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Non-US Encryption Is 'Theoretical', Claims CIA Chief In Backdoor Debate (theregister.co.uk)
Iain Thomson, writing for The Register: CIA director John Brennan told U.S. senators they shouldn't worry about mandatory encryption backdoors hurting American businesses. And that's because, according to Brennan, there's no one else for people to turn to: if they don't want to use U.S.-based technology because it's been forced to use weakened cryptography, they'll be out of luck because non-American solutions are simply "theoretical." Thus, the choice is American-built-and-backdoored or nothing, apparently. The spymaster made the remarks at a congressional hearing on Thursday after Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) questioned the CIA's support for weakening cryptography to allow g-men to peek at people's private communications and data. Brennan said this was needed to counter the ability of terrorists to coordinate their actions using encrypted communications. The director denied that forcing American companies to backdoor their security systems would cause any commercial problems.
Well of course he's going to say this nonsense, no surprise there. What is surprising is hearing about it from a british newspaper without a bleep in U.S. news. I imagine apple, microsoft, google and the likes will have a response soon.
Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75. -Benjamin Franklin
>> (for crypto) there's no one else for people to turn to (mofos)
Well, it's a good thing that all mathematicians have always been and will always be American then.
When it comes to intelligence agencies, never attribute to ignorance that which can adequately be explained by malice.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
In theory, yes.
In practice, not a fucking chance.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
I can't decide if Brennan is stupid, or if he thinks everyone else is stupid.
I readily admit this is not an uncommon reaction of mine when I read of the things presented by elected and appointed officials. The US government is a madhouse.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Well, given the fact that the Chinese are at least as smart and as technological advantage as far as public math goes as the Americans, and have more than enough money to do it and more than enough reason to do it, you could actually argue that this guy is advocating for a position where China can break American encryption, while using non-weakened encryption of their own (which there is no reason to believe to be any worse than the best American encryption).
So, well, what is the punishment for high treason?
He is worse than the terrorists.
If it's known there is a backdoor people WILL find it. And the arrogance that only American companies can create encryption libraries is dumbfounding. We have China's Red Flag, edition of Linux, North Korea appearently has "Red Star" and I suspect Russia has their own version of Linux as well. It may a crime to use non-use encryption, but it will be there and used if people fear for their privacy. We recently had an event in France where the CIA tried to claim encryption was used to coordinate their operation, and it turns it...it had nothing to do with coordination. The best people will use method with less technology dependencies. This will only make it easier for people (terrorists or "partner" like China) to go through their backdoors to access data. . We seem to "terrorism" as an excuse for everything the same way we used "communism" in the Mccarthy days. the end doesn't justify the means
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
the various agencies of the US Government tend to lie ( even to Congress ), I'm somewhat puzzled about why they even bother to ask questions of them anymore.
Perhaps Congress should forgo asking questions of the professional liars ( any intelligence agency ) and ask the tech world instead. I'm quite sure the likes of Cisco, Juniper, Apple, Google and many others ( assuming they're not secretly on the Governments payroll ) would have a much different perspective on the issue at hand.
O course not. They're exempt under the thoroughly time-tested doctrine of "we have wealth and power, so the law doesn't apply to us unless we piss off someone even wealthier and more powerful"
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
What's the saying? "When strong crypto is outlawed in the US, only non-US companies will have strong crypto"?
Breakfast served all day!
The AES encryption algorithm is Rijndael, which is Belgian
The runner-up for the contest for becoming the AES standard was Serpent, which was a British/Danish/Israeli collaboration.
Third place went to the Twofish algorithm, designed by Bruce Schneier, a US citizen who happens to be a vocal opponent of backdoors.
The "main" encryption du jour happens to be from outside the USA. The best alternative is also from outside the USA. Of course, the nationality of the creators doesn't matter - the USA is able to make modified implementations that include backdoors, but the original non-backdoored versions are already out there for everyone to use instead.
o U.S. President George Walker Bush.
o U.S. Senator Ted Stevens.
o U.S. Representative Michele Bachmann.
o U.S. Representative Todd Akin.
o U.S. Representative Joe Barton
I rest my case. I could go on, but it's really quite painful to think about.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.