One thing to remember is the fear that surrounded the export of cryptographic technology from the US and ITAR and all the rest of it at the time. And then there was the whole key escrow fiasco with Lotus Notes.

So just be careful viewing the incident from 2020 with the purported benefit of decades of hindsight.

Disclaimer: I’m the guy who first found it and announced it at the rump session of the Crypto conference in Santa Barbara that year...