<html>
<head>
<meta content="text/html; charset=windows-1252"
http-equiv="Content-Type">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000">
On 2016-05-15 08:00, spike wrote:<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:00fc01d1ae6f$16359bf0$42a0d3d0$@att.net"
type="cite">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;
charset=windows-1252">
<meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 15 (filtered
medium)">
<style><!--
/* Font Definitions */
@font-face
{font-family:"Cambria Math";
panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4;}
@font-face
{font-family:Calibri;
panose-1:2 15 5 2 2 2 4 3 2 4;}
@font-face
{font-family:Consolas;
panose-1:2 11 6 9 2 2 4 3 2 4;}
/* Style Definitions */
p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal
{margin:0in;
margin-bottom:.0001pt;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;
color:black;}
a:link, span.MsoHyperlink
{mso-style-priority:99;
color:blue;
text-decoration:underline;}
a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed
{mso-style-priority:99;
color:purple;
text-decoration:underline;}
pre
{mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-link:"HTML Preformatted Char";
margin:0in;
margin-bottom:.0001pt;
font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Courier New";
color:black;}
p.msonormal0, li.msonormal0, div.msonormal0
{mso-style-name:msonormal;
mso-margin-top-alt:auto;
margin-right:0in;
mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;
margin-left:0in;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;
color:black;}
span.HTMLPreformattedChar
{mso-style-name:"HTML Preformatted Char";
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-link:"HTML Preformatted";
font-family:Consolas;
color:black;}
span.hoenzb
{mso-style-name:hoenzb;}
span.EmailStyle21
{mso-style-type:personal;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
color:windowtext;}
span.EmailStyle22
{mso-style-type:personal;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
color:windowtext;}
span.EmailStyle23
{mso-style-type:personal-reply;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
color:windowtext;}
.MsoChpDefault
{mso-style-type:export-only;
font-size:10.0pt;}
@page WordSection1
{size:8.5in 11.0in;
margin:1.0in 1.0in 1.0in 1.0in;}
div.WordSection1
{page:WordSection1;}
--></style><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<o:shapedefaults v:ext="edit" spidmax="1026" />
</xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<o:shapelayout v:ext="edit">
<o:idmap v:ext="edit" data="1" />
</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]-->
<div class="WordSection1">
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:windowtext"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<span
style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:windowtext">Sure,
but I would be far more comfortable with it if we can go back
to WW2. The allies broke the Nazi codes, but they had to keep
secret the fact that they had done it. Plenty of people knew
about it at Bletchley Park and some over on this side of the
pond, but this would be a perfect example of a SAR program.
We know they did an excellent job of keeping that secret.</span></div>
</blockquote>
<br>
Yes, I agree Bletchley Park worked realy well. As far as I know they
never had a leak. I have also heard oldtimers in the UK
establishment worry that they do not think they could maintain the
same organisational culture today.<br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:00fc01d1ae6f$16359bf0$42a0d3d0$@att.net"
type="cite">
<div class="WordSection1">
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:windowtext">To
your other points, we know that this process works if it
filters out plenty of good capable people who should have
been cleared. But these are sacrificed to cleanse the
system of those few who would have leaked what happened at
Bletchley. <br>
</span></p>
</div>
</blockquote>
<br>
I don't think this follows. It is trivial to make a system that
filters out good people without being effective against bad people.<br>
<br>
A simple model of a filter: "security quality" of people is N(0,1)
normally distributed. Measurements (vetting) has a normal error
distribution N(mu,sigma^2), we remove everybody below a certain
threshold. The probability of letting through a bad guy (SQ < 0)
is integral_-\infty^0 f(x) (1-Phi( (-x-mu)/sigma)) dx =
1-\integral_-\infty^0 f(x) Phi((-mu-x)/sigma) dx where f(x) is the
N(0,1) distribution finction and Phi is the cdf. No neat analytic
solution, but when you plot it versus the probability of filtering
out good guys you get a classic ROC curve, where the goodness
depends on sigma. The problem is that security quality is not well
defined (circumstances may make a would-be leaker not do it, or a
secure guy decide to leak) so there is an extra "noise" term that
would make a perfect measurement of the initial state uncertain:
this can be added to the variance of the measurement, and reduce the
ROC curve. <br>
<br>
So my question can maybe be turned into: do we know the parameters
for the security ROC curves? <br>
<br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:00fc01d1ae6f$16359bf0$42a0d3d0$@att.net"
type="cite">
<div class="WordSection1"><span
style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:windowtext"><o:p></o:p></span>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:windowtext">How
to document it? I don’t know. Do we have any evidence that
anyone inside at Bletchley Park talked? We have evidence
that Klaus Fuchs from Los Alamos leaked, but I think that
was after the program was already well along. Roosevelt
told Joe Stalin after he had already heard that Joe Stalin
had been briefed by a spy at Los Alamos, but then-VP Harry
Truman had not received any word on what was going on with
the A-bomb program.</span></p>
</div>
</blockquote>
Manhattan leaked *a lot*, I have found papers on that. They were
worried about Germans, who never even heard of it, while the commies
were getting the prime information. <br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:00fc01d1ae6f$16359bf0$42a0d3d0$@att.net"
type="cite">
<div class="WordSection1">
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:windowtext"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:windowtext"><o:p> </o:p>What
other big-secret programs do we have that are now public
domain? Oh how about that caper where the US recovered a
commie submarine? Is there any evidence that the Glomar
Explorer was leaked?</span></p>
</div>
</blockquote>
That is a good case. I think it remained quiet for a long while. <br>
<br>
We should look for more examples like that; I can actually turn
loose an intern to investigate in detail.<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Anders Sandberg
Future of Humanity Institute
Oxford Martin School
Oxford University</pre>
</body>
</html>