GAK/weak crypto rationale?

["P.J. Ponder" <ponder@wane-leon-mail.scri.fsu.edu>]

After reviewing the reports filed by our intrepid reporters in the field 
about the NIST meetings, I am left with a puzzling thought:  Why are the 
NSA and the FBI so very keen on GAK and weak crypto?  There was posted on 
this list some time back a statistic about the number of wiretaps and 
intercepts requested and authorized in the past year.  As I recall, the 
number was quite small - around 12K [?].  Someone had found this out 
through an FOIA request, perhaps, (my recollection of it is poor). It was 
not a large number, anyway.  I must conclude that the actual number of 
intercepts is much, much larger than they are saying, and that they must 
be getting what they perceive to be good intel from all this snooping.

Otherwise, why would the NSA and the FBI be so gung-ho on this, when 
everyone is telling them it is bad for US software business, abhorrent to 
privacy rights, unenforceable, and just plain bone-headed in these new 
international geodesic network times?

--
PJ
p.s. -thanks for the reports, well done. I think most of the list readers 
are very appreciative of the coverage provided on Crypto95 and NIST sham.