From Online Reporter, a sister publication
US export controls on encryption are damaging US industry and should be relaxed, according
to a two-year study carried out for Congress by the National Research Council. The committee report found that products that incorporate 56-bit DES for confidentiality should be made easily exportable and that the threshold of easy exportability…should be adjusted upward periodically as technology evolves. The report further warns that overly restrictive export controls threaten the US’s lead in encryption technology, increasing the likelihood that significant foreign competition will step into a vacuum left by the inability of US vendors to fill a demand. The committee of 16 also came out against immediate aggressive promotion of key escrow encryption; the basis of the Clinton administration’s controversial ‘Clipper’ scheme, though it agreed that it would be worth running some pilot projects. Committee chair Kenneth Dam, a law professor at the University of Chicago says in the report’s preface that the US government is embroiled in a crisis of policy, rather than a technology crisis, an industry crisis, a law enforcement crisis, or an intelligence-gathering crisis. In total the report, titled Cryptography’s Role In Securing the Information Society (CRISIS) makes six major recommendations, the broad thrust of which is that the US government needs to foster broad use of cryptographic technology, start an open debate and bring policy in line with market realities. The first debate of the report will take place on June 12 when the Congressional Commerce Committee’s subcommittee on Science, Space and Technology begins a series of public hearings. The subcommittee is chaired by Senator Conrad Burns, principal co- sponsor of the pro-CODE bill (S.1726) designed to free-up use of encryption technology in the US. Report excerpts, and a recommendation overview can be found at http://www2.nas.edu/cstbweb/28e2.html
