“Despite such things as export controls and the Clipper Chip,
which gave the impression that the U.S. government was less than
enthused about the private use of advanced encryption, on January
2nd, 1997, the National Institute of Standards and Technology
announced that an effort would be under way to find a replacement
for the Data Encryption Standard. After a preliminary request for
public comments, the formal request for a block cipher algorithm,
operating on 128-bit blocks, and with key sizes of 128, 192, and
256 bits, was made on September 12th, 1997.”
“Of the submissions made, fifteen submissions were found to be
complete, and after nine months of public comment, five of the
cryptographic algorithms submitted were selected as finalists. A
further period of discussion concerning the finalists has recently
closed.”
“Soon, therefore, the successor to DES will be
announced….”
“Since there are many unsound cipher systems being offered
for sale or for use, the existence of a standard, approved by a
respected body, allows people without pretensions to cryptographic
expertise to specify a cipher – the standard cipher – with some
degree of confidence that it will be in fact secure. This is
particularly important to such businesses as banks, which are
required to meet a legal standard of ‘due diligence’.”