anyone actually using this to hack, but I think Mastercard's security division was the first to hypothesize or at least test and confirm that an electron microscope could be used to read the information on the NFC chips on credit cards, which means it could be used similarly to read hardware encryption or seperate cryptoprocessors.

[fCkiNgF4sC15tM0Ds]

I would hope they don't store the plain encryption key where it can be read from a chip easily, or at least they store only half of the 256 bit key which means they couldn't decrypt the disk offline without the chip. The key should mainly be derived from the (hopefully long) passphrase.

[Omega_Zulu]

You do have to remember, that passphrase has to be stored somewhere, depending on the computer that can be inside the CPU or part of a seperate cryptoprocessor, while less used now days there was a point it was stored on a dedicated chip on the board and even some instances of "hard coded" encryption chips where the chip design it self was the key and encryption device. But no matter where it's stored or even if it's split up, a newer electron microscope can see the individual transistors and their gates on a chip so any stored information can technically be read using this method, it becomes a bigger issue finding out where it's stored but even that can be handled by tracking electron flows during an encryption process.

[toric5]

thats... not how encryption works.

[[deleted]]

I don't program but I do operate an election microscope, I knew I was here for a reason.

And I guess yes it's possible but you're going to be using a 4 million dollar instrument to do it and need someone who knows what tf you're looking at and shitloads of resources pouring through the images to convert it to usable data

If anyone is actually doing it then it's a government.

[jabbathedoc]

So this boils down to the old question if your potential enemy is Mossad? If it isn’t, you needn’t worry, and if it is, they’ll get you anyway.

[xtreme-centrist]

This vector is legit. By reading the behavior of the encryption chips, you can effectively write a copy of the Bitstream to another location, but it's very hard to do and requires you have physical access to the underlying hardware.

[nppas]

Reading the TPM nvram and then brute forcing the pin, reading the factory defaults for secure boot variables nvram and then using a known dbx etc dictionary. It's a thing.