[160] in Cypherpunks
government free reign on RSA -- from whence?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (ld231782@longs.lance.colostate.edu)
Sun May 2 23:23:08 1993
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Date: Sun, 02 May 93 21:11:44 -0600
From: ld231782@longs.lance.colostate.edu
This is driving me crazy. I have asked many people that refer to the
U.S. government's free reign on the use of patents in general and RSA
technology in particular. There are a lot of very respectable and
reputable specialists on this list and I hope they can answer my question.
What *specifically* gives the government the *right* to use patents
developed `with public money' without licensing, or the RSA patent in
particular (if the two are not the same)?
Court precedents? A specific law? `congressional hearings'? A
condition of agreement to receive NSF funds?
>what< ?
This little tidbit of information has gotten tossed around so
frequently and haphazardly (a bit like an Urban Legend) and it really
deserves some sharp scrutiny, at least a bit more than I have ever
seen, I suspect it might have some interesting implications to consider.
