If you knew what we knew ...

[norm@netcom.com (Norman Hardy)]

The following is a paragraph from the executive summary of the NRC Crypto
policy paper: "Cryptography's Role in Securing the Information Society".

The conduct of the debate regarding national cryptography policy has been
complicated because a number of participants have often invoked classified
information that cannot be made public. However, the cleared members of the
National Research Council's Committee to Study National Cryptography Policy
(13 of the 16 committee members) concluded that *the debate over national
cryptography policy can be carried out in a reasonable manner on an
unclassified basis*. Classified material is often important to operational
matters in specific cases, but it is neither essential to the big picture
of why cryptography policy is the way it is nor required for the general
outline of how technology will and policy should evolve in the future.