It's highly unlikely that the people behind an attack like this would come out (non-anonimously) and take credit. And it's unlikely they'll be caught. So does it matter to most peoplee if it's Russians, Americans, Iranians, North Koreans, or some other country?
If you're a 3-letter agency, you'd want to know and potentially arrest them, but as a random guy on the internet, or even a maintainer, I really don't think it matters.
So if it came out that the NSA was attempting to put backdoors in consumer password managers, it wouldn't change the context of the side channel attack? How about if it was a company (like Google)? It seemed like an unserious question because I can't understand how someone would think something like that wouldn't change the situation.
> So if it came out that the NSA was attempting to put backdoors in consumer password managers, it wouldn't change the context of the side channel attack?
Not really, we already know that NSA attempts shit like this all the time, if that came out, it'd be the same as the Snowden leaks meaning, a bunch of nerds going "Huh, who could have predicted this?". I don't see the point in it being Russia, China or the US, I'd like it as much if the US did it as Russia, so that's why I asked why it matters.