NSA director defends plan to maintain 'backdoors' into technology companies — theguardian.com

The National Security Agency director, Mike Rogers, on Monday sought to calm a chorus of doubts about the government’s plans to maintain built-in access to data held by US technology companies, saying such “backdoors” would not be harmful to privacy, would not fatally compromise encryption and would not ruin international markets for US technology products. Rogers mounted an elaborate defense of Barack Obama’s evolving cybersecurity strategy in an appearance before an audience of cryptographers, tech company security officers and national security reporters at the New America Foundation in Washington. In an hour-long question-and-answer session, Rogers said a cyber-attack against Sony pictures by North Korea last year showed the urgency and difficulty of defending against potential cyber threats.

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