[...] Will Day (willday@rom.oit.gatech.edu) wrote:

I understand how it affects their claim for the security of escrowed keys, but I'm afraid I don't follow the other argument. How would the wide availability of strong encryption have helped prevent the breakin? How would encryption in general prevent breakins? I'd love to use this as an argument for strong encryption, but I don't see how it really applies.

Since we don't know how the intruders broke in, we can only speculate. I can think of several scenarios where cryptographic techniques could help. I can also think of several where they wouldn't. When you've only got 20 seconds to explain to a non-technical audience, I don't think it's dishonest to say that it might have prevented it. Off the top of my head, here are a couple examples: 1. It's possible that a DOJ employee logged in from a remote site while the intruders were snooping somewhere along the way. If the link had been encrypted, that would have made things much more difficult or impossible for the attackers. 2. Perhpas the intruders used IP spoofing and .rhosts to break in. If machines had to be cryptographically authenticated, a rsh from the wrong machine wouldn't work. I think my 20 seconds are up. :> | (Douglas) Hofstadter's Law: | It always takes longer than you expect, even Frank Stuart | when you take into account Hofstadter's Law.