"Our team (FreeS/WAN) built the Linux implementation of IPSEC, but at least while I was involved in it, the packet processing code never became a default part of the Linux kernel, because of bullheadedness in the maintainer who managed that part of the kernel. Instead he built a half-baked implementation that never worked. I have no idea whether that bullheadedness was natural, or was enhanced or inspired by NSA or its stooges."
What I read, among other tidbits, is:"Every once in a while, someone not an NSA employee, but who had longstanding ties to NSA, would make a suggestion that reduced privacy or security" and there are a lot of similar tidbits. The headline seems justified.
Edit: per the link in the other thread. http://www.mail-archive.com/cryptography@metzdowd.com/msg123...
Edit2: I'm just saying that the article really does seem to show John Gilmore speculating that the NSA seemed to interfere with IPSEC design and implementation process. I know no more than that.
Similar stories happen all the time for features with zero connection to security or the NSA. It's simply a sad fact of human nature and society that people act this way; conspiracy theories are not necessary (and are often harmful, as they distract from the real, if boring, issues).
"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity" and all that.
Never underestimate the human capacity for stupidity.
I should be such an 'idiot'.
There are tons of people out there, yes, even kernel maintainers, who are technically skilled and smart but for whatever reasons, prove to be bad at tasks like this and make bad decisions. It's usually not a conspiracy, and John Gilmore's vague handwaving isn't a very convincing demonstration that it was in this case either... :]
Every once in a while, someone not an NSA employee, but who had longstanding ties to NSA, would make a suggestion that reduced privacy or security, but which seemed to make sense when viewed by people who didn't know much about crypto. For example, using the same IV (initialization vector) throughout a session, rather than making a new one for each packet. Or, retaining a way to for this encryption protocol to specify that no encryption is to be applied.