From: Bill Stewart <bill.stewart@pobox.com>
Date: Thu, 17 Sep 1998 00:04:10 +0800
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
Subject: DARPA Hires NetAss/TIS TO Develop Secure DNS
In-Reply-To: <2.2.16.19980827140054.0dd7abc4@mailer.packet.net>
Message-ID: <3.0.5.32.19980916190027.008d4dc0@idiom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



This is somewhat tacky.  SecureDNS exists, and TIS got export approval
a while back to publish a "bones" version, minus encryption routines.
John Gilmore and his lawyer decided that, since it only does authentication,
not message encryption, it should be ok to publish _with_ the crypto
algorithms, and it's been quietly sitting on his web pages.
Recently the Feds sent him a letter saying "Oh, no, we didn't mean
it was OK to publish/export this encryption-based authentication system
just because the law says you can, so stop it"....
Now they're paying for another version.  Are they going to try something
DSS-based instead of RSA, just so you don't need encryption-capable
crypto with it, or is this going to be another scam?
Or is it just different parts of the Feds not talking to each other?

At 08:57 AM 8/28/98 -0400, Robert Hettinga wrote:
>At 1:57 PM -0400 on 8/27/98, Edupage Editors wrote:
>> DARPA LEADS FIGHT AGAINST DOMAIN-NAME HACKERS
>> The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has awarded a $1.4
>> million contract to Network Associates to develop a cryptographic
>> authentication system for the Internet's domain-address system.  The new
>> system will enable the Net's routing points to verify the origin of any
>> given Web page, preventing hackers from corrupting Web page caches or
>> rerouting domain traffic altogether.  It will not, however, prevent hackers
>> from breaking into individual Web servers and changing pages.  "That's not
>> part of this particular approach," says the director of Network Associates'
>> TIS Labs.  The company is working with the Internet Software Consortium,
>> which will distribute the security system to Unix vendors when it becomes
>> commercially available.  Beta versions are expected to be ready in about six
>> months, with a final product on the market in about 18 months.  (TechWeb 26
>> Aug 98)

				Thanks! 
					Bill
Bill Stewart, bill.stewart@pobox.com
PGP Fingerprint D454 E202 CBC8 40BF  3C85 B884 0ABE 4639