Clear-Text Patch? was: Re: OpenSSH 5.1: call for testing

[Bob Proulx]

Dan Yefimov wrote:
> Curt, WE7U wrote:
> > It's likely that your government or other nearby governments have
> > similar "stupid" laws for amateur radio.  Many do.  Radio links know
> > no political boundaries, so encryption over radio links tends to
> > make the powers-that-be nervous and they legislate against it.
> > Either that or they borrowed bits from FCC regulations which is also
> > common.
>
> Hmm. Strange point. Internet due to it's nature knows no political
> boundaries too, but AFAIK no country prohibits encrypted traffic
> over it. I don't in any way vote against including the none cipher
> in the OpenSSH distribution, but I think that the problem of such
> actually stupid regulations would be much better solved in a
> legislative way.

The regulations for amateur radio have been derived from international
treaty which prohibited amateur radio communication from using codes
or ciphers to obscure the content.  In the US these regulations date
back to the Communications Act of 1934 which still governs
telecommunications today.  In 1934 encryption was still viewed as a
munition of war.  These regulations well predate the computer
revolution and the Internet.

Trying to change international treaty is not something that can be
done easily even when there isn't any controversy involved.
Unfortunately legislature isn't like a computer program which can be
modified and improved incrementally or all together.  It is the social
creation of people.  It isn't something to which you can apply logic.

Bob