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I can't help but feel like the author sounds excessively credulous. I had to stop reading after he wrote "I could tell something big was up and there simply wa

by ebg13 7y ago

I can't help but feel like the author sounds excessively credulous. I had to stop reading after he wrote "I could tell something big was up and there simply wasn’t time to debate the merits of handing over my source code to the NSA", because at that point my eyes rolled so hard they fell right out the back of my head. After I put them back in, I skipped down to the comments. I have a hard time not agreeing vehemently with the top comment on the post, which says: "You took time off your vacation to help the shadiest government agency on the planet do God-knows-what, as well as give them your IP for free. In addition, your ignorance and glee motivated you write this propaganda post, helping their cause, all for the price of a mug with a fancy sticker on it."

moogleii 7y ago
I'm also okay with the author's response, which is, for the record: "I’ve seen a lot of commentary like this. It was a different time back then. Just one year later the Towers came down. If in 2002 I got that same call, people would hate me for not cooperating. I didn’t invent the ciphers — those are public. I gave up nothing important. I’m okay with my decisions."
starpilot 7y ago
HN is so paranoid. All government is bad, anyone from a spy agency is some double/triple/quadruple agent who's actually a terrorist child soldier working for Facebook on the side.
- smolder 7y ago
  Is that surprising? They do stuff that is rather paranoia-inducing, like: illegitimate dragnet spying on our populous, breaking into networks to eavesdrop and gather secret keys/intel, backdooring random number generators, etc.
- droffel 7y ago
  Is it really paranoia if the evidence of mass surveillance and abuse of power is right in front of our eyes? It isn't 2012 anymore, Snowden kind of made it quite clear what's actually going on behind the curtain.
- nemacol 7y ago
  There is no foil on my head, but ... it is very reasonable to be paranoid, right? They are not talking about the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs or the Office of the Comptroller of the currency... It is a comment on the NSA. From what we know, everything they do is a bit creepy. Far from "All government is bad" ... The comment is about an agency that Snowden warned us about. Also, historically speaking the US government (various departments) has done a lot of really shady things. "They" are not going to let us know all of the shenanigans they are up to. The list of mischievous things we are aware of surely isn't everything. Are we aware of 70%? 60%? I'm going to bet lower. So you have a opaque organization with a fairly long list of misdeeds and (this is just my sense of things) a growing boldness. NSA programs, patriot act, etc - those are bold programs they have in place. Those are not the "top secret" things we don't get to know about. It does not take a lot of imagination to make that leap.
  - ta1771 7y ago
    > There is no foil on my head, but Good thing, because this would amplify radio frequencies. This trope needs to die.
    - yakaccount4 7y ago
      Doesn't that make the joke even better?
    - nemacol 7y ago
      Would it? I suppose thinking about it like an antenna, it would aplify. But I would think the bowl shape on my head would reflect my thoughts back into my head. Where a bowl upside-down on my head would act more like a dish to collect external waves. Pretty sure anyone listening to my thoughts would get bored. Have the gold fishes song stuck in there since the 90's. I love the fishes 'cause they're so delicious Gotta go fishin' I could eat them everyday And my mom says that's ok I love the fishes 'cause they're so delicious Get Goldfishes!
bsamuels 7y ago
I'm sorry but if you think the NSA is the shadiest government agency on the planet, then you live in an information bubble. Do you think the NSA is shadier than the KGB? What about the Iranian Revolutionary Guard? Or even the CIA? I know people are upset about the Snowden revelations but there are much graver sins that have been committed by other agencies.
- leggomylibro 7y ago
  KGB doesn't exist anymore - you might mean the FSB or GRU? Anyways, plenty of countries have security agencies whose main job is to violently protect the local kleptocrats these days. China might be a better example to point to for even worse behavior, with their balkanized net and mass surveillance being used to carry out the mass internment and repression of ethnic minorities in regions like Xinjiang.
  - mhh__ 7y ago
    > KGB doesn't exist anymore - you might mean the FSB or GRU? The Russians have definitely gone back to the old ways, I'm not sure the distinction between the old and new matters much any more (The GRU is the same organization, the FSB still reside in the Lubyanka - "the tallest building in Moscow")
  - 0ld 7y ago
    > KGB doesn't exist anymore it actually does [0] - at least in belarus and some of the russian-occupied pseudo-republics [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Security_Committee_of_the_Republic_of_Belarus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Security_Committee_of_th...
- number6 7y ago
  Whataboutism
  - bsamuels 7y ago
    No, it's not whataboutism. His statement is that "the NSA is the shadiest agency". I am arguing that it is not the most shady. If I tried to justify the NSA's behavior _because_ of what the GRU/IRA/CIA does, that is whataboutism. Hope this was a bit helpful.
rozab 7y ago
Even all these years later, he doesn't even consider the possibility that he was manipulated. He betrayed all of his users at the drop of a hat, and all it cost the NSA was a single phone call. Crazy stuff.
- willvarfar 7y ago
  Encryption as he implemented it does not rely on the secrecy of the algorithm. It relies on the secrecy of the key. This is why he was asking about their ability to break 256 or 40 bit encryption. So there was no trust broken in sharing the source code.
  - DennisP 7y ago
    Assuming he implemented the cryptography correctly, but if he didn't then his users weren't secure anyway, and the source code would have just saved the NSA a little time.
    - ebg13 7y ago
      That may depend on some specific knowledge of the code, which is of course why they were asking for it.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- folli 7y ago
  Kerckhoff's principle applies. Nowadays, all the good encryption software is open source anyway. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerckhoffs%27s_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerckhoffs%27s_principle
  - ebg13 7y ago
    > Kerckhoff's principle applies That's true and yet unhelpful because all software has errors, some obvious, some not.

