The Penguin AES ECB problem demonstrates the vulnerability of the Electronic Codebook (ECB) mode of AES encryption when applied to images that have large regions of similar colors. ECB mode encrypts each block of data independently, which means identical plaintext blocks are encrypted into identical ciphertext blocks. This characteristic can reveal patterns in the encrypted data, making it impractical for encrypting images or other data with repeating patterns.
This example is a demonstration of why ECB is vulnerable to simple attacks, and how ECB can reveal plaintext patterns in ciphertext. In this example, we use AES with ECB to encrypt a bitmap image that has large regions of uniform color. Although each pixel's color is meant to be encrypted, the overall image can still be recognized, as the arrangement of identically colored pixels in the original remains visible in the encrypted output.
- Go To CyberChef at [https://gchq.git