[2487] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
NYT Article on Groat Spy Case
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Arnold G. Reinhold)
Mon Apr 13 16:25:49 1998
Date: Mon, 13 Apr 1998 15:49:15 -0400
To: cryptography@c2.net
From: "Arnold G. Reinhold" <reinhold@world.std.com>
Sunday's New York Times (April 12, 1998) has a front page article by Tim
Weiner about the Douglas F. Groat espionage case. Mr. Groat, a former CIA
employee, is accused of revealing to two foreign governments that their
cryptographic systems may have been compromised.
According to the article, Mr. Groat's job at the CIA was breaking into
foreign government offices overseas and stealing "codes, cipher systems and
computer chips" used for secret communications. It seems that most
governments cannot afford elaborate security systems nor full time guards
for their overseas offices and they are "easier to rob than the average
jewelry store."
I think this article may shed some light on what the intelligence
community's real concerns about widespread cryptography may be. Software
cryptosystems, like PGP running on a PC, are extremely vulnerable to
bag-job attacks, but next generation systems using smart cards may be far
less vulnerable.
Arnold Reinhold
Got Crypto? http://ciphersaber.gurus.com
