Alex Gaynor

Security Cryptography Whatever

We chat with friend of the pod and special guest Alex Gaynor, former deputy chief technologist at the FTC and all around good Security Person™. Join for nerdery about WebAuthn, stay for accidentally melting down GitHub APIs around November 2020!

Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBoGvyvsSi4

Transcript: https://securitycryptographywhatever.com/2025/08/16/alex-gaynor

Links:

- https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/no-take-only-throw
- https://alexgaynor.net/2025/jan/13/challenges-funding-open-source/
- https://alexgaynor.net/2025/apr/08/putting-a-price-tag-on-open-source/
- https://dadrian.io/blog/posts/corporate-support-xz/
- https://alex.github.io/nyt-2020-election-scraper/battleground-state-changes.html
- https://github.com/alex/nyt-2020-election-scraper
"Security Cryptography Whatever" is hosted by Deirdre Connolly (@durumcrustulum), Thomas Ptacek (@tqbf), and David Adrian (@davidcadrian)

فصول

1. Intro (00:00:00)

2. Alex Gaynor at the FTC (00:01:00)

3. US Digital Service and Healthcare.gov (00:01:56)

4. FTC's Role in Technology and Consumer Protection (00:06:16)

5. 'Favorite' FTC Cases (00:07:52)

6. Open Source (00:31:55)

7. Python Cryptography, Rust (00:40:23)

8. Managing Conflicting Needs in OpenSSL (00:43:37)

9. Upstreaming Rust to OpenSSL (00:44:17)

10. Design Decisions and Compatibility Challenges (00:45:29)

11. Rust Crates and Reusability (00:46:16)

12. Labor of Love and Ideology in Open Source (00:48:26)

13. User Frustration and Platform Support (00:49:05)

14. CI Infra and GitHub Actions (00:50:55)

15. Funding Open Source (00:56:07)

16. SSO Tax (01:06:01)

17. The Alex News Network and 2020 Election (01:18:33)

18. 👋 (01:24:34)