[4799] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Junger Reply to Gov Brief
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (John Young)
Thu May 27 13:00:19 1999
Date: Thu, 27 May 1999 11:58:01 -0400
To: cryptography@c2.net
From: John Young <jya@pipeline.com>
We offer Peter Junger's reply to the government's
brief in his appeal to the 6th Circuit:
http://jya.com/pdj-reply6th.htm
Here's a swell petard hoisting excerpt:
The government has introduced evidence that the use
of encryption "by foreign intelligence targets 'can have a
debilitating effect on NSA's ability to collect and report
critical foreign intelligence' ", but the government has not
shown that the challenged regulations are an effective means
of keeping encryption out of the hands of foreign intelligence
targets. In contrast, Junger has submitted evidence to the
contrary.
Vice Admiral McConnell of the NSA, in response to Senator
Murray's question "with at least 20 million people hooked up
to the Internet how do U.S. export controls actually prevent
criminals, terrorists, or whoever from obtaining encryption
software?" stated that "encryption software distribution via
Internet, bulletin board or modem does not undermine the
effectiveness of encryption export controls." NSA Deputy
Director Adm. William Crowell repeated the same point to
Congress, stating that "serious users of security products
don't obtain them from the Internet."
The testimony of these two high-ranking NSA officials is
strong evidence that the regulations restricting the "export"
of encryption source code on the Internet do not further the
government's stated interest.
[End excerpt]
