Encryption can be a complicated subject but developer Jeff Moser decided to simplify explaining it. He got out a pen and after reading up on the subject came up with A Stick Figure Guide to the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) plus accompanying C# code to help study it.
The AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) was the winner of a competition to produce a replacement for the DES (data Encryption standard0 which had become crackable due to advances in computing power and better mathematical techniques. It looks like it might take quite a few more years before the same is true for AES. The big worry is that some genius mathematician might come up with a break through perhaps in factorizing large numbers. It hasn't happened yet so for now we can all sleep safe.
- Link to Free E-Books page
There is another comic about security and encryption:
http://xkcd.com/538/
So much for AES
“The big worry is that some genius mathematician might come up with a break through perhaps in factorizing large numbers.”
AES has nothing to do with large prime factorization. Your article is wrong.