Trust is the key issue IMHO. If Rocke's WWW page didn't have links
to his e-mail address and other signs of this being "for real" then I don't
think I would have considered running his program. When people send
you programs that do "bad things" then they generally try to keep
themselves anonymous, in case they are found out and have to take
responsibility.
That's why I think this whole issue is a non-risk. Anyone setting up a
crypto challenge is making himself/herself very public and known.
The machine that all the packets are going to is well known and
can be traced to a real person. Should the person's intentions truly
be malicious and they are found out at some point, the consequences would
be very severe. It just doesn't make sense for someone to try to do
damage in such an open fashion.
Andrew. asterian@umich.edu | Help crack DES in your computer's spare time!
----------------------------| http://www.frii.com/~rcv/deschall.htm
For the teddy bear who has |----------------------------------------------
everything, a person. | Me: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~asterian