[1218] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Summary (Re: Cryptography laws for Eastern Europe?)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Nelson Minar)
Fri Jul 18 11:33:08 1997
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 1997 15:23:47 +0200
From: Nelson Minar <nelson@media.mit.edu>
To: cryptography@c2.net
Cc: E.J.Koops@kub.nl
Last week I asked on this list for information about laws concerning
cryptography in Eastern Europe. (As preparation for a one hour
introduction to crypto I'm giving to some Eastern European students).
I got lots of nice replies from people, thanks for taking the time to
help me out. Here's what I learned:
Most people pointed me to Bert-Jaap Koops' excellent Crypto Law Survey
at http://cwis.kub.nl/~frw/people/koops/lawsurvy.htm. It's a great
starting point to learn about crypto law around the world.
Unfortunately, it doesn't contain a lot of information about eastern
Europe. I found the following information (condensed)
Hungary - no restrictions
Byelorussia - license needed from State Security Committee to
"manufacture, repair, and operate" cryptography
Russia - license required to import cryptography. All
cryptography needs a license from FAPSI.
Someone else also pointed me to Privacy International, they're at
http://www.privacy.org/pi/. They do coverage of privacy issues around
the world. It's not so much a crypto site, more general civil
liberties. Some good information, but again not much for crypto in
this part of the world.
So I couldn't find any information at all for these places: Albania,
Bulgaria, Estonia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Macedonia, Romania,
Ukraine, Yugoslavia. I guess there's not much about these countries on
the net. I'd guess many of these places don't have formal laws in
place to handle cryptography. I'll ask my students, maybe they know more.
Next question - does anyone actually obey these laws in Russia and
Byelorussia? Are they enforced?
