Forwarded From: Nicholas Charles Brawn <ncb05@uow.edu.au>
Encryption Software Not Protected
CLEVELAND (AP) -- The government is not violating free speech rights by
requiring licenses to export software programs that provide Internet
confidentiality, a federal judge has ruled.
The high-tech industry wants the government to relax restrictions on
exporting encryption programs that prevent electronic eavesdropping. The
ability to scramble e-mail messages is also becoming more important as the
amount of shopping on the Internet increases.
But law enforcement officials, including the Justice Department, worry
that criminals or terrorists could use the technology to send
communications that police can't decode.
U.S. District Judge James S. Gwin ruled encryption isn't a form of
speech but simply does a job -- scrambling information.
"Among computer software programs, encryption software is especially
functional rather than expressive," he wrote in a decision released Monday.
Peter Junger, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University who
tried to have the restrictions invalidated, said he would appeal.
Junger sued after he was prevented from posting an encryption program on
his Internet site. The program was intended to be part of his students'
course materials on computer law.
Since the Internet is available worldwide, posting the program would
have been the equivalent of exporting the technology.
Junger said the government's licensing requirement is silly because
people in other countries already post encryption programs and he could
distribute the same information in a book.
Anthony Coppolino, the government's lead attorney in the case, said he
hadn't seen the decision and declined to comment.
-o-
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Received on Fri Jul 10 09:15:39 1998