[1259] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: Fortezza dying on the vine?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Bill Stewart)
Sat Jul 26 18:38:25 1997
Date: Fri, 25 Jul 1997 22:38:44 -0700
To: cryptography@c2.net
From: Bill Stewart <stewarts@ix.netcom.com>
In-Reply-To: <199707250248.WAA17029@jekyll.piermont.com>
>> The State department is using PGP for some overseas applications.
>Do you have evidence of that?
It wouldn't surprise me, unless they've changed a _lot_ since
the late 80s. They spent three years trying to do a procurement of
a world-wide encrypted X.25 network, and eventually dropped it
after 27 revisions of the RFP. Some of the problem was because
they were a bunch of technically clueless Wang minicomputer users,
some was because they didn't understand the impact of the suggestions
the NSA consultant who was helping them kept making, but the
big problem was turf battles between the State Department telecom folks,
who were procuring the network, and the CIA who were the real users
driving the requirements for a Top Secret Compartmented network
(unless it really _was_ the Agricultural Attaches who wanted it :-)
State's a civilian agency, so can do just about anything it wants
with non-military data.
# Thanks; Bill
# Bill Stewart, +1-415-442-2215 stewarts@ix.netcom.com
# You can get PGP outside the US at ftp.ox.ac.uk/pub/crypto/pgp
# (If this is a mailing list or news, please Cc: me on replies. Thanks.)
