>> This would be significant because? I can't think of a significant
>> player in the security market which does not derive a significant
>>percentage
>> of its gross revenues from the government. Given the uncertainty of
>> those contracts, it is not surprising to see a company which is admitting
>> that its revenues might be decreasing over the next few years.
>
>My point was that FW-1 is receiving undue criticism. It's intellectually
>disingenous to be accusing Checkpoint of installing backdoors on behalf
>of the Mossad, while ignoring the well documented ties Gauntlet and
>Smartwall have to the NSA. You can't have it both ways.
Jeeeeze, Proff! You complain, quite appropriately, that Checkpoint
is the subject of a witchhunt. But to "protest" that, you launch another
witchhunt?!?
This whole thread works off the absurd premise that the network
security is like strong crypto -- and that the _only_ way into a "protected
network perimeter" is through some maliciously-installed backdoor in a
"firewall."
In the real world, that's simply not true -- as the active
participants of this List damn well know better than most!
And most of us -- except for those poor chaps over on C'punks,
watching for the Black Helicopters and bolting steel plates to their screen
doors -- realize that people who work for their national governments can
escape without serious moral or intellectual damage. Selling product --
even developing products to classified specs for your government spooks,
since they are invariably big compsec buyers -- doesn't in itself reduce a
professional to the sort of moral abomination who would overtly betray his
commercial customers.
Corporate politics, that's a little different. I do think an
organization dependent upon arbitrary awards of government contracts is
likey to be more open to pressure to support questionable policy proposals
like CCEP, Clipper, key-escrow, or silly key-length restrictions. Where
that happens, you might see a guy like Ranum (who has clearly, on this
List, been the most vocal critic of the "trusted system" MLS premises most
dear to the American NSA) move from one job to another. I don't know if
that happened to Marcus, and I wouldn't ask him -- but it wouldn't surprise
me. People move where they are comfortable as well as productive; and a
pro doesn't have to denounce old friends to seek new ones.
The thing to remember is that honor resides in individuals, not
organizations.
Suerte,
_Vin
"Cryptography is like literacy in the Dark Ages. Infinitely potent, for
good and ill... yet basically an intellectual construct, an idea, which by
its nature will resist efforts to restrict it to bureaucrats and others who
deem only themselves worthy of such Privilege."
_ A thinking man's Creed for Crypto/ vbm.
* Vin McLellan + The Privacy Guild + <vin @
shore .
net> *
53 Nichols St., Chelsea, MA 02150 USA <617> 884-5548
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