Silicon Valley answers Bletchley Park's SOS with $100,000 donation
Martin Postranecky <mp-/[email protected]>
| Newsgroups | gmane.science.cryptography.bletchley-park |
|---|---|
| Message-ID | <[email protected]> |
From THE TIMES September 10, 2008 Silicon Valley answers Bletchley Park's SOS with $100,000 donation ------------------------------------------------------------------ Chris Smyth Silicon Valley joined the campaign to save Bletchley Park yesterday, when two US technology companies made a $100,000 ( £56,00 0) donation and urged others to repay "a debt that is owed by everyone in the IT industry today". The National Museum of Computing, which is housed at the site where the German Enigma cipher was broken by early decryption machines during the Second World War, wants to raise £7 million to secure its collection of pioneering computers. The campaign began after the deteriorating conditions at the site were decried by the country's leading computer scientists in a letter to The Times in July. Among the collection at the museum - which is staffed by 40 volunteers, free to visit and receives no public money for its upkeep - is the Colossus computer, which played a key role in cracking Enigma. Phil Dunkelberger, the president and CEO of PGP Corporation, a leading encryption specialist that donated $50,000, as did IBM, the computer group, described Bletchley Park yesterday as the "first step to Silicon Valley". He said that today's efforts to fight cybercrime, identity theft and online terrorism owed everything to the understanding of the theory and practice of encryption developed there during the war..../snip/ http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article4719890.ece http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/letters/article4726601.ece