The NSA called me after midnight and requested my source code (2018)

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Apr 21, 2020, 8:29 PM UTC

rozab wrote: post #98

ebg13 wrote: post #52

I can't help but feel like the author sounds excessively credulous. I had to stop reading after he wrote "I could tell something big was up and there simply wasn’t time to debate the merits of handing over my source code to the NSA", because at that point my eyes rolled so hard they fell right out the back of my head. After I put them back in, I skipped down to the comments. I have a hard time not agreeing vehemently…

Even all these years later, he doesn't even consider the possibility that he was manipulated. He betrayed all of his users at the drop of a hat, and all it cost the NSA was a single phone call. Crazy stuff.

Post by folli » Tue, Apr 21, 2020, 8:29 PM UTC

rozab wrote: post #98

ebg13 wrote: post #52

I can't help but feel like the author sounds excessively credulous. I had to stop reading after he wrote "I could tell something big was up and there simply wasn’t time to debate the merits of handing over my source code to the NSA", because at that point my eyes rolled so hard they fell right out the back of my head. After I put them back in, I skipped down to the comments. I have a hard time not agreeing vehemently…

Even all these years later, he doesn't even consider the possibility that he was manipulated. He betrayed all of his users at the drop of a hat, and all it cost the NSA was a single phone call. Crazy stuff.

Post by DennisP » Tue, Apr 21, 2020, 8:31 PM UTC

willvarfar wrote: post #101

rozab wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even all these years later, he doesn't even consider the possibility that he was manipulated. He betrayed all of his users at the drop of a hat, and all it cost the NSA was a single phone call. Crazy stuff.

Encryption as he implemented it does not rely on the secrecy of the algorithm. It relies on the secrecy of the key. This is why he was asking about their ability to break 256 or 40 bit encryption. So there was no trust broken in sharing the source code.

Post by ebg13 » Tue, Apr 21, 2020, 8:33 PM UTC

folli wrote: post #104

rozab wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even all these years later, he doesn't even consider the possibility that he was manipulated. He betrayed all of his users at the drop of a hat, and all it cost the NSA was a single phone call. Crazy stuff.

Kerckhoff's principle applies. Nowadays, all the good encryption software is open source anyway. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerckhoffs%27s_principle

Post by 0ld » Tue, Apr 21, 2020, 8:35 PM UTC

leggomylibro wrote: post #89

bsamuels wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry but if you think the NSA is the shadiest government agency on the planet, then you live in an information bubble. Do you think the NSA is shadier than the KGB? What about the Iranian Revolutionary Guard? Or even the CIA? I know people are upset about the Snowden revelations but there are much graver sins that have been committed by other agencies.

KGB doesn't exist anymore - you might mean the FSB or GRU? Anyways, plenty of countries have security agencies whose main job is to violently protect the local kleptocrats these days. China might be a better example to point to for even worse behavior, with their balkanized net and mass surveillance being used to carry out the mass internment and repression of ethnic minorities in regions like Xinjiang.