Archive for January 25th, 2006

Just a tiny bit about freedom and cryptography

I’ve read a note by some guy at forum/blogging web site called PlanetCrap. Its an old one and the discussion isn’t relevant so I won’t put up a direct link (and the content on that site is pretty bad), but this one guy said:


True, but encryption laws in the United States have been written so it is impossible for terrorists to use an encryption scheme that the government cannot break if need be.

Which is something I hear often enough to trouble me – the problem is like this: A lot of countries have anti-cryptography laws, including here in Israel (although its been update recently so you just can’t invent new and stronger ciphers, instead of outlawing current strong ciphers like the Americans are stupidly doing).
The premise of all anti-cryptography laws is something like this: “We are going to outlaw the lawful exchange and use of strong cryptography algorithms because we don’t want them to be access by “bad people””. Which is inherently incredibly silly!

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