Forwarded From: "Jay D. Dyson" <jdysonat_private> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Courtesy of Cryptography List. Posted by Declan McCullagh <declanat_private> http://cgi.pathfinder.com/netly/article/0,2334,13771,00.html TIME.com / The Netly News Feds Still Fretting Over Encryption June 23, 1998 By Declan McCullagh Let's say, just for argument's sake, that you're a top bureaucrat whose job is to convince American businesses that those wickedly unpopular encryption regulations are OK after all. You could do worse than follow Commerce Department Undersecretary Bill Reinsch's lead: Set up an advisory committee, hand-pick its members, kick the public out of the room for a classified briefing from the NSA, and hope for the best. That's what happened on Monday during the third meeting of the President's Export Council Subcommittee on Encryption. It's still too early to tell how crypto-conciliatory the members will be with the feds, but the lineup of speakers at each meeting isn't helping. No privacy groups or cryptographers have been invited. When Barbara Simons of the Association for Computing Machinery observed yesterday that the only folks invited to brief the committee during the previous two meetings were feds, only two other people (including Netscape's Peter Harter) said they thought it was a problem. Raising no complaints were representatives from the House and Senate Intelligence committees, who showed up yesterday to argue for strict crypto restrictions. "We cannot subject national security and public safety to the whims of the marketplace," said Patrick Murray, chief counsel to House Intelligence. "Without access to plaintext, that information will remain unavailable to law enforcement. Investigations will cease. Criminals will remain on the street." Pedophiles, he complained, could hide their "child pornography" with impunity. Murray's committee last September voted to make it a crime to sell, manufacture, distribute or import encryption products without backdoors for government surveillance. Other House committees have voted for bills that would relax export controls. "Unless there is a clear compromise," no bill will go to the House floor for a vote this year, Murray said. Also speaking to the committee were representatives from the Senate Judiciary Committee and Rep. Zoe Lofgren's (D-Calif.) office. Then the committee entered closed session. But it's not like the feds had anything especially secret to say. America's national security was not at stake. No covert operations were endangered. Then why did Commerce's Reinsch recommend a closed session? Well, he said, "while not classified, it's information you don't want to see in the newspapers." That information, according to committee members who were there, was a discussion of how many export licenses have been granted and rejected, and an admission that there were some "interagency disagreements" between the FBI, NSA and the Commerce Department. The three senior Commerce officials briefing the subcommittee: Roger Majak, James Lewis and Patricia Sefcik. Eleanor Padgett from NSA Information Systems Security spoke in the afternoon. The subcommittee also voted to send a letter to President Clinton urging him to allow overseas shipments of weak 56-bit encryption and the export of stronger products to financial institutions. "Continued delay has dulled the initial positive response the administration received when it first announced its intentions" to be nice to banks, says the letter, written by former NSA general counsel and Steptoe & Johnson partner Stewart Baker. Next on the agenda: a briefing from crypto-ambassador David Aaron at the subcommittee's next meeting. ( ( ______ )) )) .- "There's always time for a good cup of coffee" -. >===<--. C|~~|C|~~| [> Jay D. Dyson - jdysonat_private <] | = |-' `--' `--' `-------------- Nemo impune lacessit --------------' `-----' -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBNY/Uxue1NzV7EsRFAQHPpgQAok/9uuP8+YxAZ68ntFzZtKzv/sC99XBK DhGDM6YM5/u/OHcBixvI7MR7MsRGX5n4VUH5JyItn+Ps1QzKvDw40qIYQiDUG7KC m49HTUkDgEy3DwPIfh64WAJidfm5b+IT70//Z8Wo6gHki4LKprSFyWAvfztpiqb2 SUcXBrHvO54= =cvGJ -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -o- Subscribe: mail majordomoat_private with "subscribe isn". Today's ISN Sponsor: Repent Security Incorporated [www.repsec.com]
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