I told you so

[Perry E. Metzger]

Reposted from the firewalls mailing list.

Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 16:39:33 -0700
From: Bill Stout <bill.stout at hidata.com>
Subject: DES-3 Story retraction

I retract the following story, it was told to me by a contractor 
who attended a MBONE group meeting on the MBONE, where the story 
originated:

Story:

   'A person working on the MBONE project did an unannounced 
   experiment across the internet using Triple-DES for MBONE, 
   and the very next day, 'ATF' agents knocked on his door and 
   warned him against exporting munitions.  The experimentor 
   was shaken by the fact that agents approached him so quickly 
   after the experiment.'

The MBONE experimentor referred to in the story was Van Jacobson 
at the Lawrence Berkeley Labs.  I followed this up since receiving
much interested mail responses.   I called Van Jacobson himself at 
the Lab (the web is a wonderful thing!), and found that the story 
was embellished.

The real event as told by Van Jacobson was:

   'MBONE software was at one time accidentally compiled with 
   links into libraries which contained DES, and someone (I 
   don't remember who) noticed the DES capability in our MBONE 
   binaries, and informed the group about the encryption export 
   problem.  The problem was promptly fixed.'

Sorry for the mis-information.

Bill

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