Internet security experts want to rewrite Web security in the wake of disclosures that the US National Security Agency has developed the capability to break encryption protecting millions of sites. Part of the problem they face is that internet security has relied heavily on brilliant government scientists who now appear suspect.

Technologists told Reuters that they had been betrayed that the NSA, which has contributed to some important security standards. It now turns out that they were trying to ensure they stayed weak enough that the agency could break them. Johns Hopkins cryptography professor Matthew Green said that everyone assumed they could use their capacity to make weak standards, but that would make everyone in the U.S. insecure so they would not be dumb enough to do that.

Everyone thought they would never be crazy enough to shoot out the ground they were standing on, and now we're not so sure, he said.

NSA moves would result in encryption being introduced to basic Web traffic and the strengthening the so-called secure sockets layer, which guards banking, email and other pages beginning with Https.

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