From: Adam Shostack <adam@lighthouse.homeport.org>
Date: Sat, 2 Dec 1995 03:06:05 +0800
To: bdavis@thepoint.net (Brian Davis)
Subject: Re: Netscape gives in to key escrow
In-Reply-To: <Pine.BSF.3.91.951201085245.27648C-100000@mercury.thepoint.net>
Message-ID: <199512011533.KAA19471@homeport.org>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text


Brian Davis wrote:

| On Thu, 30 Nov 1995, Adam Shostack wrote:

| > 	One thing that stockholders do care about is liability.  Its
| > my (non lawyerly) opinion that anyone implementing GAK without a
| > government mandate to do so is opening themselves up to huge liability
| > the Clipper database of keys gets out.

| Well that would depend on the terms of the agreement to hold the escrowed 
| keys, wouldn't it?   And presumably the GAK keyholder will have lawyers 
| write the agreement so that it says, in essence, "we will try really 
| really hard not to let the keys out, but if they get out, our only 
| liability if to say 'Ooops' followed by a heartfelt apology!"

	I'm not sure thats true.  Allow me to argue by analogy.

	A car company, hearing the FBI's laments about cars being used
as getaway vehicles after bank robberies, starts a program of putting
explosives in all their cars, with radio detonators.  In an
unfortunate accident, some of the explosives go off for no reason,
injuring the owner of the car, etc, etc.  It seems to me that the car
maker would be quite liable for doing something stupid (putting
explosives in the engine block), even though they didn't cause the
explosion.

Adam

-- 
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once."
					               -Hume