After Levy explained the role of non-gov cryptographers in freeing cypto from government control, with a mention of cypherpunks, the host, Goodale, pressed Kahn and Levy to agree that "punks" and "nerds" should be held accountable for the likely damage to national security that followed. Goodale said punks and nerds with disparagement, as if speaking of anti-socials. He appeared to be expressing a view not his alone but one discussed in the clubs of centralized power. Neither Levy nor Kahn agreed with that view. Levy in particular defended the liberation of crypto with conviction such that Goodale backed off, saying he only meant to state the accusation strongly to get a good response. Again, Goodale seemed to be following an agenda for assigning blame for 911 to crypto availability. Neither Levy nor Kahn cited that investigators have found no use of crypto by the 911 attackers. Levy made the points that nobody knows for sure whether crypto is in use by terroritsts but that it most likely is; that bin Laden would never use an escrow-compromised program; that nobody knows what NSA can crack; that the weakness of crypto is in the implementation not the mathematics; that traffic analysis was used to trace terrorist activities in the embassy bombing investigation. Kahn concurred with these points. It is worth bearing in mind that there continues to be an attempt to demonize crypto by way of 911, that punks and nerds are likely targets, that there may be re-institution of crypto control measures, despite Levy and Kahn disagreeing with that view. This crypto demonization may well intensify as investigations proceed into the government, military and intelligence failure to prevent 911. Whether crypto actually played any role in the attack may be seen as unimportant so long as a convincing story can be promoted that it must have been. ----- On the British predecessors: it remains to be seen how much of their work was leaked to Diffie. We've got an FOIA request into NSA on this topic, now two years old, and have been told by NSA that it has material from the date of the British invention. No work on when or what will be released. Tim is right that Diffie, Hellman, all the PK early developers, deserve all the credit for making PK public and the British deserve none for their compulsive secrecy. And it may be only academic as to who invented PK. Still, it is worth learning what the possibilities are for attacks on PK, especially in the light of its unparalleled reputation for public use, or, as David Kahn said, its value as "the single most important invention in the history of cryptography." That sort of language makes me nervous about what lurks in the heart of PK, its invention, its leak, its liberation, its widespread public use, its seeming impregnability. A fair amount of the reputation of PK is comparable to a sophisticated sting -- the kind Kahn richly documents throughout the history of cryptography. If liberation of cryptography is a sting, what role of cpunks in that? What role vainglory in falling for the allure of anti- authority as the sting unfolds. Levy has words about this, although I have no reason to believe his early vaunting of cypherpunks was part of a wider scheme, nor his recent book. But, still, wizened cryptographers, as Kahn documents, claim you cannot ever be too paranoid. Whatever NSA releases on pre-Diffie PK, it will not be the truth but probably convincing to the believers in fairy tale crypto protection. The Brits way of leaking PK history to accomplish a hidden task or ability is similarly suspicious.