Shabbir is a very good organizer and often very busy, which may explain the confusion about the TWO letters that were sent out regarding SAFE. CDT sent a letter to Hon. Howard Conable, the chair of the Subcommittee, on April 24 which said that "CDT strongly urges you to report H.R. 695, the SAFE Act, out of the Courts and Intellectual Property Subcommittee without amendment." [The CDT letter is at http://www.cdt.org/crypto/legis_105/SAFE/970424_CDT_ltr.html] EPIC helped coordinate a different letter for the Internet Privacy Coalition, which went to Rep. Goodlatte on April 28 and said While expressing our support for the measure, we wish also to state our concern about one provision contained in the bill. We believe that this provision, which would create new criminal penalties for the use of encryption in furtherance of a crime, could undermine the otherwise laudable goals of the legislation. For the reasons set forth below, we recommend that this provision be reconsidered when the Committee considers the bill. The IPC letter was signed by 26 privacy groups, user organizations, private companies, and trade associations. [The IPC letter is at http://www.privacy.org/ipc/safe_letter.html ] Marc Rotenberg EPIC. At 8:55 AM -0500 5/2/97, Shabbir J. Safdar wrote:
At 8:49 AM -0400 5/2/97, Declan McCullagh wrote:
Two quick points:
* Didn't CDT, unlike the other groups like EPIC/ACLU/EFF/ATR, send a letter to the House subcommittee on April 29 urging that SAFE be approved without any changes? (I'm in Oklahoma right now and I have a copy of that letter in my office in DC, but that's what I remember.)
Declan, I can't believe you did your research so poorly. Go look at the Internet Privacy Coalition letter at http://www.privacy.org/ipc/safe_letter.html or go to the crypto.com SAFE bill page at http://www.crypto.com/safe_bill/ and read the pointer from there.
You'll see that CDT signed the very same letter that EPIC, ACLU, EFF, ATR, Eagle Forum, VTW, and PGP all signed.
Since you've been laboring under this mistaken impression, you owe somebody at CDT a big fucking apology.
-S
On Thu, 1 May 1997, Shabbir J. Safdar wrote:
The Administration hates this bill, because it threatens their ability to roll out Key Recovery. They've said as much in the letter Declan forwarded:
"The bill could be read as prohibiting the United States government from using appropriate incentives to support a key management infrastructure and KEY RECOVERY." [emphasis added]
Do you think that if this bill helped the Administration, that they'd be out there urging the subcommittee chairman to stop it? I think not.
I'm also puzzled by the fact that CDT is being criticized pretty much solely, even though the entire Internet Privacy Coalition, and several other groups all wrote a letter of support of the bill with only a criticism of one provision. However the overall statement was of support. (see http://www.privacy.org/ipc/safe_letter.html)
As far as I can tell, everyone criticizing the bill either thinks that:
a) CDT actually runs all these groups behind the scenes, or b) pretty much all of the Internet advocates believe that this bill is needed and are doing the best they can with what Congress has written.
You're pretty hard on CDT, but EFF, EPIC, the ACLU, VTW, Americans for Tax Reform, the Association for Computing Machinery, Computer Professionals for Social Responsiblity, Eagle Forum, the National Association for Criminal Defense Lawyers, and PGP Inc all signed this letter.
Can you consider, perhaps, for a second, that critics of SAFE are being unreasonable? I would think so, as critics of SAFE include the Clinton Administration. Is that the kind of company that cypherpunks keep?
Here's a great excerpt from the Internet Privacy Coalition letter:
The pending bill provides a positive framework for the reforms that are long overdue in this critical area. It makes clear that the sale or use of encryption, a vital technique to promote network security and individual privacy, should not be restricted in the United States. This is the view widely shared by users of the Internet and the computer and communications industry. It was also a central recommendation of the report of the National Research Council last year.
Looks like widespread support from people who study this issue for living. I'm glad to be counted among them.
-S
-Shabbir