[162] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: Ireland: Bid To Ban "Tamper Proof" Phones
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Conrad Hughes)
Wed Feb 5 12:43:58 1997
To: efi-talk@efi.ie
cc: kooltek@iol.ie, mani@gateweb.co.uk, aaa-list@access.org.uk,
krypto@rhein-main.de, cryptography@c2.net
In-reply-to: Message from Phil Karn
dated Tuesday at 14:12.
Date: Wed, 05 Feb 1997 10:36:01 +0000
From: Conrad Hughes <conradh@harlequin.co.uk>
>Question: have there been any problems with the use of strong
>encryption (PGP, SSH, etc) on the Internet in Ireland?
Not that I've ever heard of, on or off the Internet - I heard a rumour
that the armed forces ran into some kind of constitutional/legal trouble
over their plans to use or implement secure telephony, but it sounds
distinctly silly.
Having worked in the crypto "industry" in Ireland for a number of years,
I'd say that relative to the rest of Europe it's almost a crypto haven:
there are no enforced laws covering it (although it has been suggested
that some of our laws could be twisted to cover it if desired), and it
isn't considered a worthy target for patents - for example the
Ascom-Tech AG patent on IDEA doesn't cover Ireland.
>Is it widely used over there?
Not terribly. There are (literally, I think) a couple of companies
selling cryptographic software, and a number of software and hardware
companies which use other people's crypto in their product. The usual
big boys are end users. I haven't been aware of its wide use on an
individual basis, although my previous employer was trying to change
that at one point :)
Conrad
