I wrote a short summary about what this was about a few weeks ago:<p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6942145" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6942145</a><p>(Shorter: CFRG is the IETF's crypto review† board, and one of its co-chairs is an NSA employee).<p>This outcome was a near-certainty, for the simple reason that nobody came up with (or even nominated) a replacement for Igoe. IETF people have worked with Igoe, in person, for years. He is probably a very nice, very earnest person. Removing him from the CFRG without even having a replacement would have been demonstratively hostile without improving the quality of the research group.<p>Unfortunately, despite a few threads of very solid crypto discussion on CFRG during the Igoe debate, most of it was marked by shrill, repetitive, and often mistaken political commentary. The mailing list had the tenor of a Wikipedia "Articles for Deletion" debate that had been circulated on Reddit. IETF long-timers were visibly irritated. There was also an unhelpful strain of back-and-forth between Dan Harkins, the author of the (flawed) Dragonfly PAKE whose CFRG endorsement started this mess, and Harkins' detractors. At times, the whole thing looked a little petty, especially since Dragonfly is now a dead letter anyways.<p>It remains weird that IETF's crypto-review board is chaired by an NSA employee. But it doesn't have to stay that way. Igoe has been on the job for many years now, and, from my remove, that job seems pretty thankless. What needs to happen is for someone else to be floated as a new co-chair for the group. I wouldn't be surprised if Igoe voluntarily stepped aside for the right name.<p>† <i>(David McGrew, the group's other co-chair, disputes this characterization, but the facts on the ground seem to argue that "review board" is the CFRG function that matters)</i>