-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Robert Rothenburg 'Walking-Owl' <WlkngOwl@unix.asb.com> writes:

In today's (22 Jan 97) Long Island, NY Newsday Viewpoints, p. A31:

"Let Feds Overheard Cellular-Phone Talk" by David Kahn (an editor at Newsday and author of "The Codebreakers")

He intones the usual horseman: "...such criminals as terrorists, drug- runners, kidnappers and child-pornographers are increasingly using encryption to conceal their plans and activities, the FBI says."

Lions and tigers and bears, oh MY!

He also mis-states opponenents of GAK positions, claimingthe criticism is that "key escrow [at least he doesn't call it key recovery] won't work all the time", ignoring anti-GAK mentions of COINTELPRO, J.Edgar Stalin^H^H^H^H^H^HHoover, etc. etc.

Actually, I thought he summed up the anti-GAK positions reasonably well, though he didn't elaborate on them. The "it may not work all the time" statement was actually an admission of the pro-GAK side.

And the usual nonsense about "every day that criminal messages can be heard is a gain" w/out noting that anyone smart enough to use crypto now will not use it if GAK is fully implemented.

I found the logic questionable, but more disturbing was the fundamental position that "loss of privacy [...] is a price that must be paid to gain security". Benjamin Franklin's statement about security and freedom comes strongly to mind when I hear nonsense like this. He then cites the (in "our" view, useless and intrusive) hassles that airline passengers must endure in the name of "security" as justification for more of the same! Talk about a slippery slope!

Newsday is part of the LA Times Syndicate, so member papers may also have the same viewpoint appearing in their pages within the next couple of days.

Their website is http://www.newsday.com ... I don't know if the viewpoint is on-line there.

It is, at http://www.newsday.com/mainnews/rnmi0522.htm Pretty disappointing stuff, but then Mr. Kahn IS affiliated with the NSA these days, isn't he? Tunny ====================================================================== James A. Tunnicliffe | WWWeb: http://www.inference.com/~tunny Inference Corporation | PGP Fingerprint: CA 23 E2 F3 AC 2D 0C 77 tunny@Inference.com | 36 07 D9 33 3D 32 53 9C ====================================================================== -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 4.0 Business Edition Comment: which I won in the PGP raffle at Cypherpunks 12/96... iQEVAgUBMuZ1UvAmQsmyRPddAQFO/gf+Ikw8GScPo/+lr00lKvTnF7dZdEYhE8GC bt7wu96a/4mE81261EwxqA8voI/y5T3RsUfZLeYsGX+wkuPyqK1QImO3A7O8PNnb AvFitSaNsrMqyKTa7mI63TrvoBDCqtN3vYdDeSl6ZPHJmhHO5MF6xVoA56yeF5xf h0ooejTgeYMOGMhf2faRCKU31AdFB+pjozxMo83X2ZrCzga8wiHeqlEEKWQnu1cJ 3jc+TVZnEI95idbQqeHvxh/BBRdprrPxBfncCb8wnXuLHxPmrsWGqfvMDpS06qhl ZWEFChYLDGwsMokvcY+ZOZ6x4jlwssFGDXpflcdjFnPBp3yJKjU7fA== =/siB -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----