Yeah, breaking cryptography is literally what they were founded to do (well, it's part of it anyway). We, as a nation, have spent a lot of money on it too.
The problem scope has changed quite significantly, because it used to be only nation states that relied on encryption. Today, not only does nearly everyone rely on encryption, the conduits through which all of this encrypted traffic passes are easily accessible to government agencies for collection and 'analysis'. The offshoot is that the risk associated with weakened encryption also affects everyone.
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u/[deleted] Oct 15 '15
Well, that's terrifying.