NSA and Netscape Crack

[Norman Hardy]

At 3:46 PM 9/19/95, Jim Ray wrote:
....
>I don't expect to know NSA's specific brute-force capability, but
>does anyone know if the NSA has *ever* found a glaring weakness in
>software and then told its author(s) or owner(s) about it? Do "we"
>perform the "COMSEC" role Tim was speaking of better than the NSA?
>JMR
....
Once upon a time NSA would find weeknesses in friends' crypto systems and
tell them about it -- depending, of course, on the situation. It was a
reciprocal practice. We don't know that NSA didn't tell Netscape.