[Cryptography] "U.S. Has Made ‘Dramatic Change’ in Technology Used for Nuclear Code System"

[Henry Baker]

-----Original Message-----
From: Jerry Leichter <leichter at lrw.com>
Sent: Oct 16, 2022 12:40 PM
To: cryptography <cryptography at metzdowd.com>
Subject: [Cryptography] "U.S. Has Made ‘Dramatic Change’ in Technology Used for Nuclear Code System"

"Revamped spy museum gives public access to one of nation’s most secretive subjects"

Interesting article in the Wall Street Journal about the NSA's recently re-opened National Cryptologic Museum. Cool pictures of some of the gear on display.

The article's title is a bit click-baity. Apparently something about the whole presidential approval system for nuclear war has been completely changed very recently, and the old stuff is now no longer considered sensitive, so they are showing it off. What the article talks about makes little sense: That there's some new mechanism for generating the codes. The old one used a DEC Alpha, now on display. But how complicated could that system really have been? Details are clearly missing.

The article is at
https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-has-made-dramatic-change-in-technology-used-for-nuclear-code-system-11665758981

...but you probably need a subscription to read it through that link. Search the subject line in Google - the WSJ generally lets you read an article if the Referrer is a search engine.

-- Jerry


I heard that the original pass code was all zeroes
becuz the Pres was worried that when the time
came, no one would remember anything more
complicated.


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