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Ask The NSA About Certain Things
I spoke briefly with museum curator Jack Ingram, and proposed a Slashdot interview. Ingram said that he could not simply answer readers' questions off the cuff, and referred me to the NSA's Public Affairs Office (yes, they do have one). That sounded like the kiss of death, since PAOs in general seem to insert such requests politely into the large circular file.
I was pleasantly surprised when just a few phone calls yielded a polite and helpful public affairs officer (he requested I not use his name) who assented to field questions about the museum holdings from the Slashdot readership and assist in obtaining answers to those which could be answered without compromising national security.
So submit your questions in the space below, about Venona, about the origins of the NSA's version of the Vatican's pornography collection, about The Black Chamber, about The Special Processing Laboratory (in-house silicon fab), the famous code talkers, or other aspects of the history of governmental secrecy.
Moderators and submittors; think of this as a logic game -- since the NSA won't answer questions it considers too sensitive, what kind of questions can be moderated up high enough to send and stand a good chance of being answered?
betcha the log files from the web site are quite detailed....
Where'd I leave my keys?
Ok, this is almost certainly too sensitive, but what the heh... What does the NSA think of FBI requests to be inserted in the information stream of all e-mail traffic?
Or, perhaps in a more "sensitive" way: What does the NSA see as its responsibilities in protecting the constitutional rights of US citizens, and of protecting similar rights for non-US citizens?
The cake is a pie
Seeing other agencies, such as the FBI with Carnivore, start to act on monitoring communications, and the nature of national threats changing from large countries to smaller countries and fringe groups, what does the NSA see as it's role in the future?
So, like does the President really not know about Area 51 being a place to store aliens? I mean in Independence Day, he didn't seem to. So is that really the case?
This is a joke!!! I'm just wondering how many Area 51 crackpots are really out there.
Norris/Palin 2012
Fact: We deserve leaders who can kick your ass and field dress your carcass.
What, are some of the unsung achievements in cryptography during World War II? We all know about Turing and the Code Talkers, but who are some of the ones that history has glossed over, and what were their efforts during the war?
yours,
john
Now cryptography seems to focus mostly on RSA and other public-key crypto systems. Do you see any future innovations in cryptography, or has the science of cryptography been reduced to nothing but fields and binary relations?
Why is the NSA 'visible' now? They have a public relations office, public museum, web page.. Why is it no longer 'No Such Agency' .. Do we have replacement 'non-visible' agencies that are better at hidding?
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Vices - what I lack in originality, I make up for in volume.
No questions I can think of, but I highly recommend the museum if you're interested in that sort of thing -- old Crays, one time pads and an Enigma machine you can actually try.
My favorite thing was the newspaper clippings from the museum opening. Apparently, the NSA didn't tell anyone they were opening a museum and actually denied any knowledge of its existence when reporters asked. (Apparently because many former operatives were visiting and they felt publicity might compromise them. Although, I bet there was a lot of simple habit behind it.) So you have all these articles in the Weekend Activities section saying, "We have learned from anonymous government sources that a Museum of Cryptography has opened in Columbia."
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
I had a friend who visited an NSA museum in Maryland... he found out about it only because he had a security clearance. You needed the security clearance to get in - and I thought $47 to get into Disneyland was a high admission cost. Is this that same museum, or is there another still-classified museum? Can you tell us about it, in general non-compromising terms? If its the same thing, why has it been de-classified?
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"This is the nineties. You don't just go around punching people. You have to say something cool first."
Obviously, and for very good reason, the NSA employs a great number of skills cryptographers and mathematicians. For equally good reason, the work that they produce and the problems that they solve are of utmost importance to national security, with the unfortunate consequence being that they must be kept secret. Has the NSA ever declassified mathematical or cryptographical information that has contributed significantly to the public body of knowledge? Is such a declassification a possibility for future discoveries or breakthroughs?
yours,
john
I've heard that the NSA is the largest employer of PhD mathematicians in the world.
Is this true?
Also, what type of work goes on at the NSA that will be useful to society and to the scientific community as a whole? I understand there is a lot going on in the name of national defence, but it would be horrible to have all of those ideas locked up forever. How does the NSA go about declassifying ideas to benefit science as a whole? How often has that issue come up?
-- Truth goes out the door when rumor comes innuendo. -- Groucho Marx
What guarantee does the American Public have that agencies such as NSA, CIA, FBI, etc. are not overstepping thier bounds when it comes to our privacy?
In other words, to whom does the NSA answer?
Who's watching the watchers?
Browser? I barely know her!
I've heard that either Canada doesn't have a 'secret service' - or that they're very good at being secret... ;)
BlackNova Traders
by visiting the NSA's Museum, will they use their resources to spam you with NSA-related stuff?
"I visited the National Cryptologic Museum and all I got was this lousy Net Trace"
Tongue-tied and twisted, just an earth-bound misfit, I
Learning to fly, Pink Floyd.
How does a working NSA officer justify the invasion of privacy necessary to carry out the kind of work that is done?
From the outside it would appear that some kind of high moral stance would be necessary to be able to carry on that kind of work. Do people feel like white hats, protecting the world from "evil"? Or do they feel like they are themselves doing evil, but necessary evil? Gray hats, if you like?
Does the NSA provide any counselling for officers who have difficulty with this apparent conflict?
How dependent is the NSA on the outside world? Let me clarify: I see from the story that the NSA maintains an in-house silicon fab. So chip production is something that can be handled internally. What cannot be handled internally? I won't be specific, since I would like this question to be answered, but might a situation arise in which the NSA has to turn to industry or academia for assistance? If so, how would such such an incident be conducted (i.e., in the open, or with NDA's or more drastic measures)?
