From: Dan Geer <geer@OpenMarket.com>
Date: Wed, 29 Jan 1997 08:42:50 -0800 (PST)
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Last nail for US crypto export policy?
Message-ID: <199701291642.IAA05064@toad.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Steve Bellovin writes:

    It is dangerously naive to label this success the ``last nail for US
    crypto export policy''.  Everyone concerned with this issue, from the
    NSA to the FBI to anyone who wants to use crypto, understands this
    and accepts it.  40-bit keys are good for protection against casual
    snooping, and nothing more -- and no one is going to claim that you
    need supercomputers to crack them.  In fact, I assert that the U.S.
    government is *happy* about these results -- because it's going to
    push folks towards wanting stronger crypto for export.  The only problem,
    of course, is the terms under which such code can be exported...
    
    I'll go further -- in my opinion, the only reason the government doesn't
    want DES to fall just yet is that alternatives aren't ready.  That is,
    the banks and financial institutions, and for that matter the government
    agencies, have not converted to 3DES or Clipper or what have you, and
    can't do so on short notice; the commercial products they need just aren't
    ready yet.  No one wants to risk a loss of confidence in the financial
    system.  Two years from now, though, when some key escrow products are
    ready, it may be a different story.

Steve is absolutely right on the money, particularly about the likely
happiness on the government side.

The true explanation of the current effort is a testimony to the
strategic skill of the regulators, but it is not as represented aloud.
Export controls are meaningless without domestic use restrictions and
domestic use restrictions will never pass the test of the First
Amendment.  Therefore, in an effort to obtain what cannot be obtained
politically, this administration makes the following ploy:
  (1) Withhold from American companies the wherewithal to compete
      internationally by crippling the products they may export;
  (2) Offer to those companies that will include the functional equivalent
      of domestic use restrictions in their products a competitive
      advantage that could never otherwise withstand any fairness test;
  (3) Declare the resulting imposition of domestic use controls to be
      the "voice of the marketplace" and "voluntary."

This is as shameful as saying that a rape victim was "asking for it."

--dan