by ebg13 7y ago

moogleii 7y ago

I'm also okay with the author's response, which is, for the record: "I’ve seen a lot of commentary like this. It was a different time back then. Just one year later the Towers came down. If in 2002 I got that same call, people would hate me for not cooperating. I didn’t invent the ciphers — those are public. I gave up nothing important. I’m okay with my decisions."

starpilot 7y ago

HN is so paranoid. All government is bad, anyone from a spy agency is some double/triple/quadruple agent who's actually a terrorist child soldier working for Facebook on the side.

smolder 7y ago
Is that surprising? They do stuff that is rather paranoia-inducing, like: illegitimate dragnet spying on our populous, breaking into networks to eavesdrop and gather secret keys/intel, backdooring random number generators, etc.
droffel 7y ago
Is it really paranoia if the evidence of mass surveillance and abuse of power is right in front of our eyes? It isn't 2012 anymore, Snowden kind of made it quite clear what's actually going on behind the curtain.
nemacol 7y ago
There is no foil on my head, but ... it is very reasonable to be paranoid, right? They are not talking about the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs or the Office of the Comptroller of the currency... It is a comment on the NSA. From what we know, everything they do is a bit creepy. Far from "All government is bad" ... The comment is about an agency that Snowden warned us about. Also, historically speaking the US government (various departments) has done a lot of really shady things. "They" are not going to let us know all of the shenanigans they are up to. The list of mischievous things we are aware of surely isn't everything. Are we aware of 70%? 60%? I'm going to bet lower. So you have a opaque organization with a fairly long list of misdeeds and (this is just my sense of things) a growing boldness. NSA programs, patriot act, etc - those are bold programs they have in place. Those are not the "top secret" things we don't get to know about. It does not take a lot of imagination to make that leap.
- ta1771 7y ago
  > There is no foil on my head, but Good thing, because this would amplify radio frequencies. This trope needs to die.
  - yakaccount4 7y ago
    Doesn't that make the joke even better?
  - nemacol 7y ago
    Would it? I suppose thinking about it like an antenna, it would aplify. But I would think the bowl shape on my head would reflect my thoughts back into my head. Where a bowl upside-down on my head would act more like a dish to collect external waves. Pretty sure anyone listening to my thoughts would get bored. Have the gold fishes song stuck in there since the 90's. I love the fishes 'cause they're so delicious Gotta go fishin' I could eat them everyday And my mom says that's ok I love the fishes 'cause they're so delicious Get Goldfishes!

bsamuels 7y ago

I'm sorry but if you think the NSA is the shadiest government agency on the planet, then you live in an information bubble. Do you think the NSA is shadier than the KGB? What about the Iranian Revolutionary Guard? Or even the CIA? I know people are upset about the Snowden revelations but there are much graver sins that have been committed by other agencies.

leggomylibro 7y ago
KGB doesn't exist anymore - you might mean the FSB or GRU? Anyways, plenty of countries have security agencies whose main job is to violently protect the local kleptocrats these days. China might be a better example to point to for even worse behavior, with their balkanized net and mass surveillance being used to carry out the mass internment and repression of ethnic minorities in regions like Xinjiang.
- mhh__ 7y ago
  > KGB doesn't exist anymore - you might mean the FSB or GRU? The Russians have definitely gone back to the old ways, I'm not sure the distinction between the old and new matters much any more (The GRU is the same organization, the FSB still reside in the Lubyanka - "the tallest building in Moscow")
- 0ld 7y ago
  > KGB doesn't exist anymore it actually does [0] - at least in belarus and some of the russian-occupied pseudo-republics [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Security_Committee_of_the_Republic_of_Belarus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Security_Committee_of_th...
number6 7y ago
Whataboutism
- bsamuels 7y ago
  No, it's not whataboutism. His statement is that "the NSA is the shadiest agency". I am arguing that it is not the most shady. If I tried to justify the NSA's behavior _because_ of what the GRU/IRA/CIA does, that is whataboutism. Hope this was a bit helpful.

rozab 7y ago

Even all these years later, he doesn't even consider the possibility that he was manipulated. He betrayed all of his users at the drop of a hat, and all it cost the NSA was a single phone call. Crazy stuff.

willvarfar 7y ago
Encryption as he implemented it does not rely on the secrecy of the algorithm. It relies on the secrecy of the key. This is why he was asking about their ability to break 256 or 40 bit encryption. So there was no trust broken in sharing the source code.
- DennisP 7y ago
  Assuming he implemented the cryptography correctly, but if he didn't then his users weren't secure anyway, and the source code would have just saved the NSA a little time.
  - ebg13 7y ago
    That may depend on some specific knowledge of the code, which is of course why they were asking for it.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
folli 7y ago
Kerckhoff's principle applies. Nowadays, all the good encryption software is open source anyway. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerckhoffs%27s_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerckhoffs%27s_principle
- ebg13 7y ago
  > Kerckhoff's principle applies That's true and yet unhelpful because all software has errors, some obvious, some not.