At 4:11 PM 3/26/96, Adam Shostack wrote:

Timothy C. May wrote:

...

I'm forced to disagree on this point. I think that the comparable product has the potential to be a very big deal; it means that any product using IDEA or 3DES may become exportable, because such products are available outside the US.

I certainly don't disagree that if Leahy is passed, which is unlikely, then conventional ciphers like 3DES will become exportable. (And I am forced to add, "Big deal.")

What I'm more interested in are not the ciphers which had their genesis in the crypto work of the 70s, but in the new and exciting applications to come. Things such as this list often discusses. I believe Leahy could stall export of these new items until eventually there are offshore equivalents of sufficiently wide deployment that the Leahy clause would get invoked.

On the ITAR issue, and whether this is a big deal for someone living in the US, it seems to me that the major annoyance of ITAR is that it slows down development, and commercial uptake of crypto because the internet is a worldwide market place. ie I would have thought that getting rid of ITAR would be beneficial to internet commerce in general, and likely advance uptake of electronic cash (by several years?) For whatever reasons (best known to themselves) even big fish like netscape, and microsoft don't seem to have any stomach for taking on the USG in any meaningful way over the issue. I'd view widely deployed electronic cash to be a step in the right direction opening the way for more interesting crypto applications. What's your analysis on this? Do you think I am over-rating the negative effects of ITAR on furtherment of electronic cash? What say about electronic cash as a catalyst for uptake of other crypto applications? (my use of "electronic cash" above refers to payee and payer anonymous, not electronic cheques or credit card transactions over the internet) Adam