Kaesan Key

A Kaesan Key, also called a Star Key due to their four-point star logo, is a device developed primarily by Arkasian mathematician and software developer Entyra III Kaesan for the Arkasian government, though they have been known to be sold to civilians on occasion. Little is known about their actual coding or internal makeup, however their function is to encrypt a given electronic device in such a way as to guarantee that only the Key's owner and those whom they preapprove will be able to access it. It is known that one such device was used on the ANS Eternal Eclipse before it's destruction, which according to reports by anonymous Arkasian government sources allowed for the ship's on-board systems, including computers, weapons, cargo, engines and even lights (among others) to be locked down whenever necessary. Also notable about the Keys is that they can be accessed remotely, allowing for them to be locked and unlocked wherever the owner may be so long as they have the remote required to do so. It is believed the remote for the Key belonging to the Eternal Eclipse is still in the Arkasian government's possession.

The way in which the Keys work to prevent unauthorized access to the device(s) they protect is at once fairly simple to understand but immensely complex to overcome. They encrypt their protected devices with nine separate encryption levels, each more difficult to unlock than the last, however they default to having only the first level enabled. With each incorrect entry into a given Key to unlock it, it will activate another encryption level until level nine is active, at which point is will simply lock for twenty-four hours. The passwords for levels one through nine are always randomized daily, including not only their content of characters but also their length and virtual orientation (as the passwords must be aligned with a virtual four-point star on the device's screen), however every Key comes with software which will generate identical Keys at the same time on a separate device of the owner's choosing, that way the owner will always be able to access the Key excepting for cases in which the day-long lock has been activated. At present, there are known to be at least some seven-hundred Kaesan Keys actively in use, and another two-hundred indefinitely deactivated.