What, exactly, was the USS Liberty doing near Israel in the first place? Presumably, it was assigned to SIGINT, but who was the subject and why?
www.alarmist.org
Real names
Addresses
Phone numbers
etc.
You have much more to lose than I do.
Everyone seems interested in cryptography, but cryptography is only part of the problem. What can you tell us about the challenges involved in intercepting (and preventing from being intercepted) messages? Since much of the modern technology for this is presumably classified, perhaps a historical approach to answering this would work best, ie what went on in WWII and the cold war?
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In the future, do you expect that cryptography methods will be allowed international exportation without government interference? What is the general opinion of what would happen in that case? Would it raise or decrease the threat of other countries to each other? What is the opinion of the museum founders on the actions taken on Zimmerman for PGP? -Effendi
-Effendi
This your idea of a final threat? Spam?
Maybe I overestimated you fucks after all...
Here is my actual question: "Why can't a public relations officer from the NSA tell me his name?"
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Give us our karma back! Punish Karma Whores through meta-mod!
Linux MAPI Server!
http://www.openone.com/software/MailOne/
(Exchange Migration HOWTO coming soon)
I've heard the NSA fund research in stuff it is interested in (crypto, math, high-performance computing). What are the chances the NSA would fund some mutially beneficial open source projects?
Any possibility that some of the items in the NSA collection can go on a tour around the country? Not all of us can make it to MD.
There's a good number of items there including some parts from the U2 shot down over Russia to some enigma machines (at least one) and some other items dating back to the civil war.
-- Ever notice that fast-burning fuse looks exactly the same as slow-burning fuse? I didn't... (Edgar Montrose)
Recently there was some trouble in Britain, when it was found that Margaret Thatcher had asked the Canadian government to spy on opposition party members, in exchange for which the British secret services spied on Canadian targets.
I can appreciate scanning for threats such as child pornography (never mind the argument about whether it exists - that's another point), and targetting known criminals or likely suspects. But what is the NSA's policy on monitoring _political_ targets? If asked to bug Newt Gingrich or some other senior politician, would the NSA have the power to refuse? And if it did refuse, would it use another agency (Britain's MI5, for instance) to gather the same information, on a quid pro quo basis?
Grab.
We told you that we had connections. We told you that you didn't want to mess with us. See it in action. We're not afraid of anyone leaving, because anything they bring with them is useless - disconnected phone numbers, nonexistant sid names, and addresses of abandoned warehouses!
You don't have the connections. You have everything to lose. You can't touch us.
If so, what are those threats, and what technologies / counter-measures would you recommend (pgp, encrypted e-mail, ipv6?), etc?
When I applied for an internship with the NSA, you sent me a brochure that mentioned your computing equipment was "5 years ahead of the civilian computer systems." Historically, has this always been the case? Has there ever been a scientific or engineering feat that brought the civilian computing world ahead of the NSA, if only for a short time?
What was it?
wishus
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As we enter the information age, encrytpion is showing up in general use by the public for conveying information (money, data, ideas, etc.)
What would the NSA recommend to ordinary citizens when using encryption? Do you feel that encryption supports free speech? The economy?
Thanks,
Nick
fortune: You die cold and alone
1) What specific independent elected body oversees your operations -- if any?
2) Are you entirely funded by the US government?
3) What is your total year 2000 budget in dollars?
4) Describe your operations and their intelligence interactions with US citizens vs. non-US citizens.
Every now and then at school (Caltech) we toss around the idea of going to work for the NSA, mainly because we feel it would be a fun, intellectually stimulating environment. (As opposed to a normal engineering job in a large company which can be boring as hell and not challenging in the least.) but I digress...
So what does it take to work for the NSA? Are all of the employees mathematical geniuses? What kind of people do you look for, and do you actively recruit?
On a side note, I'm assuming that a great deal of scientific discoveries are made in the NSA's labs. How many of these discoveries coincide with research being done in the public academic community? Have there been instances where academia has made a discovery, or published a paper, while the NSA has already known that information for years because they discovered it themselves? Is there any collaboration between the mathematicians at the NSA and those in academia? Or is the NSA research body a purely autonomous group?
Moller
The Navy has Topgun and Crimson Tide, and there are numerous movies about Marines and soldiers and pilots. There has been kind of an FBI trend lately with pop items like The X-Files and various movies. Assuming that there is a story to be told (writing proofs on white boards probably doesn't make the cut) would NSA like something like that?
Does the NSA monitor everything (domestic and foreign)? In other words, is the NSA the central organization for monitoring everything that goes on anywhere?
www.alarmist.org
Do you have any publically releasable figures on how much the SPL cost to build, and how much it cost to operate? If so, would you share those with us /.ers?
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Crudely Drawn Games
I'm sure a well done cryptology exhibit that toured major museums such as the one nearest me, the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum), would probably draw many interested individuals if such a prospect was feasible. I'm not sure how well the exhibits would travel (although many delicate and priceless artifacts travel somehow), if putting together a tour would be too much work, that the NCM has too small of a collection that touring out any part would make it too empty, or any other valid reason against would stop it, but my wishful thinking would like to ask: Will the exhibits ever tour?
The US Secret Service are members of the Treasury department, and their purpose is to prevent counterfeiting of US currency. With Canadian currency near an all-time low compared to other currencies, you'd think the counterfeiters would've moved on to greener pastures.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
I forgot the password to my dialup account, and I was wondering if you could email it to me.
t
What does the NSA think about the current civilian projects using distributed computing to attempt to decrypt high-level encryption? Does the NSA consider the possibility of other nations using similar distributed computing farms to decrypt encoded US traffic a possible threat or is the encryption used by the NSA just too plain strong?
