On 5/22/12 11:50 AM, Werner Koch wrote: > There are a lot of ways to compromise a system, hidden backdoors in > other systems have already been revealed in the past.
It's worth bringing out Vint Cerf's estimate that between a sixth and a quarter of all desktop PCs have been completely compromised and are under the control of botnet operators [1]. That was from five years ago: the numbers are probably worse today. And that only covers people targeted randomly! For those people unfortunate enough to be targeted for surveillance by an even semi-competent crew, it's far worse. Your front door is no obstacle to someone who's learned how to pick a lock -- or someone smart enough to look around for a fake plastic rock nearby in which you've placed your backup key. I have no doubt whatsoever that a good crew could gain access, enter, compromise the target's PC and be out of there in under five minutes without the target ever knowing about it. So, yes. If anyone is the target of a serious surveillance campaign (legal or extralegal, state actors or non-state actors, whatever), well... you have your work cut out for you defending against that. GnuPG will not save you, not even with a 16K keypair. _______________________________________________ Gnupg-users mailing list Gnupg-users@gnupg.org http://lists.gnupg.org/mailman/listinfo/gnupg-users
