DES export regulations. And what to do about it!

[Jan Mikkelsen]

In article <14511 at hoptoad.uucp> gnu at hoptoad.uucp (John Gilmore) writes:
>People can endlessly debate the small points of the rules; I want to
>understand the big ones.  WHY SHOULD PRIVACY TECHNOLOGY BE ILLEGAL?
>Why does the US government think that privacy is something neither its
>subjects, nor the citizens of other countries, should have?

I agree, privacy technology should not be illegal.  I cannot see the
justification for restricting software DES implementations, nor most
hardware implementations.  I have a couple of Schlumberger M64 smart
cards lying around which do DES in a monolithic chip, with secure key
storage.  I don't know what the situation with devices like this is in
the United States, but I that it would be very hard to enforce a
restriction on devices such as this.

There are however, other aspects of an implementation for which I can
see the justification for treating as sensitive, which have nothing to
do with DES, or any other crypto system.  For example:

>                                         I don't think techniques for
>heat-sinking, sealing, shielding, etc are export-controlled, though
>there are some that are classified (and thus aren't even available to the
>U.S. public).

Now, what can be done about making crypto systems more available to
the masses?
-- 
Jan Mikkelsen
janm at dramba.neis.oz.AU or janm%dramba.neis.oz at metro.ucc.su.oz.au
"She really is."