From "Top Ten Reasons to Work for the NSA" -
(yes, there is a page like that..)
Recreation Programs
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NSA has clubs available to people interested in:
Art
Battlegaming
Bible Study
Black Expressions (??!)
Bridge
Ceramics and Handicrafts
Coin/Stamp Collecting
Flying
Gardening
Golf
Magic (!)
Model Airplanes
Photography
Public Speaking ("no comment"...)
Rifles and Pistols
Shortwave Radio
Sign Language
Singing
Skiing
Spanish
Sport Cars
Traveling
WIN (Women and Men in NSA)
Yachting
Organized sports include:
Basketball, Golf, Soccer, Softball, and Tennis.
Other activites and services offered:
Dancing
Library Facilities
Emergency Loan Fund
Recreation Equipment for Loan
NSA employees can also enjoy the use of the facilities of a 20-acre
recreation site with ball fields, picnic tables and grills.
"...they may harpoon us, but they ain't gonna pick us up on no radar screen!"
What is something really, really cool that you could tell us that we, as civilians, wouldn't think to ask a question about because we, unknowing as we are, think it would so obviously be a threat to national security, that we wouldn't even begin to consider asking a question about, but really isn't that big of a deal? Maybe something that seems so outrageous that we would think it were far too preposterous to be true?
Co-founder and designer at Music Nearby: http://musicnearby.com
Why have Intellegence (there's a joke) and Law Enforcement Agencies of the United States of America decided that "National Security" is what is in the best interests of the Government instead of the Citizens? Remeber the phrase "By the people, of the people, for the people"? Millions of American citizens have NOT fought and died to secure the power of the Government of the United States of America, they have done so to secure the freedom of the Citizens of the United States of America. Just remember- the Government of the United States of America is the employee of the Citizens, and employees can be fired.
Democracy is dead. All kneel to the Commander In Thief.
Why aren't the materials in the NSA museum in the Smithsonian, where they will be more publically available, cared for by professional curators, and not drain valuable NSA resources? What impact does the NSA Public Relations Office intend for the museum to have on public opinion and employee morale?
Thanks.
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We have fought the AC's, and they have won.
my lazy ass and go look at the page before posting questions like that then. ah well. :-)
Moderators and submittors; think of this as a logic game -- since the NSA won't answer questions it considers too sensitive, what kind of questions can be moderated up high enough to send and stand a good chance of being answered?
How's the the cafeteria food? Do you guys have company softball games? When are you planning to get a cool crypto statue like the CIA's? Do I look fat in this? I want your honest answer.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
Coming soon...
I'd like to hear some recent examples of technologies developed at NSA which were released to the commercial sector. What commercial initiatives has NSA collaborated on recently? (Perhaps, something Al Gore didn't invent?)
...or maybe not.
Wow, I hate to say this, but go read their FAQ first (yes, they have one).
http://www.nsa.gov/about_nsa/faqs_internet.html
No, they can't tell you their exact budget, who works for the, whatever. READ THE FAQ. It covers who they say they're allowed to monitor, etc, and answers about half the other questions people have asked so far.
However, MY question is, what is the screening process for people applying for jobs in the NSA? Can certain parts of someone's background be overlooked? I looked at the FBI's screening process, and I don't make it in there for certain abuses of substances when I was "young and dumb". Anyway, I know I'm not the best around, but I'm considered to be pretty bright and I fit a few of the job categories for the NSA. Could a guy like me make it in anyway? Do I need a degree first?
Does it help that I almost applied to work for the CIA (their college program is pretty nice).
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We have fought the AC's, and they have won.
The Cure of the ills of Democracy is more Democracy.
Erlang Developer and podcaster
Just wait till tomorrow...
What role does the NSA play in advising lawmakers about cryptography exportation? Did the NSA call the shots or simply make recommendations with the recent US government relaxing encryption export regulations?
"I say consider this day seized!" -Hobbes
"Tomorrow we'll seize the day and throttle it!" -Calvin
--
Rob Carlson
..who is watching the watcher's watchers?
The streets shall flow with the blood of the Guberminky.
There was a scandal where RCMP "spooks" burned a barn where purportedly nefarious people were planning ill; the "public" view was that this made the RCMP look bad, and so the RCMP wanted no more to do with the "spooky" activities. When they're the "secret service," who can really be sure???. The public face on this was thus:
See also the CSE Unofficial Web Page, which has a rather interesting discussion of the organization.
They are a mixed civilian/military group largely devoted to "signals analysis," and include pretty much the same functions associated with the NSA, notably not including having their own chip foundries. (Unless there's one hiding somewhere in Labrador!)
Notable "listening" sites include Gander (a formerly notable airport), Alert (the most northerly inhabited place in the world), Masset, and Kingston. My father used to work next door to CSE headquarters, the Sir Leonard Tilley Building.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
As a young-ish programmer, there is a wealth of available job opportunities. As the world's premier intelligence agency, you would of course want to hire the best and brightest stars of the upcoming generation.
My question is simple: why would I want to work for you?
Hot new dot-com startups can offer me incredible stock options. Larger corporations give me a chance at rapid advancement in a stable job. When I think of the NSA, by comparison, I imagine slaving away in a cinder-block room for $30,000, and being a nameless cog in the machine.
Your web site touts the hard-core bleeding edge technology that I would get to work with. While that's an admitted draw, it doesn't overcome the dreary impression that most people have of large goverment agencies.
Does the NSA, or other TLA-agencies for that matter, have incentive programs that would interest the kind of people that you want working for you?
