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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday February 12 2020, @11:03AM   Printer-friendly
from the put-all-your-secrets-in-one-basket dept.

'The intelligence coup of the century'

In case of paywall...
CIA Secretly Owned Crypto, the Swiss Company That Ruled Global Spy Comms for Decades, Says Report

For more than half a century, governments all over the world trusted a single company to keep the communications of their spies, soldiers and diplomats secret.

The company, Crypto AG, got its first break with a contract to build code-making machines for U.S. troops during World War II. Flush with cash, it became a dominant maker of encryption devices for decades, navigating waves of technology from mechanical gears to electronic circuits and, finally, silicon chips and software.

The Swiss firm made millions of dollars selling equipment to more than 120 countries well into the 21st century. Its clients included Iran, military juntas in Latin America, nuclear rivals India and Pakistan, and even the Vatican.

But what none of its customers ever knew was that Crypto AG was secretly owned by the CIA in a highly classified partnership with West German intelligence. These spy agencies rigged the company's devices so they could easily break the codes that countries used to send encrypted messages.

For the most goodest security, use only one commercial crypto system. Trust it with all your secrets.


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  • (Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Wednesday February 12 2020, @05:05PM (2 children)

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday February 12 2020, @05:05PM (#957252) Journal

    We need government mandated ROT17.

    "The government selected ROT17 because two applications of it will not revert the ciphertext back to plain text.", the senator explained.

    "...and furthermore", the senator added, "we chose ROT17 because 17 is a prime number unlike 13."

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    People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
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  • (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday February 12 2020, @06:54PM (1 child)

    by maxwell demon (1608) on Wednesday February 12 2020, @06:54PM (#957327) Journal

    But of course the real reason why ROT13 is insecure is that 13 is an unlucky number. Therefore if you encrypt with ROT13, the attacker is likely to guess your cleartext just by chance.

    On the other hand, if the attacker already suspects ROT13 encryption, the bad luck will struck him instead, and he'll not be able to decrypt. That's why if you ROT13 encrypt, you should always add that information in clear.

    --
    The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
    • (Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Wednesday February 12 2020, @07:18PM

      by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday February 12 2020, @07:18PM (#957337) Journal

      More experienced users will find that ROT13 is not as secure an encryption scheme as EBCDIC.

      --
      People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.