[108100] in Cypherpunks
Re: Nasty rumor?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jim Gillogly)
Thu Feb 4 16:12:06 1999
Date: Thu, 04 Feb 1999 12:54:48 -0800
From: Jim Gillogly <jim@acm.org>
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
Reply-To: Jim Gillogly <jim@acm.org>
scoops writes:
> I just received a call from a paranoid associate who reported that he had
> just gotten off the phone with a spook at NSA. He reported that NSA has
> pretty much got encryption licked and that it can access any key.
Yeah, yeah. Tell him that this is actually <good> news: that he should
call his friend at NSA back and tell him that since the crypto war is
over, NSA should stop badgering Commerce to keep up the export walls,
and encourage the White House to stop jawboning the Wassenaar countries
to force weak crypto on the world -- if they really have all these systems
under control, they may as well raise the bar and get all the other
players off the street. If NSA is the only entity that can read our mail,
we're in a lot better shape than if we live in a Wassenaar world where
anybody with half-decent resources can read our mail.
Not to worry. This kind of paranoid FUD crops up pretty often. Call
his bluff, and have him call his informant's bluff.
--
Jim Gillogly
14 Solmath S.R. 1999, 20:47
12.19.5.16.9, 3 Muluc 2 Pax, Fifth Lord of Night
