More on Magic Lantern, McAfee, Symantec, and FBI

[Will Rodger]

Declan --

While we're all pondering whether or not McAfee talked to the FBI, I have 
to wonder: How likely is it the FBI would want to talk to about their 
keystroke logger, anyway?

The Trojan horse -- if it indeed exists -- won't likely be seen in the 
wild. Wide distribution would defeat the surreptitious nature of the 
alleged Magic Lantern. It would also violate Fourth Amendment protections 
in ways that would make even AG Ashcroft blush.

We also know that virus scanners are remarkably bad at picking up and 
stopping new malware. If they were any good at all, new viri and Trojans 
would not spread the way they do.

So -- We have a Trojan horse that

--will likely land on a handful of computers a year
--should not propagate
--will operate silently, and
--whose existence remains classified.

How hard would it be to design a Trojan horse that could get around current 
scanners?

I am quite certain that Ted Bridis got his story right. I am less certain 
that his sources told him the truth.

Will Rodger




---------------------------------------------------------------------
The Cryptography Mailing List
Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at wasabisystems.com