IP: Janet Reno reports on crypto-negotiations with industry

[Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

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http://cgi.pathfinder.com/netly/afternoon/0,1012,1864,00.html


The Netly News / Afternoon Line
March 31, 1998


Gregg Shorthand


   Not many bureaucrats are as lucky as Attorney General Janet Reno. When
   she showed up at a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing this
   morning, Chairman Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) offered to help her solve such
   knotty problems as encryption, wiretapping, and the best way to fatten
   the Justice Department's already immense budget. Asked Gregg: "Do you
   need significantly more resources in this area?" FBI Director Louis
   Freeh's reply was unsurprising. "We do need resources," he said, to
   deal with mushrooming hacker threats. Gregg also asked how close the
   Justice Department was to closing a deal with the computer industry --
   presumably the Americans for Computer Privacy coalition -- on
   compromise encryption legislation that some advocates fret will trade
   away Americans' privacy. "People need to understand that if you don't
   solve the encryption issue, the country's basically open to all sorts
   of threats, terrorist threat and obviously drug dealers," Gregg warned
   -- doubtless in reference to the cartels currently dealing crack over
   at freebase.com. How were the talks progressing? "I think we have a
   lot of work to do," Freeh replied. Reno said she's only "asking that
   our authority be adopted to modern technology" by banning encryption
   products without backdoors for government surveillance. Right -- the
   same authority that says you have to make an extra set of keys to your
   house in case the feds feel like dropping by unannounced. Reno has
   asked Congress to delay voting on all crypto bills during the
   negotiations, which she predicted will last two months. --By Declan
   McCullagh/Washington