re once tapped your code is no good any more in strnlghtc nrhw qb netcom com strnlght netcom com david sternlight writes in article bu edu uni acs bu edu shaen bernhardt writes i wish i could agree with you ask yourself this why would any private sector entity wish to buy a crypto system that was known to be at least partially compromised key escrows in this instance why would any private sector entity wish to buy a crypto system that had not been properly evaluated i e algorythm not publically released the answer seems obvious to me they wouldn t there is other hardware out there not compromised des as an example triple des as a better one what follows is my opinion it is not asserted to be the truth so no flames please it comes out of a background of years as a senior corporate staff executive in two fortune companies no wonder american businesses are going down the tubes i d be happy to use a crypto system supplied by the nsa for business if they told me it was more secure than des and in particular resistant to attempts by japanese french and other competitive companies and governments to break it s nist not nsa nsa is not supposed to have anything to do with this they didn t say that they said is was better than some commercial grade encryptions i for one wouldn t trust them if they did unless they release the algorithm for investigation i d be happy to do so even with escrowed keys provided i was happy about the bona fides of the escrow agencies the federal reserve would certainly satisfy me as would something set up by one of the big accounting firms maybe the aclu and eff it would have to be a non profit so the big would be out i d trust the nsa or the president if they stated there were no trap doors i d be even happier if a committee of independent experts examined the thing under seal of secrecy and reported back that it was secure i wouldn t trust the nsa i think i would trust the president on this but i m not certain he would be told i d trust something from the nsa long before i d trust something from some swiss or anybody japanese that s your problem this may seem surprising to some here but i suggest most corporations would feel the same way most many some pick one corporations have an attitude that the nsa is part of our government and we support our government as one very famous ceo put it to me one day i want to emphasize the i am not speaking for beckman instruments at this point however we are an international company and i would like to think that our customers come first ahead of our government s whims arthur l rubin a rubin dsg dse beckman com work beckman instruments brea mcimail com compuserve com arthur pnet cts com personal my opinions are my own and do not represent those of my employer
