Mr Noyb posted:
>Julian, /all/ electronic communications - email, fax, telephone,
>radio - are examined, no matter whether the communications are
>military, diplomatic or civilian. Think about it: how could anyone
>tell which traffic is encrypted (or "interesting") without examining
>all of the traffic?
True, but I chose my words with care. Sampled/Monitored/Examined
represent ascending orders of sigint intercept treatment. A scoring
system is used, so a mid-score might generate an automated attempt to
break the encryption, a high scoring message being routed for human
attention and/or higher resource allocation, ie more cycles.
> I couldn't corroborate your claims about the weakness of PGP (via a
>google search using the information you provided). I'm always
>skeptical about the veracity of claims that PGP encryption can be
>easily broken - particularly claims made "quietly" for the purpose
>of obtaining money ("if the budget is available").
I dont think anyone has used the word 'easily' in the context of PGP
breaking, certainly not me. But if Kroll reckon they can, they almost
certainly can. Payment is by results!
>>Significant vulnerabilities in PGP have been identified
>*snip*
>
> ...and promptly fixed!
The ones to which attention has been drawn publicly, perhaps. It
improbable that a government signals intercept agency would publicise any
vulnerabilities they identified.
>Nitpick: the vulnerability was due to a bug in the implementation,
>not in the OpenPGP standard itself (this is explicitly stated in
>your reference).
Sure, and most of the breaks achieved will likely have been through
weaknesses in the Windows, and to a lesser extent Unix implementations.
But that is what people actually use. Curiously enough the implementation
least fingered as suspect seems to be Mac, although I found the OS9
version klunky. OSX implementation may be subject to the Unix engine's
known vulnerabilities.
In the real world I am sure you are right that and that PGP is for
practical purposes secure - unless it happens to be the government who is
interested in reading your messages. Lets just hope Chris evades the men
in black!
Bestest,
Julian
"Magnetism, as you recall from physics class, is a powerful force that
causes certain items to be attracted to refrigerators." (Dave Barry)
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