New Report On NSA Released Today 81
daveschroeder writes "George Washington University has today released a three-volume history of NSA activities during the Cold War (major highlights). Written by agency historian Thomas R. Johnson, the 1,000-page report, 'Cryptology During the Cold War, 1945-1989,' details some of the agency's successes and failures, its conflict with other intelligence agencies, and the questionable legal ground on which early American cryptologists worked. The report remained classified for years, until Johnson mentioned it to Matthew Aid, an intelligence historian, at an intelligence conference. Two years later, an abstract and the three current volumes of the report are now available (PDF) from GWU and the National Security Archive. Aid, author of the forthcoming history 'The Secret Sentry: The Top Secret History of the National Security Agency,' says Johnson's study shows 'refreshing openness and honesty, acknowledging both the NSA's impressive successes and abject failures during the Cold War.' A fourth volume remains classified. Johnson says in an audio interview: 'If you are performing an operation that violates a statute like FISA, it's going to come out. It always comes out.'" And reader sampas zooms in on a section in Document 6 about the growth of NSA's IT: their first Cray purchase in 1976, the growth of circuits between facilities, and internal feuds over centralized IT development vs. programmers-in-departments. "A young systems engineer named [redacted] was urging NSA to look at some technology that had been developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). In 1969 DARPA had developed a computer internetting system called ARPANET... NSA quickly adopted the DARPA solution. The project was called platform."
Intesesting museum (Score:5, Interesting)
The National Cryptologic Museum, I found it very interesting. If you are in the area you might give it an hour or two.
http://www.nsa.gov/MUSEUM/museu00009.cfm [nsa.gov]
Re:Intesesting museum (Score:5, Interesting)
But, if you do get a chance to go, play with the Enigma machine they have on display. That was something that practically blew my mind when I first encountered it in the flesh.
A dinosaur zoo in 1990 (Score:1, Interesting)
I visited the NSA many times from 1986 to 1990 - I found their computer systems to be abysmal. After several tours, and it was obvious that the whole place had a 1960's mindset towards computing. Namely, get the biggest, fastest, and most expensive computers, then build your own software around them.
Yes, they had the very first Cray and CDC supercomputers - each had a homebrew operating system, written in house, and practically undocumented. Horribly expensive to maintain your own custom operating system, and lots of downtime.
Lots and lots of antique 9-track (and 7 track!) vacuum-column tapedrives, even into the 1990's. Several management types proudly said, "we have acres of computers". Literally, a dinosaur zoo.
They seemed allergic to microcomputers - the IBM PC had been out for several years and I didn't see one there until 1988.
I lectured about Unix (with several hundred people in the audience). From the questions, it was obvious that practically nobody knew anything about it. No knowledge about TCP/IP or BIND. Several people expressed surprise and interest in the (then obvious) idea of salting a password file.
I came away with the sense that NSA was 5 to 10 years behind the times. It was quite disillusioning to realize that they spent money prodigiously, yet all the cool stuff was at the universities.
Maybe things have changed - a river of money has flowed into Ft. Meade over the past 10 years. But I've become quite skeptical of the wonderful claims made about NSA, especially by those who work there.
If you haven't been to NSA in nearly two decades (Score:5, Interesting)
...and even then, only did so as a guest/contractor, then you have no idea about what is going on at NSA currently.
Computing under DOD has always been an exercise in maintaining extreme reliability, sometimes at the cost of (perceived) modernization. Many enterprise organizations still use several-year-old, proven systems because that's what's reliable and that's what works. And what ignorant managers proudly attest to in any organization is usually separated by a gulf from reality.
But you're right: things have changed. There's a lot of old technology all over the military and the IC, but there is also a lot of conventional modern -- and even "bleeding edge" -- gear. The mindset has drastically changed from "must be built here" to the extensive use of commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) solutions. And that was already happening in the mid- to late-1990s.
Funny you should mention universities -- academia is simultaneously a fantastic dinosaur zoo of its own, and simultaneously a breeding ground for some of the most exciting and groundbreaking work. NSA has long had this same duality. If you saw the NSA of the last 10-15 years, you'd be surprised at the technology in play -- warts and all.
Re:[Redacted] (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:FISA compliant operations. (Score:4, Interesting)
Believe it or not, everything someone says, just because they are affiliated with NSA, isn't always all propaganda or misinformation.
Correct. It is also always what they want you to hear. The chief enemy of every state is it's own people, because that's the most likely entity that will end their rule.
As far as intelligence agencies and "nuanced" truth, you only have to look at Operation AJAX. We quite simply overthrew a democratic government so we could have better access to oil. If you think any modern conflict is any different, I can only ascribe it to purposeful ignorance.
Even from an intelligence standpoint, the NSA and CIA are nearly useless. They didn't predict the collapse of the Soviet Union. They missed 9/11 by a mile. When they were trying to discover whether Ho Chi Minh was taking orders from Russia or China, the most they found was a single Russian newspaper at a Vietnamese Embassy. Their end analysis? The Vietcong were so loyal they didn't even need to receive orders, they "just knew" what their communist masters wanted. I think they call it "groupthink," though political malice seems like a much easier explanation.
They are just unaccountable agencies with no oversight that serve the interests of the ruling party, and as a side benefit inject technology into private industry for the benefit of the same power center. Everything they touch is propaganda, and they have no constitutional authority to exist. So, they shouldn't. One thing has not changed since the dawn of time: concentration of power in a centralized fashion leads to corruption and misery, whether it's in a government, corporation, or your local PTA. If you cover that up with secret budgets and unaccountable violence, you shouldn't be surprised that the results are so bad.
Re:Biggest Failure?? (Score:5, Interesting)
I was in the Cuban Missile Crisis. I was a systems analyst for the minuteman missiles systems which carry nukes.
I was a member of the Combat Targeting team made up of three team members and our job was to program the missile's computer with target data and other information and to aim/align its guidance system optically to true north.
The half finished missile sites in Montana were taken away (literally commandeered) from Boeing and new missiles postured for use adding a larger quantity of nukes than the USSR had counted on facing.
The Strategic Air Command (SAC) was at its finest with the B47's ready and the B52's ready as well.
This was a time to remember.
we assumed we were going to die but did not know much about what was going on (all portable radios were confiscated) so just did our jobs to the best of our abilities.
Probably the NSA is going to look me up for sharing this.