James A. Donald wrote: The basic problem with any legal incantation is that at some point you must explain to the authorities: "My actions were legal for this reason and that reason", explaining in inconveniently great detail what you are doing, and their response your complicated and highly informative explanation will almost certainly be to hit a few times, and then lock you up. With cryptography they have a mysterious block of unexplained and useless bits. ---------------------------------- And doesn't providing all these explanations of their behavior, or else excuses for them, put a person in the position of being the equivalent of a puppet on a string? They yank, you respond (or else). It's not much at all like the ideal of being one's own person, with liberty and authority to direct one's own actions, to be reduced to answering for your decisions (crypto or otherwise) - under the guidance of a stranger who is only concerned about following the proper procedure for responding to the pull - to some other stranger put into position of power over you, who may be irate, bored, humorless, eager to be elsewhere, etc. The arguments in these threads deal with cryptography and bits of data and how they are treated by 'the owner' or 'the consumer' or 'the researcher'. And they are discussed within the context of laws which are designed to circumscribe the actions of citizens in regard to each other. But in fact there is a larger context which precedes these contexts, which form the foundation of expectations about being a real person and living a rational life, and which should not be set aside as insignificant. This is what makes me - and some other of us - uncomfortable about the laws, lawyers, and legal systems. It is ideal - as an individual or in a controversy with others - to be able to come to terms about what is Truth and Justice, and Right and Wrong, using intelligent arguments to distinguish between them and make decisions in regard of them. But if that is not possible, then either a person succumbs to what others impose upon them, or they must find methods of self-defense against being reduced to the status of a "criminal" and being treated as such (worthless). Currently it appears that anything which is not first reviewed and approved by official overseers falls under the category of 'crime'. The 'crime' appears to be that of not making oneself satisfactorily, publically, submissive and subordinate to legal oversight and direction. And this tells me that in fact, those who study and apply the law do not really know the difference between good and bad (what is proper or improper) for 'mankind' - when the only solution they can come up with to the problems of living and working together is to reduce everyone ad absurdum to a malleable level, when they should actualy be assistants to to prevention from being reduced to low standards of functioning. [But I guess this is best dicussed on L-Cyberia. Do they keep archives?] .. Blanc