Ok so here's what i understand what's going on here from reading the challenge and people's responses.
1) A classical crypto-challenge where you are given a cipher text and the algorithm and told to crack it is somewhat useless Because that would just prove strength of the primitive algorithm, not the system. Here you are given a scenario and told to use whatever attack is at your disposal to hijack the conversation and somehow retrieve the plain text. So while it is similar to in someways, but not exactly the same case.
2) People are not amused because they seem to find the vulnerability that upon initiation of the secret chat, the first time, the server can perform a MITM attack. Because apparently they use a Deffie-Helman key exchange where the server connects them to each other. So the server is in the best position to do the MITM. And since this contest does not allow to make that attack (even if u had the server in your control, the secret chat has been initiated already).
And hence everyone is frustrated because they seem to KNOW the system is weak, but they cant prove it right now. And this will lead to Telegram boasting in March.
1) A classical crypto-challenge where you are given a cipher text and the algorithm and told to crack it is somewhat useless Because that would just prove strength of the primitive algorithm, not the system. Here you are given a scenario and told to use whatever attack is at your disposal to hijack the conversation and somehow retrieve the plain text. So while it is similar to in someways, but not exactly the same case.
2) People are not amused because they seem to find the vulnerability that upon initiation of the secret chat, the first time, the server can perform a MITM attack. Because apparently they use a Deffie-Helman key exchange where the server connects them to each other. So the server is in the best position to do the MITM. And since this contest does not allow to make that attack (even if u had the server in your control, the secret chat has been initiated already).
And hence everyone is frustrated because they seem to KNOW the system is weak, but they cant prove it right now. And this will lead to Telegram boasting in March.