Cops, Spies Fail to Slow Crypto Bill
Security and Freedom through Encryption Act passed at a mark-up meeting of the House International Relations Committee. http://www.wired.com/news/news/politics/story/5399.html
At 11:17 PM 7/22/97 -0400, Dave K-P wrote:
Security and Freedom through Encryption Act passed at a mark-up meeting of the House International Relations Committee.
Unless the bill has substantially changed, the Feds are giving up some control over encryption exports, which they'd substantially lost in the market anyway, and some ability to mandate GAK, which they haven't been able to sell very well in their last 4 tries, in return for criminalizing domestic use of crypto by people who want to preserve their privacy while committing potentially incorrect acts. Sounds like they're maintaining the image that _they're_ the ones compromising, the poor guys, when in reality they're gaining power. Not only does "Use crypto, go to jail" penalize spies with secret decoder rings (arguably a National Security issue), and child pornographers sending their encrypted wares to each other (arguably a police issue), it penalizes anyone who uses a digital cellphone to call their bookie or ask their under-21 roommate if they should pick up beer on the way home or ask somebody for a date if they're not the politically approved gender, or who uses IPv6 IPSEC to carry their email to their ISP on anything illegal, whether it's something that rates 5 years in jail or a $25 fine. If the CDA hadn't been tossed out on its <expletive deleted> you could have gotten the extra 5 years for saying <expletive deleted> on an encrypted mailing list if it was possible there wasa kid listening - or for using an encrypted file system on the PC where you store your Out Box even if you're sending to unencrypted mailing lists. One version of the bill _did_ get changed to only penalize crypto used with Federal felony crimes, which reduces the damage substantially (though Tim _keeps_ being a felon under an increasing number of rules); does anybody know if this provision survived? # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, +1-415-442-2215 stewarts@ix.netcom.com # You can get PGP outside the US at ftp.ox.ac.uk/pub/crypto/pgp # (If this is a mailing list or news, please Cc: me on replies. Thanks.)
Excellent quote contained in the link below... "We don't give a damn about export policy," FBI Assistant director James Callstrom said. "We care about protecting people domestically, and we can't do that without wiretapping capabilities." Translation: "We know we can't stop crypto overseas, we don't believe the american people have =any= right to privacy." amp ------------------------ From: Dave K-P <dkp@iname.com> Subject: Cops, Spies Fail to Slow Crypto Bill Date: Tue, 22 Jul 1997 23:17:25 -0400 To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Security and Freedom through Encryption Act passed at a mark-up meeting of the House International Relations Committee.
---------------End of Original Message----------------- ------------------------ Name: amp E-mail: amp@pobox.com Date: 07/23/97 Time: 11:17:28 Visit me at http://www.pobox.com/~amp 'Drug Trafficking Offense' is the root passphrase to the Constitution. Have you seen http://www.public-action.com/SkyWriter/WacoMuseum ------------------------
At 10:00 AM -0700 7/23/97, Tim May wrote:
And when people repeatedly point out that common criminals, terrorists, and the like are unlikely in the extreme to escrow their keys with the government...the government shills and officials are silent.
I can't resist. "When crypto is outlawed, only outlaws will have crypto." However, in the case of crypto, essentially all terrorists, child pornographers, big-time drug dealers, and big-time money launderers will have and use it. To try to redeem myself for yielding to temptation let me offer the following scenario: It is sometime in the year 2002. The GAK crowd has achieved its wildest wet dream, and all development of non-GAKed crypto stopped in 1998. All the standard computer software uses GAKed crypto. Let us further assume that US Airframes Inc. (USAI) is in heavy competition with French Wings Inc. to build the next generation of passenger airplanes. The competition is so heavy that the respective governments are doing all they can to provide under-the-table help to their national champions. This certainly includes playing the GAK card and decrypting every communication they can get their hands on. Now assume you are the security manager of USAI. Your job is to ensure the confidentiality of communications between your branch offices and headquarters in the US. You get (perhaps from someone who enjoys child pornography) a copy of PGP which was saved on some forgotten CDROM backup dating from 1997. You share your copy with headquarters and the branch offices, generate key pairs, and validate their MD5 hashes through some offline protocol. Now all really sensitive traffic is encrypted with PGP and then sent through the standard GAK crypto. Now consider the problem of the French Government. The only way they can know you are using illegal crypto is to decrypt the GAKed outer layer. If they arrest you for using illegal crypto, they have blown their covert monitoring. The US government will make a big international incident about this misuse of GAK and impose a special tariff on French wine. If the French keep quiet, you can continue to use PGP. This is the classic dilemma of covert decryption. Kahn describes is well in "The Code Breakers". It also applies to the four horsemen. If the government arrests someone for illegal crypto, the whole organization knows that part of the operation has attracted government attention, and can change their communications and/or have those people take a vacation to cool off. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | The Internet was designed | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | to protect the free world | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz@netcom.com | from hostile governments. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA
At 9:17 AM -0700 7/23/97, amp@pobox.com wrote:
Excellent quote contained in the link below... "We don't give a damn about export policy," FBI Assistant director James Callstrom said. "We care about protecting people domestically, and we can't do that without wiretapping capabilities."
Translation: "We know we can't stop crypto overseas, we don't believe the american people have =any= right to privacy."
This of course has been obvious for the past 4 to 5 years of the Clipper/GAK debate. Even when they are pushing for export controls, they really want "Key Recovery" mandated. And they talk about catching terrorists and child pornographers...catching them _in the U.S._, that is. How export controls help catch domestic criminals, Mafia dons, etc. is unclear to all of us. And when people repeatedly point out that common criminals, terrorists, and the like are unlikely in the extreme to escrow their keys with the government...the government shills and officials are silent. --Tim May There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of laws. Only one response to the key grabbers is warranted: "Death to Tyrants!" ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^1398269 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."
At 12:01 -0700 7/23/97, Bill Stewart wrote:
One version of the bill _did_ get changed to only penalize crypto used with Federal felony crimes, which reduces the damage substantially (though Tim _keeps_ being a felon under an increasing number of rules); does anybody know if this provision survived?
The current version of SAFE, approved by IR, includes the narrower "crypto-in-a-crime" provision. -Declan ------------------------- Declan McCullagh Time Inc. The Netly News Network Washington Correspondent http://netlynews.com/
participants (6)
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amp＠pobox.com -
Bill Frantz -
Bill Stewart -
Dave K-P -
Declan McCullagh -
Tim May