San Jose Mercury, January 8, 1982 (EIGHTY-two), page F-1 CIA boss assail high-tech leaks [The Washington Post] WASHINGTON -- Adm. Bobby R. Inman, deputy director of the CIA, Thursday predicted a "tidal wave" of public outrage and laws restricting scientists if scientists do not agree to voluntary "review" of their work by intelligence agencies. Scientists had better cooperate in making some of their papers secret voluntarily, or they will face tough laws restricting them, Inman told a panel session at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Scientists should beware that there are congressional investigations now in progress that will point up the "thoroughly documented" fact that in the buildup of Soviet defense capability "the bulk of new technology which they have employed has been acquired from the United States," Inman said. When the details of this "hemorrhage of the country's technology" come out in public, Inman said, there will be a "tidal wave" of public outrage that will lead to laws restricting the publication of scientific work that the government might consider "sensitive" on national security grounds. "The tides are moving, and moving fast, toward legislated solutions that in fact are likely to be much more restrictive, not less restrictive, than the voluntary" censorship system he has suggested, Inman said. When he was director of the National Security Agency, the codemaking and breaking intelligence agency, Inman led an effort to get prominent private researchers to submit their papers on the mathematical theory of codes to his agency before publication. The NSA also briefly put secrecy orders on some of the private code research in recent years. But in April 1981, cooperation among the National Science Foundation, the American Council on Education and the NSA resulted in a voluntary review system under which scientists can submit their papers to NSA for review and receive a judgement on whether they possibly contain information damaging to the national security. Since then, about 25 papers have been reviewed and none had problems, according to Daniel Schwartz, until recently chief counsel for the NSA. "There are other fields where publication of certain information could affect the national security in a harmful way," Inman said. These include the fields of "computer hardware and software, other electronic gear and techniques, lasers, crop projections and manufacturing procedures." ------- The above news article ran twelve years ago. His tidal wave of crypto censorship didn't appear; instead, a wave of support for free expression ran through the scientific and library community. About half of the technical societies amended their by-laws to disallow closed or censored meetings or conferences. I wonder if Admiral Inman feels the same way today, as he faces Senate confirmation hearings as Secretary of Defense. Will we be seeing the same sort of proposals? How does he feel about export controls on cryptographic software? What should be done with the Skipjack program? If you wonder too, please ask your Senator to ask him about it. Seriously. John