[Cryptography] NSA versus DES etc.... was: iOS 8

[Richard Outerbridge]

On 2014-09-23 (266), at 17:36:27, John Denker <jsd at av8n.com> wrote:

> On 09/23/2014 09:50 AM, ianG remarked:
> 
>> I think it is important to keep mining this 'event' because how the
>> threat actor acted with DES gives us a window on how they will act in
>> the future. 
> 
> Agreed.  See further ”mining” below.

[….]

> This is more-or-less what happened.  Hint: GOST.

The 1st paragraph of that paper sez the full design of GOST
wasn’t published until 1994, 20 years later.
 
> Also superencrypt with whatever you were using before,

[….]

There was nothing before.  Maybe Bookcodes & Testkeys.

[….]

> To summarize:  The claim that DES was superior to this-
> or-that straw man is irrelevant and deceptive.  Better 
> ciphers were available at the time.  Proof by construction.

In 1974?  Both the USA and the USSR were both still using 1950s
era rotor machines!  What better (digital) ciphers at that time
did you have in mind?
__outer