4.  The Threat of the DES Chip

      Chips to perform the DES encryption are already commercially available and they are very fast. The use of such a chip speeds up the process of password hunting by three orders of magnitude. To avert this possibility, one of the internal tables of the DES algorithm (in particular, the so-called E-table) is changed in a way that depends on the 12-bit random number. The E-table is inseparably wired into the DES chip, so that the commercial chip cannot be used. Obviously, the bad guy could have his own chip designed and built, but the cost would be unthinkable.