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I have hung out on the Cypherpunks mailing quite a bit over the past 6 or so years. The fellow who posted this is fairly well respected as far as crypto is concerned.

If you use GPG or PGP, I'd advise you consider his opinions.

Why is it that people who have NO insider information or experience with the NSA spout about how the NSA can or cannot do something? Having worked in highly secured environments, I can say that 99.9999% of all comments are pure stupidity and ignorance. The job of the NSA is to both create encryption formulas for our use and to crack the other guy's. Now, if RSA was SOOOOO secure, then wouldn't the NSA just grab it and toss away what they are doing? If RSA was soooo good, then wouldn't the other guy just use it and baffle the NSA? It always seems that some academic in a university always wants us to beleive that he "knows many people in the NSA" and that he can tell us that his system is secure, as thought his "friends" in the NSA have told him our most classified secrets about our crypto capabilities. RSA is 30 years old. How long do ya think it takes the NSA to crack it? How long do you think the NSA keeps their routines in service? 30 years? I bet not.