On Tue, 11 Aug 1998, Vladimir Z. Nuri wrote:
if the internet is insecure, blame the real source of the problem: the multibillion dollar NSA that has a vested interest in keeping the world technology weak..
This is absurd. The internet would be insecure even with strong crypto. Certainly, good crypto would plug up some holes but general internet technology is full of cracks. All the crypto in the universe won't stop a buffer overflow in your mail program, or 1000's of nested tags from crashing your browser in a DoS. NSA has nothing to do with bad programming practicies. Crypto is not the end-all-be-all in overall security. Encrypting your mail does you little good if I can read the plaintext off of your hard drive. Crypto is one piece of a secure system, and in some cases it may be the smallest piece. I don't support export restrictions any more than anyone else who is likely to be on cypherpunks .. but laying all the evils in the universe at NSA's door is a wee bit irresponsible. Michael J. Graffam (mgraffam@mhv.net) http://www.mhv.net/~mgraffam -- Philosophy, Religion, Computers, Crypto, etc "..subordination of one sex to the other is wrong in itself, and now one of the chief hindrances to human improvement.." John Stuart Mill "The Subjection of Women"