Re: Taking crypto out of the U.S.

[tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May)]

At 5:55 AM 9/26/96, Adamsc wrote:
>On Wed, 25 Sep 1996 06:26:31 -0500 (EST), Adam Shostack wrote:
>
>>| >Theres a personal use exemption.  Michael Froomkin's web page has a
>>| >pointer to it.
>
>>| What if your laptop gets "stolen"?  Or you sell it for a plane ticket home
>>| after your wallet gets pinched?
>
>>You're required to report it to the Feds.  RTFU.
>
>Yeah, but you can't be persecuted.    So what happens if Joe-Cryptographer
>writes a *great* NSA-stumping crypto program - not for export - and it just
>happens to get pinched (The police might even recover it!)?  Outside
>distribution w/o penalties...

This is what judges and juries are for. Interpreting the "spirit of the law."

(I feel strange defending the legal system, but in plain English: it ain't
this stupid. A defense of "I didn't give secrets to the Koreans, I was just
reading these documents outside their embassy, and they blew off the bench
and onto their property." won't cut it. Or, at least, I think there's a
fair chance a jury would find one guilty of espionage, treason, whatever.)

Now I don't think there's any real chance of being prosecuted for having a
laptop lost or stolen, regardless of what it contains (unless it was true
DOD secret stuff, and then the discipline would be handled internally to
one's agency), but don't think for a second that this is a new "loophole"
in the export laws!

--Tim May

We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I know that that ain't allowed.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."