Re: Secrecy of NSA Affiliation

[Scott Brickner <sjb@universe.digex.net>]

Kevin L Prigge writes:
>Timothy C. May said:
>> When I attended Crypto '88, nearly 8 years ago, at least several of the NSA
>> attendees had "National Security Agency" on their name badges. It may be
>> that run-of-the-mill employees still maintain the fiction  for public
>> consumption that they are DOD employees, but such was not the case in 1988
>> at "Crypto."

This sounds about right.  When I was an NSA employee ('83), our
introductory briefing included the suggestion (I don't recall it being
phrased as a command command) that we identify ourselves as DoD.  It
was suggested that this might lessen our visibility as espionage
targets.

At the time, the brass would likely have been identified as NSA, as
were the lesser brass in the National Computer Security Center, but
regular employees weren't.

>At the RSA conference last week, there were approximately 10 people from
>the NSA. Only 2 of those were registered as DOD, the rest were NSA. I
>mentioned this at lunch to a guy from the NSA, and he said that only
>oldtimers do the DOD identification anymore.

Yikes.  Sometimes age creeps up on you when you aren't looking.  I
guess I'd be an "oldtimer" if I were still working there?  An
"oldtimer" at thirty-three... hmm.