> If they aren't stupid won't they realize it's a terrible idea to embed weaknesses in standards destined to become so pervasive your own economy will rely on t

> If they aren't stupid won't they realize it's a terrible idea to embed weaknesses in standards destined to become so pervasive your own economy will rely on them (as well as your own military/intel)? The Dual_EC_DRBG backdoor [1] is a asymmetric crypto based backdoor. Only the one who built the back-door has the key to access it. It's even impossible to prove the backdoor is there without knowing the key. This way you don't weaken yourself or allies WRT 3rd parties when standardizing on that specific weakened algorithm (of course you need to closely guard your key). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_EC_DRBG https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_EC_DRBG