Key length security (calculations!)

[Arsen Ray Arachelian]

To quote you:
<<Not to attack Doug's point, which has validity here (that we don't
know what factoring advances NSA may have made), but I personally
think the combined capabilities of "public domain mathematicians" are
now far greater than what NSA has. Shamir, Odzylko, Blum, Micali,
Rackoff, Goldwasser, Solovay, Berlenkamp, etc., are top-flight
researchers, publishing many papers a year on these topics. It is
unlikely that some GS-14 mathematicians at the Fort, not able to
publish openly, have made much more progress. I think the resurgence
of crypto in the 70s, triggered by public key methods and fueled by
complexity theory breakthrough, caused a "sea change" in inside
NSA-outside NSA algorithm expertise.
>>


You mention Shamir, etc.  However I would point out that even if any of the
original RSA mathematicians found a better factoring algorithm, they'd be more
than likely to keep it under lock and key.  The obvious reason is that their
money supply depends on such an algorithm being suppressed.

Now, someone outside of their circle with a little less to worry about the
impact of such a factoring algirthm would be likely to publish it, but I 
doubt that PKP's founders would.