The Eye: Computer code not all it’s cracked up to be

How many wrongs does it take to make a right?

The Eye gaped wide to find out that in the case of Loveland computer programmer Rocke Verser, it took 18 quadrillion. That’s how many keys Verser and a nationwide team of students, programmers and scientists searched in order to break a message encrypted with the government’s 56-bit Data Encryption Standard algorithm.

The numbers are difficult to picture even in The Eye’s mind’s eye. Thousands of computers linked together over the Internet tested 18 quadrillion keys at a rate of almost 7 billion keys per second to discover the message, “Strong cryptography makes…