This campaign spokesperson is misinformed. You can get software on the internet that will break standard encryption packages and break into computers with passwords. Corporations use these resources to recover computers whose users have either forgotten the passwords or who have left the company. The companies who supply the “keys” sell their services “by the drink”.
I doubt that they vet their clients. Even if they did, they probably readily sell their services to the DNC. Why not?
How good is PGP protection for laptops? We have it on our work laptops and have been repeatedly warned and threatened to NOT forget our password as recovering it or resetting it is a near impossibility.
~”You can get software on the internet that will break standard encryption packages and break into computers with passwords.”~
The new generation of TPM (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trusted_Platform_Module) and related technologies are pretty good. The NSA might be able to break them, but your regular hacker wouldn’t have the resources.
Companies use this technology all the time on sensitive computers. There’s no indication of whether Romney’s camp was using this particular technology, but it’s not very expensive or difficult.