chip@dartvax.UUCP (Brig ) (02/16/84)
Someone asked about the NSA blocking a patent from someone in Seattle. Four oinventors, led by Carl Nicolai, inventeda telephone volice scrambler called the Phasorphone in 1977. They submitted a patent application in October 1977, and in April 1978 got a response from the Patent Office--stamped with SECRECY ORDER across the top. By a roundabout way, the NSA (middle management) had decided to classify this reasearch. They later had to back down. Evidently, the Phasorphone used frequency hopping, and was not terribly sophisticated. But it was to be sold commercially for about $100. I read this in "The Puzzle Palace" by James Bamford, Houghton Mifflin 1982. It's an interesting book, but would bebetter at half the length. By the way, the NSA was in the NY Times again today, for trying to remove papers from a library collectionin Virginia; those very papers used by Bamford...