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Do you have on exhibit the evidence collected from the very first time the NSA illegally infringed on someone's privacy?
"So on one hand, honey is an amazingly sophisticated and efficient food source. On the other hand it's bee backwash."
Well, might be OT but not that far OT ;-)
http://www.stevenet.net/Author/
Yes, this page has real pix of the NSA HQ sign just before being told to stop taking pictures.
Other points of interest too.
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
One of the exhibits shows how fingerprints are identified. And the label on the machine that always scares me says, "Fingerprints are not permanently stored" I wonder how long they consider temporary?
You didn't mention that this place used to be a motel. It was bought from the same guy who owns the Washington Wizards. Ok, so my dad was one of the people that helped negotiate for the government. Lots of good tidbits there.
I plan on going to the gift shop and buy a secret decoder ring.
since individual freedom and privacy tend to be contrary to national security , where does the nsa see the as the balance between to two? till what point does national security outway privacy?
I was wondering, as a standpoint from the people that did the actual work (espically in the 50's,60's and 70's when most of the pioneering was done) did they work creatively? as in come to work because of the pure joy of the job? or was it based on the sense of preforming an important function for the security of the USA. Basically was it a general atmosphere of patriotisim or was it a bunch of geeks there for the rush of breaking a new code.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
My question is: what subjects are we supposed to not ask about?
After making my "pilgramage" the the Crypto museum, I was fascinated to discover the amount of work that the NSA has done with silicon and custom chips. My question then is this: Does the Special Processing Laboratory have set schedule for the release of new silicon technologies, or is it on a "as needed" basis. ie - We all know that Intel shoots to have a new chip on the market every 8ish months. Does the SPL do the same? And if so, what is the average time from algorithm inception by one of your cryptanalysts/cryptographers to final product in silicon?
The NSA really deals more with cryptographic issues. They do do monitoring, but it is different in nature than the sorts of cases that the FBI deals with. I understand where the confusion may lie, but really, the nature of the agencies is still different enough that they still have the same purpose.
Eh...
Here's my question:
How many black markers does the NSA go though each year censoring -- er, redacting -- Freedom of Information Act releases? Does the NSA have someone whose main job is blocking out words?
When you think about it, whoever is stuck doing that would have to have awfully high security clearance. You can't hand a stack of insert-your-favorite-classified-info-thing-here documents to one of the interns and have them work on it.
--
"Better dead than smeg."
--
The real Captain Derivative has a Slashdot ID.
"Invasion of privacy..." That sounds kind of like a personal thing you're referring to. Like my privacy while I'm on the jon, or your privacy while you talk to your doctor about your anal warts. Frankly I think the NSA really doesn't care a whole lot about my stool or your anal warts, and I think the same could be said for the emails we send back and forth, etc. We are nobodies. We raise no red flags, we have no affect or influence on anything. As far as the "privacy" of.. oh.. enemy governments and things.. I don't think the term "privacy" has the same meaning as we're used to. War is war, national security is national security. I dunno. I just don't think the NSA is doing half as much "invasion of privacy" as everyone seems to think. They have real jobs, real targets to monitor.. far better things to do than "invade my privacy" or anyone else's. Really, every conspiracy is a lot of fun to think about, but it's like magic. When you actually know what's going on, you're so disappointed that you wish you didn't even bother to learn the truth...
The streets shall flow with the blood of the Guberminky.
Why has The Incredible Mr. Limpett story been swept under the rug? It was shameful that Hollywood participated in the mis/disinformation campaign, turning his documentry into a farce.
Why was his real underwater identity blotted out with that stupid, cheesy, hand drawn animation? For that matter, why didn't the NSA provide supercomputing graphics power for the movie in the same manner that JPL did for the Star Trek movies?
This is just another in the long line of attacks using DK as a patsy.
Shameful, just shameful!
I bet you don't answer this either.
thank you
I'm curious to see how the NSA would answer these questions and what it would package for us as their "official response". I'm also curious if the NSA would answer differently to CNN than it would to slashdot... but I have no way of testing that. It should also be noted that I'm not digging for anything, just making small talk, I seriously doubt they would show a schematic for the new version of DES no matter how benign I was.
--// Hartsock
Live to Code, Code to Live!
Why is the NSA the ONLY military facility that i have ever been to where the "no pictures" areas are left to one's imagination?
When the Airforce does not want you taking pictures or even having a camera, they say so on big signs everyplace. So do the Army and the Navy, but no not you guys.
So, what gives? If you don't want pictures taken, wouldn't a gate or a sign be easier than stopping people and jotting down their ID?
Yes, this did happen to me.
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
Everyone knows that many of the great cryptography systems came from odd sources (Indian Languages and such), but what I don't know is all of its applications.
Obviously it can be used to secure a transmission in a war, but what are some of the more odd applications of cryptography (obviously in the non-compromising type)? Are there any places where cryptography makes something more efficient, or forms of cryptography that reveal other facts of a document?
We don't need no Net Explorer We don't need no Thought control
This is a marvelous chance to point out:
There's a GI Joe Navajo Code Talker action figure out now, with seven recorded messages in Navajo and english. Get 'em while they last.
( If this is successful, maybe they'll come out with the Alan Turing action figure. Or Lady Lovelace with Camper and Grappling Hook.)
--tangram
I was looking through the NSA website and noticed that everything was rather vague in the descriptions of the exhibits. Why isn't there links to more information on say for example the code talkers or the DF Tractors? Where can more information be found on the exhibits that are in this museum like:
How the items came to the museum?
How were these items developed?
... and what were some of the previous designs?
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The program isn't debugged until the last user is dead.
