From: mccoy@ils.nwu.edu (Jim Mccoy)
Subject: Re: PGP and real criminals
Reply-To: mccoy@ils.nwu.edu
Organization: The Institute for the Learning Sciences
Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1992 09:54:14 GMT

In article <1992Nov21.112308.60@nsrvan.vanc.wa.us>, sysevm@nsrvan.vanc.wa.us writes:
> In article <1ej1fsINN5ad@morrow.stanford.edu>, castor@drizzle.Stanford.EDU (Castor Fu) writes:
> > [should convicted felons be restricted from using cryptography?]
> > 
> > It seems to me that  once a person has violated certain rules, e.g.
> > child molestation, insider trading, etc.  one might restrict their
> > access to tools which are particularly useful towards those ends,
> > e.g. guns, crypto etc.
> 
> Let me get this straight. You are suggesting that convicted felons are
> required to give up their privacy even after their terms are up. I don't
> see the differience between this and requireing them to wear a transmitter
> at all times so that the LE staffers can listen in at random without due
> process (in principal). Felons have rights. (Yes, I know about no guns for
> felons but how was the constitution bypassed here?)


Well, the inability to use possess a firearm is not the only thing
convicted felons lose; they also cannot vote and have other restrictions
placed upon them.  Why?  Because they are _convicted felons_.  This means
that they have broken the societal codes that we have set up and "society"
basically feels that once you do that it can squash you like a bug.  This
is because felons have proven that they cannot be trusted to follow "the
rules" (or at least the most important ones, hence the felony/misdemeanor
distinction) and if they decide to continue living in this particular
society they must accept the fact that they have distinguished themselves
in this fashion and society has limited thier actions accordingly. That
is how the world works.  It may not be fair, but no one ever said life
would be fair.

----the real question-------

I guess this returns to the "is cryptography the gun of the information
age" question I asked a while back.  Information is not just an intangible
"essence", it is something we use to make decisions and to record our
actions, and the means in which we use it will be subject to judgement by
others.  In some cases the community/society may demand access to that
information and, while it may take a decision by a judge or court to
determine whether or not law enforcement officials may obtain access, when
we create tools that make this task impossible it is a moral imperitive to
examine the situations that have been discussed in this group recently.

Secure cryptography carries a danger in that it may be used for purposes
which we feel are immoral or unjustifiable.  By preventing access to
information it may be used to hide things that a society/community feels it
has a right to know.  It seems very easy for people to present straw-man
arguments regarding the dangers we face from the evil government forces
that are slinking around dark alleys in Washington waiting to impose the
new fascist police state upon America, but it seems that very few people
who present these arguments balance them by showing how thier right/need
for this sort of information protection overrides any possible claim that
might be made upon this information by the society/community of which they
are members.

Arguments against "key registration" and other possible limitations to
secure cryptography will almost always contain within them the words "right
to privacy", but few people who use this aegeis seem willing to acknowledge
any restrictions on this "right".  Privacy rights, at least in the US, are
a fragile construction at best.  Societies claim the right to know how much
a person earn to establish a tax on income, the right to privacy does not
protect information regarding one's criminal record, there are numerous
other cases where society claims a right to know certain pieces of
information.  In a sense I am playing devil's advocate here, but the nature
of this forum (Usenet) is one that places a high value on privacy and a
responsible inquiry into the nature of these tools demands that certain
questions be asked.

I am interested in hearing answers to this question: Why is it necessary for
citizens to have access to cryptography that prevents _any_ attempts at
information retrieval by law enforcement agents (assuming they are acting
on legitimate instructions from the court, or in other ways that society has
determined to be valid through it's process of making laws and regulations) ?


To further this discussion, perhaps we can try limiting this thread to the
"real criminals" in the Subject line.  Those who have been convicted or, in
the case of our "hypothetical example", who actually committed to crimes of
which they are accused.  A tool may be used for many purposes, do not
dismiss the immoral ones just because you may not use it in that fashion
yourself. 


jim
-- 
Jim McCoy          |  PGP 2.0 Key md5 hash:
j-mccoy@nwu.edu    |  61323c49024cb089337c78a05aafe8c6
mccoy@ils.nwu.edu  |  finger mccoy@ils.nwu.edu for public key