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Diffie & Hellman Get $100,000 Fellowship

Posted by michael on from the richly-deserved dept.

MoNickels writes "Diffie & Hellman will receive a $100,000 fellowship from the Marconi Foundation for their work in encryption. The panel discussion Oct. 10 at Columbia University in New York should be rich. Check out these names: George Heilmeier (former head of Bellcore) will speak, then the panel will include Diffie and Hellman, Eric Ash, Leonard Kleinrock (inventor of packet switching) and Paul Baran (co-inventor of packet switching)."

5 comments

  1. There are Doors and then there are Doors by BlackHat · · Score: 3

    Take the following remark from FBI agent Jim Kallstrom as quoted in an article by Steven Levy in
    the New York Times Sunday Magazine: "Sure, we want those new steel doors ourselves, to protect our banks, to protect the American corporation trade secrets, patents rights, technology. But people operating in legitimate business are not violating the laws -- it becomes a different ball of wax when we have probable cause and we have to get into that domain. Do we want a digital superhighway where not only the commerce of the nation can take place but where major criminals can operate impervious to the legal process?"

    1. Exactly how does the meatworld highway give us this ability to restrict criminals from using them? Do wee look in every car that passes a tollbooth?

    2. Given that many "legitimate business" are in a perptual state of litigation, define criminal activity in wireworld?

    3. Ideas "trade secrets, patents rights, technology" do not fit in physical protected boxes why should we extend it to wireworld.

    Interesting FAQ too bad it is packed with lots of questions and few answers.

    1. Re:There are Doors and then there are Doors by Trevor+Goodchild · · Score: 2
      It's just typical law enforcement blather. You gotta remember, these people think very differently from us, and if we didn't act to reign them in we would probably be living in a totalitarian police state by now.

      It scares me that some people can get so involved in their one field that they end up with blinders to the rest of the world. I don't think these people are being intentionally evil, they are just too involved with their one niche. Tunnel vision is dangerous.

    2. Re:There are Doors and then there are Doors by BlackHat · · Score: 1

      ok, you say I'm trolling
      but i'll bite anyway...
      1. If this is true, all I can say is poor fucks(the guys running the check points, can you imagine the back-chat). However still the methods proposed by the TLA's and others are more invasive.
      2. Is it absurd? If Co.A knows that Co.B is doing something "wrong" and that makes Co.A lots of cash but Co.A owns majority of Co.B. When B is shut down or must pay damages is A also in trouble?(see ISP/carrer threads) Should I go on to introduce the idea of the disposable company ala Hollywood into this broth? No not absurd at all.
      3.A bit preachy it may be. The loss of our privacy to gain control over information flow is what it is about. There are very few meatworld restrictions or monitoring of private conversation. If I tell you that a Soft Drink has Lemon in it via E-mail. Is that different than telling you in the livingroom? Should the Softdrink company be notified instantly that I have told A trade secret in a living room on Blue St, Anytown. Should food preperation rooms be monitored for trademark infringment by children drawing micky mouse on cakes for team bake sales?

      my 2 cents worth of Troll Food.

  2. I like the photos by townmouse · · Score: 1

    Hellman looks like a corporate professional & Diffie like an academic.

    --
    Ask me if I've been required to disclose any crypto keys.
  3. They forgot James Ellis. by inductor · · Score: 1

    The Columbia News article is misleading. It says that Diffie/Hellman did what thousands of goverenment agency researchers couldn't. Which is not quite right.
    British mathematician James Ellis working for the British Communications - Electronic Security Group (CESG) independently conceived public key crypto in 1970.
    I remember reading an interesting Wired magazine story on James Ellis, by Steven Levy. Also, Bobby Inman of NSA claimed that NSA knew about public-key crypto 10 years before Diffie's discovery. Don't know how good this claim is.

    Anycase, http://www.research.att.com/~smb/nsam-160/ has an interesting historical account of public key crypto .