Show HN: 1-of-1 AES Encryption Objects (Not-Cross-Decryptable)

https://github.com/0north-eth/zero-north-vault/releases/tag/v1.0-demo

by 0north • 8 months ago

2 3 8 months ago

0north2• 8 months ago

hey dudes i built this new thing, its basically singular offline encryption environments where you can encrypt words and text. It’s inspired by genesis blockchains but applied to the AES runtime key pairing to create cross decryptable cipher environments.

i can make infinite of them, and they're not cross-decryptable. so if you have one on a USB for example, its literally your own personal, private encryption language. theyre like little artifacts.

heres a video explanation i recorded in my kitchen: https://youtube.com/shorts/LfVV-gDmJKs?si=OVa31R09wN-EiYBJ

same password + same message in any two vaults = impossible to cross-decrypt

click the link in the title for the demo I have two demo vaults, bear with me on the huge size. they are that big because each one electron package bundles chromium, not because of my encryption logic. sorry about that.

the encryption environments work offline, and I store nothing, theyre deleted server side after my API delivers them. no cloud, no backup server, no seeds.

you can check out more details at my github at github.com/Onorth-eth if you wanna peep the actual post or the original devpost submission. (some of the terminology in my original video may be weird, its AES)

didn't post my actual API link to generate individual vaults because im pretty sure my digital ocean droplet would literally explode, but the 2 vaults in the demo can encrypt and decrypt anything you guys want; and you can see that they don't decrypt one-another.

if you want a personal one i can give some to the first commentors or whatever just comment 'encrypt pls or something and I can make you one.

tldr: 1-of-1 encryption vaults, like Minecraft seeds for personal encryption kinda. mess with my demos and sorry about the size.

why build it: journalists can encrypt sensitive data then delete their .exe, keep the encrypted output, and decrypt it all on their backup at home. people can keep a vault on a usb in a safety deposit box and encrypt data or messages for their family. lots of stuff.

if you like it: https://buymeacoffee.com/dantehorton

if you think its dumb/malware: its not, also tell me why i guess.

slooonz• 8 months ago

I think you should clearly spell out how the key is derived.

From the description, I believe it's random string hard-coded in the executable + user-provided password => AES key ?

Also… "full offline", but "my API is on a digital ocean droplet" ? What ?

(I guess the API to generate a .exe with its own random string ? But again, very unclear of what it is, what’s it’s doing, and how)

0north2• 8 months ago

You’ve mostly got it.

The API on DigitalOcean just builds a fresh .exe and embeds a unique seed into the runtime build. After that, everything is offline.

The seed is made server-side during creation as a SHA-256 over a timestamp + jitter source, and is written as (vault-seed.txt)in the .zip.

Inside the .exe, the vault reads its own embedded seed. The KDF is thus:

key = SHA256(SHA256(password||seed))

Each encryption uses a fresh 16-byte IV and encodes ciphertexts as:

ivHex + "." + encryptedHex

So the text is encrypted and locked behind an AES key and an ivHex per click.

The result is simply: same password + different builds => different AES keys, because each .exe has a different seed baked into it.

That’s what creates the conditions where two environments can never decrypt each-other’s ciphertexts and can be generated endlessly.

Show HN: 1-of-1 AES Encryption Objects (Not-Cross-Decryptable)

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