Last year's deadly attacks in Paris "would not have happened" without
the use of encrypted communications to enable the perpetrators to avoid
detection, the NSA chief said in an interview.
National Security
Agency director Michael Rogers was quoted in a Yahoo News report
Wednesday as confirming speculation about the use of encryption in the
November massacre on the streets of Paris by supporters of the Islamic
State organization that killed 130.
Rogers told Yahoo that "some
of the communications" of the Paris attackers "were encrypted,"
preventing intelligence officials from picking up the trail.
As a
result, he was quoted as saying, "we did not generate the insights ahead
of time. Clearly, had we known, Paris would not have happened."
Rogers,
who made the comments last week, has joined US law enforcement
officials in warning about the dangers of new encrypted devices that
make it difficult if not impossible to tap, even with a warrant.
The
report comes as Apple has challenged a US court order to provide
assistance to the FBI to crack an iPhone used in attacks in San
Bernardino, California, opening a new front in the encryption debate.
Rogers
has said he supports the use of encryption for online security but has
cautioned about the use of devices which cannot be decrypted, even with
legal authority.
"Is it harder for us to generate the kind of knowledge that I would like against some of these targets? Yes," Rogers told Yahoo.
"Is
that directly tied in part to changes they are making in their
communications? Yes. Does encryption make it much more difficult for us
to execute our mission. Yes."