[1632] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
RE: Legislation is useless
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Cryptography)
Fri Sep 26 12:33:56 1997
From: Cryptography <cryptography@lists.ecosystems.net>
To: cryptography@c2.net
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 1997 13:22:39 -0700
> engineers in these companies with a libertarian bent would want to
> wait
> till as many of their phones which could easily accomodate crypto were
> deployed (making recall and control all but impossible) before leaking
> the
> firmware/hardware changes.
>
Now there's a cool idea. A phone with a flashable ROM.
Also, there will soon come to market a number of Windows CE and
Java-based telephones that will use POTS, PCS, ADSL, and/or ethernet
connections -- the latter (or two) enabling H.323 voice over IP and
utilize H.323-PSTN gateways.
This will push the issue. Once there is an open mass-market telelphony
platform, cryptographic software could easily be developed and
distributed and very well may come from overseas with electronic
distribution. One can hardly ban the manufacture and sale of
programmable telephone devices. At that point restricting telephone
encryption becomes near impossible -- so much for the FBI's expensive
tax-dollar paid wiretapping infrastructure.
Matt
Matthew James Gering
mgering@ecosystems.net