What's in my pocket?
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
but I've got Kharisma.. er.. Karma.
Are you THE Anonymous Coward? Man! You are prolific!
Oops! Gotta go! The NSA is monitoring this forum..
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Vices - what I lack in originality, I make up for in volume.
www.nsa.gov is struggling under the load of slashdot. Do you really believe these guys could possibly be secretly monitoring every packet sent? I'm sure netnews keeps them more than busy enough.
Now, microsoft on the other hand...
I can't belive that they said that in a brochure. I work in tech support and one of our largest customers is the NSA/DOD, I can't tell you how horribly old most of their stuff is....Sparc 1000's and even older crap!
Too funny that the goverment has such wonderful marketing....
"Most of my heros won't appear on no stamps..." Chuck D from Fight the Power
Do you guys ever read some of the conspiracy theories about all the evil that goes on at Ft Meade, and just laugh your butts off?
--
Communication is only possible between equals
No questions I can think of, but I find it amusing that today is the day I chose to wear my NSA T-shirt to work.
Looks over shoulder.
If you get a chance, do visit the museum. They have some interesting things on display.
The fact that you can get multicoloured embroidered NSA T-shirts was very surreal to me.
This
Does the NSA have any connection whatsoever with the "number stations" on shortwave radio?
n umbers/index.html
If the NSA owns any of these stations, would you be able to give us even a vague idea of what kind of data is carried on them? Even a one-word answer like "names", "words", "images", etc...
Here's where I first heard of them:
http://www.salon.com/people/feature/1999/09/16/
http://www.ibmpcug.co.uk/%7Eirdial/conet.htm
Does the NSA, or other TLA-agencies for that matter, have incentive programs that would interest the kind of people that you want working for you?
The chance to uncover and join conspiracies at the very highest levels of our government? C'mon, do you think that "The Man" (also know as "they", "Big Brother", etc.) is immortal? No! Even with the incredible genetic longevity treatments that they won't release to the general public, The Man can only expect to live two, three centuries, tops. They need fresh blood to firmly grasp the puppeteer's strings that our society dances to!
Think about the chicks you could pick up, if you could have their current boyfriends' reputations destroyed with a phone call.
Think about the perks you could be treated to, when you had the inside dirt that The Man's omnipresent surveillance systems have collected on every political and corporate leader in the world!
Sure, you would have to undergo their powerful classified psychotherapy techniques to keep you from revealing The Man's secrets, and to make sure you suicide before cracking under torture. But really, is torture by foreign counteragents really a worry anymore in a world where the Russian mafia is in bed with the NSA and the Chinese Communist party, in a global conspiracy to squeeze control ever tighter around the minds and hearts of men?
And really, wouldn't be worth it, the first time some clueless hippie-wannabe bitches to you that The Man is trying to keep him down, and you get to reply,
"No I'm not."
Hah! :-P Somebody needs to make a line of geek action figures.
OK, either your friend filled you full of BS and you bought it, or... well let our imaginations wander.
I went there with my girlfriend and my son. I have a clearance, they don't. Nobody checked our ID or anything. We were in her vehicle so "dreaming" a background check out of the temporary tag number and somehow linking it to me won't work.
Anyway, just go to NSA HQ, make a left, drive past the Shell station (there is one across from the CIA too, as well as one down the road from Station C at Remington?warrinton, VA, go figure), anyway, just past the Shell gas station you will find the museum. Walk in, sign the book or not (I think I signed in as Kevin Mitnick, but don't remember). Walk around, look at the desplays, ask the guides questions, play with an Enigma hands on, have phun!
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
What's the most riduculous conspiracy theory that you have heard about yourselves? Is there any particular movie or book that you all laugh at as an inside joke (e.g. Mercury Rising) becuase of the way it misrepresents the NSA?
http://www.netcraft.com/whats/?host =www.nsa.gov
Why did your webmaster choose to run Apache on Solaris?
That is, unless you're fooling Netcraft, which is a valid possibility...
The Once and Future Cool Site:
Ceterum censeo Microsoftam esse delendam.
I interviewed with CSE so I know a bit about them (nothing classified or secret, since ended up taking a different job).
Aside from all the current NSA-type stuff, the CSE is also working on a public-key infrastructure for use by Canadian citizens. I believe this work is being done in partnership with Xcert. Cool stuff...
Is there really such a collection? The only book I saw when I followed the link was on Polygraphy.
I see a lot of questions about NSA and SigInt successes, but what about the failures? For example, one hears a great deal about cracking Enigma during WW2. How about Allied codes during WW2? How successful were the Axis in reading our signals? What methods did they use? Who was generally better at SigInt during WW2 and why? It would also be interesting to hear about any significant US failures during the Cold War.
Both the CIA and NSA have missions of "spying" on other countires. How does your mission differ from the CIA?
Such a discovery, if disclosed to the public, would represent a severe threat to the national security of the United States of America and her citizens. Disclosed only to the National Security Agency, it would be a useful tool in the defense and security of this nation.
What would the proper way to disclose such a discovery to elements of the National Security Agency?
To purchase it is not like spending money but rather it is an investment in the future in a blow against the empire
The NSA can only monitor stuff outside the US. It's in their charter. And if they under any circumstances WOULDN'T refuse, they sure wouldn't tell 'bout it on slashdot.
Sincerely,
a kind and curious spookette
Actually, a lot of those very unsung heroes were Turing and the work done at Bletchley Park ... it wasn't until the enigma was stolen that a lot of people actually knew what Bletchley was and their (large) contribution to the war effort.
