[telecom] Iranians discover that finding a needle in a Haystack ain't hard...

There was nothing wrong with Haystack: it just never existed. It was an idea borne aloft on the winds of hype, sustained by the breezy publicity of the "once over, lightly" technical press, and finally brought down by a zephyr of reality.

Anyone who has dealt with the Iranian police - my cousin was in that country while in the Army - will tell you that they're not the brightest bulbs on the tree. They are however, very effective, with an arsenal that includes pliers, flatirons, and cattle prods. It's ludicrous to think that anyone could "hide" something from them when their first (and, usually, the only needed) response to a computer security problem is rubber-hose cryptography.

The "authors" of Haystack are - let's be kind - inexperienced in International Politics. Their time would have been better spent conducting a hunger strike outside the Iranian embassy: perhaps the clarity of starvation would have taught them to start with the basics instead of jumping from supposition to grand scheme.

My 2¢. YMMV.

Bill Horne (Filter QRM for direct replies)