[Cryptography] RIP Claude Shannon
Walter van Holst
walter.van.holst at xs4all.nl
Tue Feb 23 17:32:10 EST 2016
On 2016-02-23 21:38, Henry Baker wrote:
> It was probably Shannon's job to deliver the message to the top brass
> that the Soviet 1x pads were indeed unbreakable, and -- short of
> finding a copy of the pad or evidence of pad reuse -- that 1x
> pad-encrypted messages would leave the U.S. in the "dark". I can
> imagine the top brass then going into a hissy-fit and asking all of
> those PhD's to work *harder* on this problem -- a la James Comey &
> Hillary Clinton.
It was an era in which managers, politicians and generals did not suffer
from less hubris than today. It was also an era in which the boffins
were dealt with a modicum of respect. If they said it couldn't be done
it might be possible to do it, but everyone except Stalin knew that
trying to bend the laws of nature through sheer coercion was a road in
which way madness lies.
Regards,
Walter
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