Cloud Storage Security Challenge: The Free Software Foundation Wins

Today our first cloud storage challenge officially comes to an end. We're thrilled - but not surprised - to say that no one cracked the Nasuni Filer and revealed the contents of the encrypted prize file, which we left out for anyone to attack. As such, this security challenge successfully demonstrated that modern encryption can protect cloud storage files.

We were inspired to launch the contest in part because we understand the fears businesses have when it comes to storing data in the cloud. In fact we designed our system with these concerns in mind. The cloud storage security challenge was our way of both educating businesses about security and showing that with the right system, data at rest in the cloud can be secure.

Our other primary motivation here was to support the Free Software Foundation (FSF) for the Gnu project and specifically GnuPG, an FSF implementation of the OpenPGP standard. This is at the heart of our system and, as such, we're following through on our promise to give the prize money to the group. "We thank Nasuni for donating the $5,000 security challenge award to the Free Software Foundation and GNU project," says Peter Brown, Executive Director of the FSF.

After we announced the challenge, a few people commented (some with vehemence) that the contest could not be won, since modern encryption is essentially unbreakable. That's exactly the point. "This challenge demonstrated the strength of modern encryption and highlights the importance of free software tools such as GNU Privacy Guard," Brown adds.

The real heroes here are the minds behind GnuPG. They are the ones that deserve the credit. Our donation to the FSF and GNU project is also our way of recognizing the importance of ongoing support for free software.

Next week we'll be revealing the image in the encrypted prize file. We'll also explain how the image was recovered and prove that the file really was in the cloud in the first place. In other words, we'll show that we weren't cheating.

This is merely the first of our cloud storage challenges. Stay tuned for more details.