From: Stanton McCandlish <anton@hydra.unm.edu>
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 93 14:51:38 PDT
To: fnerd@smds.com (FutureNerd Steve Witham)
Subject: Re: "RSA sells out" hue and cry (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <9306172009.AA16710@smds.com>
Message-ID: <9306172150.AA01239@hydra.unm.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


This is in reference to the material direct from Jim Bidzos of RSA that I
have posted, re: the charges that NSA is selling out to the Clipper scheme
by licensing NIST to use their "patented algorithms" <snort>


Quoth FutureNerd Steve Witham, verily I saith unto thee:

> > Draw your own conclusions.  I sure will.
> 
> What the hell kind of conclusions are you drawing?  Will you cut the
> sniffing and say what you mean?  Sniping is tiresome.  Sniping that
> doesn't even make a whiff of sense is doubly so because it's
> confusing.  Pardon my pique but there's a *real* war on.

RELAX, fnerd!

I almost sent you my new "Dear flamer" form letter, but I guess this
deserves an answer.  Please don't yell at me like this.

My cautious conclusion from this and other discussions with Jim directly
(at least I presume it is he; as I said before I get suspicious when the
head of the worlds largest cryptography corp. does not use his own
signatory authentication software), is that 

1) RSADSI/PKP cares only for its bottom line.  People like Jim Bidzos may
care about stopping Clipper, but that is largely irrelevant in a corp.
It's like your brain deciding it doesn't want food.  Your body will go on
craving food if you like it or not. 

2) DSI is more-or-less anti-clipper, because it will hurt their biz in the
long term.  It is, being a typical corp., driven more by immediate profit
motive; thus it calls bullshit on the Gov't violating their "patent", and
thus accepting the deal when the govt "capitulates".  In typical
corporate double think, it does not see the blindinly obvious conflict of
interests here.  The weasel factor is likely the rationalization that key
escrow does not equal clipper, which is true, though as we all know, they
two are intertwined like snakes in a basket. 

3) there is no conspiracy of PKP/RSA with NIST/NSA.  It's just a product
of commercial short-sightedness and even outright stupidity and illogic. 

4) regardless of this, this move on the part of RSA is likely to be
detrimental to the cause, and is dangerous.


As for your other points:

A) I am "sniffing" and I said this is a "cautious" conclusion, because all
the evidence is not in.  

B) sniping is USEFUL.  Ask any revolutionary.  This is not a pitched
battle, it is a guerilla war, a propaganda war, & a political cold war.

C) it makes plenty of sense.  My intent was to present the facts and
material I find (for which I actually expected some thanks, imagine that!
Who else among you bothered to make the effort to contact Big Jim
personally and get their side of the story?), and to encourage people to
think about it and weigh the data and "draw your own conclusions".  I do
not Know All in this matter, and did not wish to try to force my view on
the whole.  Furthermore, I think you are upset with the messenger, rather
than concentrating on the message.  All I am doing is saying, "Here I got
this.  It made me think.  Look at it and think about it too."

D) Yes there's a war on.  But I am not Rambo, I'm the USAF journalist who
doesn't feel like getting shot thank you very much ;)


Note this is being passed on to the appropriate list and groups, in case
others need this clarification.

 -- 
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