---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 19:39:35 -0700 (PDT) From: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> To: fight-censorship-announce@vorlon.mit.edu Subject: Commerce Department encryption rules declared unconstitutional A Federal judge in San Francisco ruled today that the Commerce Department's export controls on encryption products violate the First Amendment's guarantees of freedom of speech. In a 35-page decision, U.S. District Judge Marilyn Patel said the Clinton administration's rules violate "the First Amendment on the grounds of prior restraint and are, therefore, unconstitutional." Patel reaffirmed her December 1996 decision against the State Department regulations, saying that the newer Commerce Department rules suffer from similar constitutional infirmities. Patel barred the government from "threatening, detaining, prosecuting, discouraging, or otherwise interfering with" anyone "who uses, discusses, or publishes or seeks to use, discuss or publish plaintiff's encryption programs and related materials." Daniel Bernstein, now a math professor at the University of Illinois, filed the lawsuit with the help of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Patel dismissed the State, Energy, and Justice departments and CIA as defendants. President Clinton transferred jurisdiction over encryption exports from the State to the Commerce department on December 30, 1996. The Justice Department seems likely to appeal the ruling to the Ninth Circuit, which could rule on the case in the near future. -Declan More info: http://www.eff.org/pub/Legal/Cases/Bernstein_v_DoS/Legal/970825_decision.ima...