Re: GAK/weak crypto rationale?

[John Young <jya@pipeline.com>]

Responding to msg by Andrew.Spring@ping.be (Andrew Spring) on 
Tue, 12 Sep  7:3  PM

>A more cautious conclusion would be would be that the 
>importance (to the  LEA's) of the busts made with 
>crypto is much larger than the numbers  suggest.  You 
>could interpret that a lot of ways:  I suspect that  
>high-profile career-enhancing cases are highly 
>dependent on wiretaps.


   In response to an audience question about wiretaps and
   crypto, Mr. Michael Nelson of the White House said at the
   NIST GAK meeting (paraphrased):

      We are not concerned with bad people using crypto among
      themselves, we can handle that. We are more concerned
      with their using crypto to communicate with regular
      folks, to make legitimate arrangements -- finance,
      supplies, travel, and so on -- for their nefarious
      deeds. It's the intermix of the bad with the good that's
      the problem.

   Maybe someone else at the meeting heard this differently
   and will comment, but this seems to mean that the Feds can
   track, and maybe crack, the crypto-intercomm of "bad
   people" so long as it is not buried in a torrent of public
   crypto use. And not commingled with lawful, ECPA-
   protected(?), communication.

   Anybody want to elaborate what Mr. Nelson was implying
   about wiretaps and crypto?