RSA denial sidesteps claim it was paid to use compromised encryption by default

RSA denial sidesteps claim it was paid to use compromised encryption by default

Dec 23rd 2013, 11:22, by Aaron Souppouris

Security firm RSA has denied it entered into a contract that it knew would give the NSA a backdoor into its BSAFE security system. Last week, Reuters claimed the NSA paid RSA $10 million to make an algorithm called "Dual EC DRBG" the preferred, or default system in BSAFE. The security giant says that, although it has worked with the NSA, the relationship has never been a secret, and the relationship has been with the "explicit goal" of strengthening security.
In a tightly worded blog post, RSA also gives a timeline of the backdoor debacle. It says it decided to use the random number generator Dual EC DRBG based on advice from the National Institute of Standards (NIST) that deemed the generator safe. It says the algorithm was "only one...
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