From: "L. Detweiler" <ld231782@longs.lance.colostate.edu> *create* the field), and it is handled outside the chip, there is no guarantee that the system designer does not, for example, encrypt the LEEF in the communications transit, thereby completely sabotaging the `exploitative' tappability of the chip.
Hence there is a *very* real possibility that this scheme, or something similar, could be used to gain Skipjack-level encryption without any key escrow complications. I suspect the NSA is *extremely* worried about this.
Their spokesagency, NIST, has said that it will be illegal to encrypt on top of Skipjack or to mung the LEEF. Pre-encryption is not mentioned, AFAIK, and would be borderline impossible to detect anyway. As I see it, this is already a restriction on non-Skipjack encryption, issued in the same document that assured us that no such thing is being considered. It's a special case, to be sure, but it clearly asserts a government power to restrict the means and manner of private encryption performed entirely within the United States. This is a key issue, IMO. Eli ebrandt@jarthur.claremont.edu