Other Spy Agencies

We have talked plenty on the list about the NSA.What about the spy agencies of
other nations?What do they have to offer in the way of crypto roadblocks.Maybe
an exchange of crypto ideas could turn up intresting info from foreign agencies
 But I can picture life in San Quentin for espinoge.I can see the scene now,
 "Im in for triple murder,how about you? I got 40 years for telling the Swedes
about RSA so don't screw with me pal!Crypto huh,your one sick con."
-- 
Greg Kucharo
kryten@shell.portal.com   University of Maximegalon College of Computer Science
 This .sig contains much that is apocryphal,or at least wildly inaccurate.

>  We have talked plenty on the list about the NSA.What about the spy agencies of
> other nations?What do they have to offer in the way of crypto roadblocks.Maybe
> an exchange of crypto ideas could turn up intresting info from foreign agencies
>  But I can picture life in San Quentin for espinoge.I can see the scene now,
>  "Im in for triple murder,how about you? I got 40 years for telling the Swedes
> about RSA so don't screw with me pal!Crypto huh,your one sick con."
> -- 
> Greg Kucharo
> kryten@shell.portal.com   University of Maximegalon College of Computer Science

I've read many books about the intellignence establishment, including
some that deal at length with foreign (non-U.S., that is) intelligence
agencies and their practices. Most folks on this list have never heard
of Chobetsu or the BND.

My point? These books are freely available and the authors know a
thousand times what we know about these things...and yet they aren't
facing espionage charges. So, discuss away!

--Tim May


-- 
..........................................................................
Timothy C. May         | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,  
tcmay@netcom.com       | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
408-688-5409           | knowledge, reputations, information markets, 
W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA  | black markets, collapse of governments.
Higher Power: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available.
"National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."

Earlier, Greg - Kucharo wrote:

>  We have talked plenty on the list about the NSA.What about the spy 
> agencies of other nations?What do they have to offer in the way of 
> crypto roadblocks.

In Australia, the Defence Signals Directorate (DSD) is on par with the
NSA in terms of responsibilities. The DSD is relatively unknown to 
most of the population, and indeed their charter was only made public
in 1985 as a result of recommendations in the Hope Royal Commission
on Australia's Security and Intelligence Agencies (the DSD report, 
along with another, was not published on "security grounds"). It's
rather funny to read advertisements in the Cweath Gazette for DSD
positions with duties involving ".. collection, analysis and reporting
of foreign radar emissions and .." :-). Read Ball/Richardsons "The 
Ties that Bind" for a DSD history, but this 10-15 year old publication 
is out of date wrt. recent changes in DSD operation/etc.

Anyway, cutting to the chase. I was having a chat with a local producer
of crypto IDE/SCSI/IEEE802.3 cards just last week at our PC94 show. This
place had tried to get these products approved for use by Government
Departments (the Evaluated Products List) which means the DSD has to 
actually test and approve the product, but in his words "they wanted 
the product and a way to crack it in order to evaluate it, we said it 
couldn't be cracked, and they said 'well we can't evaluate it'". I was 
going to question him more on this, but I had no time to spare. I'd 
already waited 15 mins while he babbled with someone with an American 
accent and when this guy turned around, his nametag said "Department 
of State" (this was seriously amusing to my friends :-).

Apart from that, they're going to Cebit'94 to market this stuff, so
there seems to be no export problem. Digging a bit deeper, one finds
that their product uses an "ENIGMA varient" for it's security, but
DES (and soon IDEA) PLD tables are available. No prizes to those who
want to guess which they are going to export :-)

Matthew.
-- 
Matthew Gream
Consent Technologies
M.Gream@uts.edu.au
(02) 821 2043
PGPMail accepted

Earlier, Matthew Gream wrote:

> of foreign radar emissions and .." :-). Read Ball/Richardsons "The 
						    ^^^^^^^^^^
Oops, that's Richelson.

(Richardson is a labor powerbroker, who started the sports funding
scam as a way to buy marginal labor seats)

Matthew.

-- 
Matthew Gream
Consent Technologies
M.Gream@uts.edu.au
(02) 821 2043
PGPMail accepted

On Fri, 11 Mar 1994, Greg - Kucharo wrote:

>  "Im in for triple murder,how about you? I got 40 years for telling the Swedes
> about RSA so don't screw with me pal!Crypto huh,your one sick con."

There has still been zero in the Swedish public media about Clipper. I 
have introduced the subject in the national Fido echo about datacomm, 
including the unconfirmed information that .se (together with .uk) is
one of the first external countries to apply for a KF. (Swedish Fidonet 
sysops seem to long for CALLER-ID, which has been postponed here for 
 reasons of privacy, to keep track of their users. Wouldn't this also be 
beneficial for traffic analysis?) Cryptology in Sweden is probably 
centerer to the Forsvarets Radioanstalt ('Radio Agency of the Defense') 
which is as secretive about it's methods as any letter agency. Not until 
recently did it become known that they compromised the German G-printer 
during WWII. The teleprinter lines between occupied Norway and Denmark 
went through Sweden and the traffic was encrypted with this Enigma-like 
machine (I don't know exactly but it had about ten wheels that had to
match in adjustment plus an extra level consisting of cables from the 
wheelhouse that could be set differently to twist the output). The crack 
was done all by himself by one legendary genius called Beurling using 
only pencil and paper. It took him two weeks from the day they picked him 
up at the university (mathematician of course). After the war he took the 
former seat of Einstein at the Princeton University but fell into 
obscurity (allegedly he had serious personal problems). Regardless of 
being neutral the Swedish Defence has cooperated with USA in covering the 
Russian's radio traffic from the 40's until now. I'm sure they got 
something back (more than RSA which is in the public domain). At the 
moment I have some probes out to laywers to establish the status of the 
Swedish cryptology laws (if any). A curiosity: The electromagnetic 
spectrum is considered free here, contrary to most European countries, 
meaning for example that pirate decoders for TV sattelite transmissions 
are legal. This will probably change when Sweden, unfortunately, soon 
enters the European Community.


//mb