I think they legitimately did not know. The person who worked on it directly, Jerry Solinas, did not remember and gave an explanation that turned out to be wrong. In his defense, multiple people told the same story about hashing a phrase that was wrong.
replyIf they did know, they could have handed over these timestamps 15 years ago and put the issue to bed.
It was a very different time back then.
replyWhat was so different, culturally?
replyWell the thing that comes to mind for me was the US gov classing encryption as a munition and placing it under export controls
replyThat was more early-mid 1990s, and not so much late-90s and early 2000s, when the NIST/NSA issues came about (from what I understand)
replyIf they deny everything they didn't do, then whatever they don't deny will stand out.
reply"independent cryptography community" - I actually LOLed at this
replyI don't think that "community" would accept any kind of answer as truthful so why waste the time...
It’s independently verifiable. What do you mean?
replyOne of the top comments in this very thread suggests the seed timestamps were maybe selected specifically for purpose.
replyAfter Dual_EC_DRBG, there is no longer justification for any attitude towards the NSA other than suspicion and skepticism. Everything should be assumed a potential attack vector and thoroughly explored. I thank the community for carrying this torch for so many years.
replySo is Earth's sphericity.
reply