As for another unsung hero, a guy called Ellis who worked at GCHQ in the 50's actually developed public key crypto way before the RSA/Duffie etc. It sometimes helps to look outside the box, the NSA museum is very interesting, however you have to bear in mind these places are extremely jingoistic, there are many other great people (from other countries) that have made massive contributions over the years who haven't received any recognition.
P.S. Don't rely on Hollywood for your history either.
In March I was in DC to get a Brazilian Visa and while I was in the general area decided to take a trip the the NSA's National Cryptological Museum. It's a fascinating place and they have a nice little gift shop. Seeing a tie-dyed shirt sporting the NSA logo on the front, I bought it on the spot and wore it back home to Pittsburgh. My question is whether or not the shirt and whatever evesdropping capabilities it employs were involved in any way with the 75mph spinout on Interstate 270 that nearly killed the three of us. Or was it acting in a beneficial way since we did not hit anyone else on the highway and were able to walk away from an undamaged car. I can only assume that the spinout was meant as a warning since we were discussing rather subversive topics in the car at the time.
Sipping on Jolt and Dew. Laid back. With my mind of my cubicle and my cubicle on my mind.
Of those things no longer classified, but no longer in existance, what do you regret most having been destroyed?
Also, a quick follow-up - there are bound to be many things in existance now which simply won't survive, because they're just too sensitive to risk. Does the NSA (and/or museum) have any program to securely isolate those artifacts which are likely to be of historic significance, until they can be safely declassified?
(IMHO, we only have one history. Many possible futures, but there's only one past. If something is lost, that's it. No second chance. Bleeding-edge research is probably one of the most exciting aspect of life in any age, but it's also - by definition - the most likely to be deliberately destroyed, through sheer necessity. IMHO, some kind of archive would be invaluable for the future, but maybe just too expensive for the present.)
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
They have the "police raid" style windbreakers (NSA in large letters, plus the logo), notebooks and clip boarsds, even Golf balls
In all seriousness, its actually a nice museum. A place where things of historic interest are kept. The only stuff with actual transistors in it is the old cray, and its robo-tape module.
As mentioned they have an enigma, but also a number of other even older machines. They have things like the almost entirely passive bug that they found in a gift wall decoration, a 17th century (french) text on codes, etc. Its a bit north of the DC beltway, but well worth a morning if you are already in town. I assume there is a public transit route there, but I don't know it. (for a real nerd day, rent a car, and combine it with a visit to the Garber facility, the suburban MD home to the Air and Space museum overflow and restoration shop. the two sites are 20 minutes apart when traffic is not at a standstill)
Organizer:New England Rubbish Deconstruction Society;The NERDS,first US team in the UK Scrapheap Challenge/Junkyard Wars
How many licks it takes to get to the center of a tootsie pop.
I'm dying to know.
After that, how many hairs do I have on my head?
When death looks you in the eye, smile. Someone needs to cheer him up.
Until recently there was a very controversial and public web site, crytome available which offered a unique and interesting look inside the world of espionage. Of course, by placing under the public eye so much information they made enemies of the FBI, the CIA, and various foreign intelligence agencies.
Do you know what happened to this site, and to your knowledge was your agency (or any of the other aforementioned agencies) involved in its apparent disappearance from the net?
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
30 years down the road, Adi Shamir invented differential cryptoanalysis (a method of attacking crypto systems by 'feeding' them certain inputs and seeing what comes out), and showed how the original design of DES was vulnerable to that method, and that the NSA's changes made DES much less vulnerable.
It was later revealed that NSA had already discovered differential cryptoanalysis in the 60's, and the coeffecient changes were specifically done to protect DES.
I understand the NSA is developing a Secure Unix distrabution based on the GNU/Linux platform, or rather out-sourcing this project. Can you say if the NSA plans on releasing the changes made to GPL licensed modules back to the Copyright holder -- even if the NSA plans on only using the Distrabution internaly? I asume if the Distrabution is publicaly released the NSA will abide by the rules of the GPL software liscense.
Well, yeah, but the answer is: We're not telling you.
"As part of these investigations, the House Select Committee on Intelligence requested documents from the National Security Agency (NSA) regarding its operating standards for intelligence systems like ECHELON that may intercept communications of Americans. In a surprising move, NSA officials refused to disclose these documents by invoking the attorney-client privilege."
Source: http://www.aclu.org/echelonwatch/con gress.html
Do you guys run distributed.net or do you run something that works in a simular manner?
Yes, the question is: when will all of Alan Turing's work be released into public?
Some of Turing's research is secret even today. I wonder what is so important there... I guess he proved P == NP or something.
If it's because of some WW II war-time cryptography thing, well hello, the war ended over 50 years ago.
What was up with all those water filters you guys used to sell?
K.
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Shoot, a fella' could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all that stuff.
Is it true that NSA stands for "No Such Agency"?
Why all the secrecy around the death of Paul McCartney?
Have you retired Elvis Presley yet?
42?
Do all NSA workers have to memorize phrases like "I have no recollection of any such event or happening"?
How far will you go in talking Alan Cox into including the NSA BackDoor in the Linux kernel?
(this is a fact) How the hell did you persuade Norwegian officials into installing your giant Echelon Radar in Vardø, Norway? Do you have any idea how much that radar pisses the Russians off?
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"Oppression and harassment is a small price to pay to live in the land of the free." -- Montgomery Burns.
It is clear that Cuba, China, Libya, Etc. has the ability to download restricted encryption from the places out side of the US and it would not be hard to illegally down load it from the US so why try to stop this from happing. I had to wait 48 hours so that my Nokia account can be activated because They needed to process the request by hand to confirm I was in the US. I needed a SSH client. There are many cases of the US Government trying to stop very good and useful things like VPNs and Kerros in its early days because of encryption. Everyone I know thinks it is a joke the restrictions are not working and can not work so what purpose do they serve and how much longer will this need to go on.
