The New York Times, March 25, 1996, p. D5. The key issue for the Net is not smut, it is the use of encryption Growing fears that Big Brother might decide to read your E-mail. By Denise Caruso The current uproar over the Internet is about smut and what can be made public on the global computer network. But the next public-policy tangle will be about what we're allowed to keep secret. Earlier this month, a bipartisan group from both houses of Congress introduced versions of legislation called the Encrypted Communications Privacy Act of 1996. This bill, which outlines the proper use of encryption technologies for privacy and security, is by far the most critical piece of Internet legislation yet introduced. Encryption uses a mathematical key to scramble and unscramble digital messages so they can be read only by their intended recipients and not by human or electronic snoopers. Legislation about this powerful technology is especially important when viewed in light of two laws already on the books. One of these, the Digital Telephony Act, signed into law in 1994, allows Federal law-enforcement agencies to update the telephone network with the most pervasive surveillance equipment in history. The other, the freshly signed Communications Decency Act, bans "indecent" material from the Internet. It is a law that many legislators seemed to feel was on shaky ground even as Congress was passing it. A constitutional challenge to the law is currently being heard in Federal District Court in Philadelphia. Though the encryption bill as written is receiving qualified support from industry and civil libertarians, some worry that changes made in committee could make the bill too restrictive, completing a triumvirate of Big Brother legislation that would give law enforcement the ability and rationale to monitor all the electronic messages of citizens, leaving little or no recourse for private or secure communication. Such restrictions threaten to suffocate the Internet. As new users and businesses flock daily to the Internet, their need to protect confidential business data and messages becomes a key issue in making the Net safe enough to be useful. Computer security experts say that many of today's problems on the Net -- minors getting access to pornography, security breaches of corporate data, the need to prove one's identity -- could be solved by using encryption. Today, using encryption of any kind is still perfectly legal inside the United States. Historically, it was mostly used to protect secret military communications, so the technology is still classified as munitions -- the same threat to national security as a boatload of artillery shells. Thus any products containing encryption are subject to strict export controls. Law-enforcement and national security officials say that widespread use of strong encryption would enable terrorists and organized-crime syndicates to communicate with impunity. They say export control is the only way to keep this genie in its bottle, at least when it comes to foreign, not domestic crime. In addition, security experts have persuaded the Clinton Administration to propose an encryption method called "key escrow" that would give the Government access to information even after it had been encrypted. Key-escrow systems generate a decrypting key that is held by a trusted third party. When law-enforcement agents show up with a court warrant, the trustee hands over the key to unlock the message. So far, the Clinton Administration's proposals, which include a key-escrow system called Clipper have been universally reviled by both civil libertarians and the computer industry, which claims it stands to be deprived of up to $60 billion annually by the year 2000 because of export controls. They argue that any country today can make and sell encryption products stronger than what can be legally exported from the United States and that people won't use a system like key escrow because it has a built-in security compromise. One defender of key-escrow policy is Dorothy Denning, a professor of computer science at Georgetown University and a consultant to the military industry. She argued in a letter to Senator Patrick J. Leahy Democrat of Vermont -- one of the sponsors of the new legislation -- that such a system was vital to public safety and security. James Barksdale, president of the Netscape Communications Corporation, whose popular Web-browser software has built-in encryption capabilities, called Ms. Denning's solution a "stopgap measure." "Key escrow is an unworkable idea, and we do not support it," Mr. Barksdale said. "Key escrow will be defeated just like Prohibition was defeated by bathtub gin -- all it took was a big bag of sugar and a long weekend." Policy watchdogs like the Center for Democracy and Technology and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, both outspoken advocates for privacy rights and due process, agree that the bill is headed in the right direction. It does not dictate the use of a key escrow system, eases export controls for "mass market" products (like Netscape's), prohibits any restriction on the domestic use or sale of encryption, and provides a "personal use" policy for American travelers who use encryption while outside the country. But the bill is sure to face a fight as it moves through the House and the Senate, and the key-escrow and export-control proponents marshal their experts. David Farber, a professor of computer science at the University of Pennsylvania and a board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, says encryption policy always turns into "a religious discussion" between those who fear terrorism and those who want to live without fear of constant surveillance. But, he adds, if you take privacy discussions to the people, their attitudes are pretty clear. " If you ask the American public what they think of national I.D. cards, for example, a huge percentage are opposed to them," he said. "Why? They're not hiding anything. They just don't want the Government to have that type of power." [End]