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| Big
Brother in the Wires : Wiretapping in the Digital Age |
| A Special Report by the American Civil
Liberties Union (03/1998) |
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| This report describes the struggle
over cryptography policy which is taking place in the higher echelons
of government, science and industry, the outcome of which is likely
to have far reaching and possibly irrevocable consequences for every
Americans' right to privacy. Whereas electronic surveillance seems
of marginal utility in preventing or solving serious crimes, the Clinton
Administration has tried to acquire more law enforcement power by
demanding a backdoor access to the country's information infrastructure.
This possibility of digital wiretapping represents, according to ACLU,
a grave threat to personal privacy, and is inconsistent with a free
society. On the contrary, the ACLU believes that the best way to protect
privacy and safety in a digital environment, is by encouraging the
development of the strongest encryption products, for both domestic
and international use, and to remove existing US controls on encryption. |
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| Encryption
Export Controls Held Constitutional By One Judge |
| by David Carney, Tech Law Journal
(07/07/1998) |
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| This article presents new developments
in the Junger vs Daley case, when an important judge decision stated
that "although encryption source code may occasionally be expressive,
its export is not protected conduct under the First Amendment."
According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which has been supporting
persons challenging the Constitutionality of encryption export restraints
in the courts, it is disturbing that the Court refuses to admit "the
communicative nature of software" and assimilate it as only a
functional tool. |
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| Privacy
group objects to new U.S. crypto regs |
| by Jeannette Borzo, IDG News Service
(02/01/1999) |
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| This article presents the reaction
of the Americans for Computer Privacy group after the September announcement
from U.S. Vice President Al Gore that the government intended to modify
its encryption-export rules by allowing for more liberal export of
products containing the 56-bit Data Encryption Standard, and by expanding
exemptions to the rules to include insurance companies and corporations
involved in electronic commerce. According to the ACP, this change
in policy falls short when compared with the Wassenaar agreement and
does not allow U.S. encryption manufacturers a level playing field
in the global marketplace. |
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| Privacy
and Encryption Export Controls: A Crypto Trilogy |
| by Keith Aoki, module developed for
the University of Oregon School of Law (24/08/2000) |
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| This teaching module presents legal
developments occurring in the 1990s over attempts by the Clinton Administration
to use State Department regulations, and then Commerce Department
regulations, to stop the export of strong public key cryptographic
tools, and in particular a trilogy of cases beginning in the mid-1990s:
Karn v. U.S. Dept. of State; Bernstein v. U.S. Department of Justice;
and Junger v. Daley. These cases address the problematic limits on
the use of extremely strong "public key" cryptographic systems
by private actors in the context of the export licensing schemes administered
by the State Department and the Commerce Department. They do not only
have strong first amendment and administrative law components to them,
but they also go beyond that to implicate fundamental questions of
individual privacy in the digital environment : who will have presumptive
access to strong encryption tools? |
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