Are wiring diagrams for the Enigma rotors available? I have enough information to simulate an Enigma device, but I don't have enough to recreate an actual encoding.
If the NSA had found a way to solve encryption problems that can also be used solve many other problems like making better microchips, faster searches of data, and smaller electronics, etc. For example all NP complete problems are the same if you can find an all-purpose solution for one you can use it for any NP complete problem. This would be of a great economic value to any one. Is there a way to have people from out side of the NSA look at you technology and lobby to have it made public for the common good if not too dangerous for national Security. For example if the early work of Allen Turing was keep from the public computer science as we know it might be 30 40 or even 50 years behind. We have this kind of thing with NASA and there technology can help a country make ICBM's so why not the NSA.
I'm an American. I was born in the US (although my parents are from the Dominican Republic), and I love this country.
What can I, as an average (more or less) citizen, do to help my country maintain it's national security?
I'm not a mathematician, or an expert cryptologist, or a wunderkind. I know the NSA has it's recruiting programs and any suficiently qualified individual can apply for a job with you guys, but seeing as I'm not as gifted as you would require me to be before being able to offer me a full time job, what can I do (on my own)?
q
"PROFANITY is the inevitable literary crutch of the inarticulate MOTHER FUCKER." -- some PC user
I can accept being legitimately moderated down. If this bozo had said I was "off topic", because they didn't think it was funny (it was pretty silly), that would at least make a little sense.
Important clue, kiddo: It can't be Overrated if nobody rated it.
On the positive side, thanks for inspiring a new .sig file for me.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Also, my best regards to XXXX XXXXXXXX if you see hXX..
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SCO employee? Check out the bounty
I recently looked at a list of patents the NSA had for stuff, and anong the really cool stuff, something very very interesting popped up: Integrated Child Seat for Vehicle. This really piqued my curiosity. Why does the NSA have a patent for a child seat?
Calmacil
I can't seem to face up to the facts, I'm tense and nervous and I can't relax... --Talking Heads
When I was in college (late 70s), we had an NSA recruiting poster up in the computer lab. The graffiti added at the bottom said "You don't need to call us - if you're interested, we already know about you." :-)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
He's rumored to be buried under the goal posts in the Meadowlands stadium in New Jersey. (He's also rumored to be buried just about anywhere else in New Jersey that has a large quantity of cement from the appropriate time frame, though he was also seen out on a date with Elvis, and having hot grits at a Cmdr's Taco stand with Natalie Portman.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Are there instances when making information public furthers state security
better than keeping it secret?
Just as you probably have large numbers of people devoted to
protecting secrets, do you have people whose role is to promote
the dissemination of information (I mean for non public relations reasons,
for the furthering of state security)
Jg xgn babo qbvj xgno hg-kgomboq hgjbj pbqqycbq, enqd zgo znv? Go wq dlyd mwvj gz qdnzz qdowhdix foglwrwdbj rx Nffbo Pyvycbpbvd, wj gojbo dg pywvdywv yv ywo gz fogzbqqwgvyiwqp yvj qdnzzwvbqq?
Are you jealous that the FBI has a neat privacy-raping concept/product and you don't get any credit for it?
I have a date tonight, and I need the NSA to help me! I have no clue with women and this is my real opportunty to score big!
Tell me her secrets so we have something to talk about... her fav food etc....
I won't mention her name since you already know it by now.
Thanks in advance! - A Geek in Need...
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This
(nt)
<O
( \
XGNOME vs. KDE: the game!
Will I retire or break 10K?
Which consequences have resulted from this dramatic computer crash? It was reported that it was the result of an overload and a "software anomaly". The Washington Post quoted the chairman of the House Select Committe of Intelligence as saying that
(Feb. 2 2000, p. A19)(That sounds like we're talking about normal network cards.) What have you learned from the incident and how do you plan to prevent something like this from happening in the future? Have you considered that the reasons behind the decisions that have led to the failure might be on a human level (social and psychological factors)?
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I stopped by the museum last winter, and by far my favorite part was getting to play with an actual Enigma they had set up out in the open. I still have the cyphertext and initial wheel settings written down somewhere, in case I run into another Engima someday. Also, they had a pad of paper out with a question posed, something along the lines of 'What kind of technology from today will be in museums in the future?' I couldn't stop myself from writing 'ECHELON' before walking out of the building. :)
_ The bureaucracy is expanding to meet
the needs of an expanding bureaucracy.
I saw the other day someone claimed the NSA can read PGP encrypted emails with ease. Should we bother trying to encrypt out emails?
OK tte NSA is not going to answer this but what do others think?
What about this? Leaving aside the NSA, can other people read PGP etc?
Why won't you answer this question? Stumped the NSA oh yeah!
This Wiki Feeds You TV and Anime - vidwiki.org
to read about, but not that interesting. I did like the question about the group in WWII that most people might not know about but did contribute during that period of time.
Important clue, kiddo: It can't be Overrated if nobody rated it.
Um, if you post with a 1 and the moderator thinks that a 1 is too high a rating for your post but doesn't know what to specifically classify it as, then the moderator gives it Overrated. Note that it doesn't read Overmoderated, in which case you could possibly have an argument, but simply Overrated, meaning that it is rated too high. The line that I quoted from your post would more accurately read, "Important clue, kiddo: It can't be Overrated if nobody moderated it," but then, of course, it would then be more easily flagged as inaccurate.
