The popular belief is that the CIA and its intelligence colleagues will go to any lengths to protect its power and secrecy. But apparently a Crypto engineer dis

The popular belief is that the CIA and its intelligence colleagues will go to any lengths to protect its power and secrecy. But apparently a Crypto engineer discovered the secret conspiracy in 1977, and even fixed vulnerabilities on behalf of the Syrian state – and the CIA was content to leave him alone for the next 40 years? > In 1977, Heinz Wagner, the chief executive at Crypto who knew the true role of the CIA and BND, abruptly fired a wayward engineer after the NSA complained that diplomatic traffic coming out of Syria had suddenly became unreadable. The engineer, Peter Frutiger, had long suspected Crypto was collaborating with German intelligence. He had made multiple trips to Damascus to address complaints about their Crypto products and apparently, without authority from headquarters, had fixed their vulnerabilities. > Frutiger “had figured out the Minerva secret and it was not safe with him,” according to the CIA history. Even so, the agency was livid with Wagner for firing Frutiger rather than finding a way to keep him quiet on the company payroll. Frutiger declined to comment for this story.