Re: New crypto regulations

From: Mike McNally <m5@tivoli.com>
> solman@MIT.EDU wrote:
> > The government's claim is that in the interests of national security,
> > export of cryptography must be prevented. By limiting the policy's
> > applicability to media which are in, or can easily be converted to,
> > electronic form ...
>
> Does anybody seriously believe that nbody writing these policies has
> an understanding of OCR software?  An on-line form of code printed
> in a book is just a quick trip to a scanner away.  They know that.

The regs, as Lucky pointed out, do hint at restrictions on OCR fonts in
the future.  However this is obviously doomed since as OCR technology
advances the distinction between OCR and non-OCR fonts will vanish.
I imagine that a special purpose character recognition engine could be
built to work on any known, monospaced font, as is typically used for
source code.

In this light, the explicit exemption for printed materials is really
quite welcome.  It has never been 100% clear that a book of source code
is exportable.  Yes, we've had some favorable court cases recently but
none of these have been fully resolved.  Rumors were posted here that
the NSA came very close to trying to stop the export of the original PGP
source code book from MIT Press (and supposedly arranged for MIT to be
punished later for its audacity).

Having all sides agree that crypto source code can be exported in printed
form is an important step in the right direction.  We can still contest
the issue of restrictions on machine readable exports.  In an era where
electronic publishing is becoming as important as paper publishing for
expressing ideas, we can continue to push to extend the exemption to
machine-readable images of the pages of the book, and later to actual
source files.

Hal

Hal Finney sez:
> 
> In this light, the explicit exemption for printed materials is really
> quite welcome.  It has never been 100% clear that a book of source code
> is exportable.  Yes, we've had some favorable court cases recently but
> none of these have been fully resolved.  Rumors were posted here that
> the NSA came very close to trying to stop the export of the original PGP
> source code book from MIT Press (and supposedly arranged for MIT to be
> punished later for its audacity).

My uncharitable side says that is because they wanted to stay as far
away from cries of "book-banning" as they could. If nothing else, IN
THAT NARROW CASE, reason prevailed over fervor.

And I caution against thinking in terms of "NSA did" in favor of
"Under FBI pressure, NSA did" just to remind ourselves where the
real battle lies..... 

-- 
A host is a host from coast to coast.................wb8foz@nrk.com
& no one will talk to a host that's close........[v].(301) 56-LINUX
Unless the host (that isn't close).........................pob 1433
is busy, hung or dead....................................20915-1433

Hal Finney wrote:
> 
> From: Mike McNally <m5@tivoli.com>
> > solman@MIT.EDU wrote:
> > > The government's claim is that in the interests of national security,
> > > export of cryptography must be prevented. By limiting the policy's
> > > applicability to media which are in, or can easily be converted to,
> > > electronic form ...
> >
> > Does anybody seriously believe that nbody writing these policies has
> > an understanding of OCR software?  An on-line form of code printed
> > in a book is just a quick trip to a scanner away.  They know that.
> 
> The regs, as Lucky pointed out, do hint at restrictions on OCR fonts in
> the future.  However this is obviously doomed since as OCR technology
> advances the distinction between OCR and non-OCR fonts will vanish.
> I imagine that a special purpose character recognition engine could be
> built to work on any known, monospaced font, as is typically used for
> source code.
> 
> In this light, the explicit exemption for printed materials is really
> quite welcome.  It has never been 100% clear that a book of source code
> is exportable.  Yes, we've had some favorable court cases recently but
> none of these have been fully resolved.  Rumors were posted here that
> the NSA came very close to trying to stop the export of the original PGP
> source code book from MIT Press (and supposedly arranged for MIT to be
> punished later for its audacity).
> 
> Having all sides agree that crypto source code can be exported in printed
> form is an important step in the right direction.  We can still contest
> the issue of restrictions on machine readable exports.  In an era where
> electronic publishing is becoming as important as paper publishing for
> expressing ideas, we can continue to push to extend the exemption to
> machine-readable images of the pages of the book, and later to actual
> source files.
> 
> Hal

To hell with it, lets just send it over a modem and claim its Analog not
electronic transfer.  If MA-Bell (or sibling) wants to change it from
Analog to Digital for overseas transfer then THEY can go after MA-Bell. 
Then if we can't do that then we would not even be allowed to discuss
cryptography (code) verbally as it all gets transformed to electrons now
anyway.  

Can we discuss cryptography code verbally(using sound waves)?

What is the difference between me reading(using sound waves) code line
by line to John Doe versus having my computer(using sound waves)
communicating to John Does's computer,Tape Recorder(high quality), or
his well atuned ear which understands MODEMese (or was that MODEMonics)?

Oh well, it was a good 20 second(or was that 2 second) thought, but I
don't think it'll hold up in court :)

Is anyone geting tired of Uncle Sam (or is that Uncle BAN)taking away
the freedoms that we have fought so hard for, and are trying to give to
all these third world countries such as Bosnia(Oh hell did I mention
something about politcs, Oops)?


-- 
Mark Johnson
Network Project Manager
St. Mary's Regional Med Ctr
mark@hercules.reno.nv.us