Sony has another reason to touts its PS3 as the console that does everything. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Cyber Crimes Center also known as C3 uses the cheap $300 PS3s to crack passwords of computers of alleged child pornographers.
A warrant allows the government officials to seize the suspect’s computer but due to Fourth Amendment they can’t force suspects to reveal their passwords. In such a case, cracking password is the only option.
There are up to 282 trillion combinations in a six-digit password and breaking the correct combination is only possible when a machine can process heaps of data quickly. Networked PS3s used by C3 processes 4 million passwords per second, making it a cost effective solution compared to the $8,000 Tableau/Dell server combination that was used previously.
C3 plans to buy more original PS3s because of its flexibility to run Linux.
[Axcessnews via Slashdot]
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