

How and why the feds killed a talk on Tor-hacking at Black Hat - floodcow
http://venturebeat.com/2014/08/06/how-why-feds-killed-a-talk-on-tor-hacking-at-black-hat-exclusive/

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Karellen
"The feds put the hammer down — _most likely_ the National Security Agency.
[...] “So with this, the researchers suddenly can’t talk about it because of a
National Secrecy Order. [...] The source didn’t have first-hand knowledge of
this incident but based their assessment on knowledge of the NSA’s operation
and its background with Tor." (emphasis mine)

So, the author of the article doesn't actually _know_ "how"...

"The NSA _likely_ put the screws to CMU to back off, the former intelligence
official said, and there are two _probable_ reasons: either to protect its own
use of Tor or to ensure that knowledge of how to crack Tor remains within a
more limited circle. Tor and its variants are used by U.S. intelligence case
officers operating in the field to communicate securely wherever they may be"

...or _why_ , to any great degree of certainty at all.

Heck, almost anyone with some passing knowledge of the Snowden revelations
could have _guessed_ all of that. Yup, the talk was likely suppressed by the
NSA, with some kind of court order meaning the researchers can't talk about
it, either to protect a crack they're already using, or to stop others
cracking their own use of it.

Or, have I missed something, and is there an actual story there?

