Sun CSO: Write down your password

SAN JOSE, Calif.--"Write down your passwords; your wallet is a lot more secure than your computer," Whitfield Diffie, chief security officer at Sun Microsystems, said Tuesday.

Cryptography experts, especially Diffie, were delivering several one-liners during the traditional Cryptographers Panel here at the RSA Conference. The panel sat on the same stage where Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates again predicted the end of passwords only hours earlier.

"Security is always political. Security measures always benefit somebody or some group at the cost of another person or group," Diffie said.

Adi Shamir, professor of mathematics and computer science at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, also had something to say about the advent of radio frequency identification tags, including a dire prediction for that industry.

"Cell phones will have all the technology you need to kill RFID tags," he said. "You can just walk around and kill RFID tags."