Ron Rivest, one of the inventors of the RSA algorithm, said that the field of theoretical cryptography blossomed in a way that he didn’t anticipate in the early days.

Martin Hellman, an inventor of public key cryptography along with with Whitfield Diffie and Ralph Merkle, believes that security bolted onto systems cannot be effective. He was also curious to see if the iPod can become a trustworthy agent.

Whitfield Diffie, one of the inventors of public key cryptography, is looking forward to seeing how Vista holds up in terms of security

The RSA Cryptographer’s Panel: Moderator Bert Kaliski, Whitfield Diffie, Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir and Martin Hellman

Parade of cryptographic legends

Jacques Stern, professeur d’informatique, directeur du DI (Du00e9partement d’Informatique de l’Ecole normale supu00e9rieure) and directeur du laboratoire d’informatique de l’ENS, was awarded the RSA Math prize.

Symantec CEO John Thompson proclaimed that “people are today’s new perimeter,” and that managing user identities is the most pressing challenge facing the industry today.

Symantec CEO John Thompson said that “building confidence in the connected world is everybody’s jobu2013no company is so dominant or so all knowing that it can provide a level of confidence.”

Art Coviello, executive vice president, EMC and president, RSA, said, “We haven’t implemented information security. We have been securing the perimeter, the moat and castle, but not the king, and information is the king. And like a king, information has a nasty habit of wanting to move around.”

Joe Tucci, CEO of EMC, and Art Coviello, executive vice president, EMC and president, RSA, discuss their recent merger.

Craig Mundie, chief research and strategy office at Microsoft, and Bill Gates discuss the state of cybersecurity. Mundie gave the expected nod to Vista and Office 2007 as the first products run through Microsoft’s security design lifecycle process. “This won’t make them perfect….humans are human and they make mistakes. A large part of going forward is not just dealing with the engineering aspect…it’s dealing with fact that errors do happen whether operational, design or intentional,” Mundie said. The message is that Vista is made by smarter humans, but it isn’t invulnerable to hackers.

The RSA 2007 Conference opened with a Broadway-style dance number, featuring dozens of costumed monks and two singers belting out the David Bowie/Queen song “Under Pressure,” something to do with the Renaissance theme of the conference.

Ze Frank is hosting the RSA 2007 Conference. Check out his Web site–http://www.zefrank.com/

Greg Garcia heads up the U.S. government efforts cybercrime fighting efforts as assistant secretary of cybersecurity and telecommunications for the Bush administration

VeriSign CEO Stratton Sclavos unveiled Project Titan, boosting the capacity of its DNS network infrastructure

Howard Schmidt, CEO of R & H
Security Consulting and former eBay, Microsoft and White House security czar, and Bruce Schneier, author and CTO of BT Counterpane at RSA 2007

The adversary is sophisticated, nimble and organized, and is motivated by economic gain, causing damage, espionage, revenge and publicity, said Greg Garcia, Department of Homeland Security assistant secretary for cybersecurity and telecommunications. “They are better organized, but we are getting organized in a systematic way.”

John Swainson, president and CEO of CA, said security services have to evolve to the point where they are available to every part of the infrastructure.