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Re: PGP in the US (Re: formal documents)



On Sun, Oct 04, 1998 at 09:49:44AM -0400, Kikutani Makoto wrote:
> > > Do you accept a passport as the above formal documents ?
> > 
> > Yes.  [Though if there is any opportunity to meet another developer in
> 
> Good. I asked this because Japanese developers who are planning to
> become maintainers feel difficulty to have an international call
> for the real-life identity verification.
> 
> BTW. 
> I'm a Japanese living in the United States, but not a permanent
> resident. I've heared that the usage of PGP in the States by
> a person like me is controversial. I posted this qestion to some
> related Mailing-Lists (such as mutt-users).
> Someone said "No problem", someone said "You shouldn't use it".
> I'm very confused.

If you brought it with you (and can PROVE it) there is probably no problem
in theory.

I wouldn't put it past the gov't to try it, but if they do I'm sure the EFF
and/or ALCU would be HAPPY to make a Very Very Big Issue out of it.

Most of those who are citizens of the US who routinely export crypto or have
done so in a public manner as an act of civil disobedience do so fully
realizing the consiquences---but also fully realizing how silly the case is
going to look when the EFF starts making press releases saying that someone
was arrested for downloading a web page, then clicking a submit button to
send the information downloaded back to the same server it was retrieved
from..  You have to admit they'd look damned silly and it would probably
look really bad for them justifying the crypto laws considering.

I've participated in this.  I can tell you that after 8 months, nothing has
been done to me or to anyone else who has done this.  I'm sure my fones are
probably tapped and all that, but <shrug> I've always assumed that unsecure
links are unsecure and that someone with enough money and power (the US
gov't comes to mind) can probably crack a secure link as well.

Attachment: pgpS10sDIUhnT.pgp
Description: PGP signature


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