The legality of PGP

Well,

I've been reading a lot of speculation and outright disinformation about
the legality of PGP.  Does anyone have any informed information about the
actual legal status us sing and disseminating the program?

Gratis

My SuperIllegal Key :

-----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----
Version: 2.0

mQCNAirSjlcAAAED/ijVaTjlU62mQdXwxj+bEO3wqdMKkZlRNt1rSi8VOSkeQ0G7
7KbBeINoVCTIi12ax74q7ANhKCga+ZkBxAVTnfSBQZXfFh/5XMxzzqk7NT2fKKlZ
/Hrf4cDd8VYgSl6WPhyVO+EpvyZn5HezGLBbryGpCcloSmjBcwd2g1pYVIhjAAUR
tCxTLkUuIEJyb3duIDxzaGF3bmJAY3NjaWhwLmVjc3QuY3N1Y2hpY28uZWR1Pg==
=Wrv7
-----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----

>From: S.E. Brown <shawnb@ecst.csuchico.edu>

>Well,

>I've been reading a lot of speculation and outright disinformation about
>the legality of PGP.  Does anyone have any informed information about the
>actual legal status us sing and disseminating the program?

PGP is based on RSA cryptography, which is patented. The patent is
controlled by Public Key Partners, which has not granted a license for
people to use PGP. Therefore, using PGP is possibly a patent
violation, although thus far no action seems to have been taken by PKP
in this respect.

Perry

Also, every day they don't enforce the patent is silent reinforcement
to the view that their patent is illegitamate (in that it covers a
mathematical algorithm).  I doubt this has legal standing other than
as material to try to convince juries with.

dean