[103] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: Machine readable form (was:RE: [DES] DES Key Recovery Project, Progress Report #7)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Phil Karn)
Thu Jan 30 10:35:56 1997
Date: Wed, 29 Jan 1997 18:33:57 -0800 (PST)
From: Phil Karn <karn@qualcomm.com>
To: das@razor.engr.sgi.com
CC: cryptography@c2.net
In-reply-to: <9701291452.ZM10632@razor.engr.sgi.com> (das@razor.engr.sgi.com)
> But isn't your case still based on the arbitrariness of
>prohibiting the export of a floppy while allowing the export
>of a book containing the same information, unlike the Bernstein
>case, which is based on the constitutional protection for free speech?
Yes, that's the substance of many of the arguments we are making.
I suspect that the "arbitrariness factor" in my case is having an
effect on the government. Consider the language I quoted from the
Federal Register saying that the government was studying the issue of
printed source code and reserved the right to control it in the
future.
As long as a year or so ago, the NSA was rumored to be distancing
themselves from the absurd predicament raised by my case by claiming
that their original recommendation to DoS on my first CJ request (on
the Applied Cryptography book) was to classify it also as a munition.
If so, they were overruled by State.
You have to admit that it is far more consistent to treat both the
book and the floppy as a munition than to take the position DoS
eventually took. Even if the more consistent position is a far more
restrictive one that has even less chance of surviving a court
challenge.
Phil