All that being said, who gives a shit? Taco sending you a buck for every karma point you collect? I can't blame the moderator for giving your post an Overrated mod, because your post is vaguely ontopic and isn't a troll or flamebait, but still doesn't serve much of a purpose other than to fill up a few lines of space. This post, while a topical response to your complaint post and somewhat informative to boot, is offtopic in the general scheme of this NSA thread, so moderation could go either way, depending on how the individual moderator is feeling at the time, as there are no strict guidelines, that I am aware of, that strictly define what is considered to be "on topic".
Deo
Anyone ever hear of the Voynich Manuscript? It's an odd bit of coded manuscript from around the 14th century written in an unknown language (quite possibly two languages) that has baffled cryptanalysts for centuries. Wonder if our friends at the NSA have cracked it. Visit this link for more on the strange artifact. Speculation on its actual contents range from it being a codification of Cathar doctrine, an alchemical tract, or even the monstrous Necronomicon itself.../p?
Qu'on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme, j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre.
They built that one before the NSA was formed.
Ever get the impression that your life would make a good sitcom?
Ever follow this to its logical conclusion: that your life is a sitcom?
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
What do you people do for fun there? Do you program your own games so that the computers you have are not always idle or do you actully find signifgant interest in your work that it can not be thought of as work but as a paid hobby you people have?
NSA and IBM had a sizable effort to develop high-speed cyrogenic computing components in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. Did any usable hardware ever result from that effort? It would be an interesting footnote to computing history if it did.
And is it my imagination or did Enoch Root magically come back to life?
The conclusion of your syllogism, I said lightly, is fallacious, being based on licensed premises
Voting via the net seems to be en vogue. Companies as well as local government intitutions are experimenting with it. Do you think internet voting will support democracy or endanger it? Who could supervise the technical side of internet voting in a fair and independent way? What's the NSAs view on these topics?
I'm about 90% sure that my late mother was involved with the Navy codebreakers of OP-20-G during WWII. Unfortunately, her Navy personnel records don't confirm this. Is there a NSA historian I can contact who could check the records for me? My understanding is that the Naval Security Group was taken over by NSA.
I doubt they would answer this, but...
Is there any possibility that someone in the US/UK sigint community has proved that P=NP and is using that to crack RSA? Is it possible that public key algorithms are actually as wide open as Enigma was in WWII??
This is my sig.
The way I read it, he nearly died on the operating table, and the conspirators decided it was best to let everyone think he was dead.
/., in which case Enoch Root either lost his personality and memory, or was bought by some other poster.
Look at the book again, as Shaftoe leaves with the Finnish girl, they help someone hidden under a coat into a car. That would be Enoch.
Unless you're talking
George
what exactly would your career options be if you decided to leave the NSA's employ?
My guess would be you could apply just about anywhere you wanted, except perhaps for a government agency in another country. I know one of my coworkers is a former NSA employee. I'm sure everything will be fine as long as you don't go blabing about the work you did there (after all, it is secret)... remember, its not the mafia or "The Firm" or anything...
A pretty damn good point. I'll settle down now.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
No text here to see. Circulate!!
Some of the answers to questions on here can be found in James Banford's book, The Puzzle Palace.
While it was published in 1983, I think it shows an insight into something most people don't know of today. Downright scary some of the stuff that goes on.
Its been a while since I read it, but I think it even talked about Eschelon (or something similar), way back then.
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Why are there so many people always asking for whirled peas?
If there is a classified (secret or top secret at least) museum, how would _anyone_ get clearance? I thought access to classified information (in the US government scheme of things at least) was on a "need to know" basis; by this standard, who would "need to know" what was in the museum, save for the curators and the beancounters? Hence, no access.
-jtm
Check this out. http://www.cryptoarchive.net/ftp.cryptoarchive.net /mirrors/ftp.cryptome.org/
========================================
Death will come, and will have your eyes
-- Pavese
Okay, you got me. That wasn't exactly civilian. Just the first computer I could think of prior to 1952. Now it's time to go hide in a corner.
Ever get the impression that your life would make a good sitcom?
Ever follow this to its logical conclusion: that your life is a sitcom?
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Okay, here goes.
Just how effective is the tack of sticking stuff like "bomb gun terrorist saddam hussein nuclear pedophile crack heist uranium hacker militia blackbox hijack" at the end of one's communications just to give you guys excessive stuff to deal with, especially when large numbers of people do it on a specific day out of the year? Does it just make you guys laugh at the futility of the excercise or do you get really pissed off?
Also, if you guys only read the overseas email, is anybody reading our email?
I feel we have the right to know if our own government is spying on the entire country.
Unless of course being computer users somehow incriminates us or waives our rights legally in some way we were not aware of. Then it's all cool.
Feel free to simply not answer either of the above questions, if you feel that would represent a threat to national security. I'd much prefer that to a couple spooks showing up at my door.
Ever get the impression that your life would make a good sitcom?
Ever follow this to its logical conclusion: that your life is a sitcom?
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Dial 1-800-CALL-SPY. Seriously. I'm not kidding. It's a voice mail box you can use to report such things.
I'm not terribly enthused about eventually working in Silicon Valley. I probably won't end up working for the government either. I just know one of my friends mother just started working for the government again as a coder, and since she had worked for them before they simply acted like she had never left in terms of the salary and benefits that she was receiving, so since she had worked for them for like, 8 years previously , they just pretended she was still an 8th year employee. I thought that was pretty cool.
:-) Thankfully I don't have to make these decisions for a few years yet.
Me? Well, I may earn half as much at home as I do in Silicon valley...but the cost of living is at least half as inexpensive, if not less.
Moller