a very thoughtful message re Clipper

[David Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

[a bit of bracketing done by me .. djf]


Date: Thu, 10 Feb 1994 18:54:26 -0500
From: crawford () cs ucdavis edu (Rick Crawford)
To: Multiple recipients of list <cni-modernization () cni org
X-Comment: CNI Modernization of Scholarly Publication WG


---------- original ------------------
        From: Jerry Berman, Executive Director of EFF
        jberman () eff org


        This is the first step in a larger campaign to counter the efforts of
        those who would restrict our ability to speak freely and with privacy.
        Please stay tuned--we'll continue to inform you of things you can do to
        promote the removal of restrictions on encryption.


        .......
------------ a comment from a   Charles Pearce --------------------------


  I hope this larger campaign and this mini one both fail.  What you're
  talking about is experting the license for anyone (terrorists, foreign
  governments, mafia, etc.) to encrypt whatever data they choose.  This would
  essentially prevent the U. S. government from collecting intelligence on
  these groups.  A standard encryption method would let the government
  agencies concerned with these things do the jobs that Congress has mandated
  them to do and we taxpayers support.  If you're not engaged in anything
  illegal or otherwise pose a threat to national security, then don't
  worry...no one wants to read your mail.  Paranoids have always worried
  about Big Brother.


  Charles Pearce
  <pearce () ksuvm ksu edu


---------------- the comment to Pearce' email by Rick Crawford -------------


Those who know even a smidgen of U.S. history know that "terrorists"
such as the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. were illegally wiretapped
by our law-abiding intelligence agencies.  The communications integrity
of law-abiding U.S. citizens was even more flagrantly violated by the
FBI's COINTELPRO operations that lasted (at least) into the 1980s.


Will Clipper protect us from criminals?


In an unprecedented July 1993 public appearance before the Computer
System Security and Privacy Advisory Board in Washington, Dr. Clint
Brooks, the Assistant Director of the NSA, readily admitted that the
Clipper system is *not* intended to catch any criminals.  Obviously, he
said, those who have something to hide will avoid inviting government
wiretaps by using the system.  Ray Kammer, the Acting Director of NIST
(ostensibly the lead agency for Clipper), was more blunt:


       "It's obvious that anyone who uses Clipper for the conduct
        of organized crime is dumb."


Suppose --- contrary to all historical evidence --- the public trusts
that no intelligence agency will mount an organized campaign of general
surveillance. If government-accessible cryptography is widely used, is
there a potential for rogue elements in government intelligence agencies
to abuse the public trust? The same week that Dr. Brooks testified, the
U.S. House Judiciary Committee held hearings on abuse by police of the
FBI's National Crime Information Center (NCIC --- a computerized database
of criminals and suspects).  In one instance, a former police officer
accessed the NCIC without authorization to track down and murder one of
his former girlfriends.  In another case, a woman finagled access to the
NCIC to check the records of prospective clients for her drug-dealing
boyfriend, so they could avoid undercover operatives.  It is widely
assumed that the broad collaboration between police agencies and private
security forces means that much of the NCIC data has already been
compromised, and is now duplicated in numerous private databases.




Will Clipper protect us from malicious foreign governments?


Anyone familiar with the encryption issue knows that you can already
buy triple-DES crypto gear on the streets of Moscow.  The genuine
terrorists had this capability long ago.  Encryption was *not*
invented in the U.S., and even our rogue intelligence agencies
have never been able to prevent foreign govts from using it.


Clipper technology carries a similar risk to that of atomic power:
It must be safeguarded from misuse for generations.  Just as stockpiled
plutonium represents concentrated military power, and thus must be
guarded in perpetuity, so centralized mass-surveillance technology
offers concentrated social power, and presents a long-lived irresistible
temptation --- perhaps a "fatal attraction".


Why must U.S.A. stand for "Universal Surveillance for All"?


-rick


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