Re:Clipper III questions

["Timothy C. May" <tcmay@got.net>]

At 11:40 PM -0800 10/3/96, Jim McCoy wrote:
>>The recent CDT policy post sez of Clipper III:

>>This reminds me of the understanding between CIA/NSA and their counterparts
>>in British Intelligence.  [...]
>
>While I am not sure that this oft-made claim can actually be proven,

Actually, Bamford documents it in detail in "The Puzzle Palace," 1982. See
the sections on the "UKUSA" or "UK-USA" agreement. More recent reports have
described how the actual sharing is done in a room at Fort Meade between
GCHQ and NSA intercept analysts. The GCHQ guys monitor the U.S. traffic,
and then "summarize it" (as per the UK-USA arrangement) for their American
counterparts. All strictly according to the letter of the law, such as it
is. The practical effect is obvious. (I also heard a report that the
telephone Long Lines, built some decades ago, were deliberately routed
across Indian reservations in several states--for the purposes of the
domestic surveillance laws, Indian reservations have "sovereign nation"
status! Same reason the CIA used the Cabazon Band of Indians lands for
illegal work.)

>it does raise an interesting point:  a large amount of communications
>traffic crosses international boundaries, which country's laws and
>procedures are to be followed when a "legitimate law enforcement need"
>is perceived?  While Americans have become somewhat disenchanted with

This is a very important point, I think. Given that users have little
control over packet routing, mightn't packets get deliberately routed to
jurisdictions where the "Global GAK" policies might be interpreted
favorably? Suppose encrypted traffic between two American sites actually
went by way of a Canadian hop, and Canadian authorities (possibly working
for/with NSA) went to the "Trusted Key Authorities" with a _Canadian_
warrant?

And so on, including some nations whose notions of "search warrants" bear
no resemblance even to our somewhat tattered notions. So much for U.S.
Constitutional protections, even in the post-GAK age.

--Tim May





"The government announcement is disastrous," said Jim Bidzos,.."We warned IBM
that the National Security Agency would try to twist their technology."
[NYT, 1996-10-02]
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."