Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!brl-adm!rutgers!ames!ucbcad!ucbvax!jade!topaz.berkeley.edu!newton2 From: newton2@topaz.berkeley.edu Newsgroups: sci.crypt Subject: Re: encryption with public keys Message-ID: <2050@jade.BERKELEY.EDU> Date: Wed, 24-Dec-86 15:46:13 EST Article-I.D.: jade.2050 Posted: Wed Dec 24 15:46:13 1986 Date-Received: Thu, 25-Dec-86 18:39:55 EST References: <3072@ihuxf.UUCP> <9001@duke.duke.UUCP> <7447@utzoo.UUCP> <230@gaia.UUCP> Sender: usenet@jade.BERKELEY.EDU Reply-To: newton2@topaz.berkeley.edu.UUCP () Organization: University of California, Berkeley Lines: 36 Summary: RSA patent held by MIT Well, I've dealt, as a developer of devices using PKC, with RSA Data Security, have negotiated (but not consummated) licensing agreements with them, and have invesitigated the roots of their patent claims. "The" patent is held by MIT, licensed to RSA Data Security, which offers sublicenses. I'd say it's at best murky just what MIT owns, and vastly more obscure what RSA Data Security is entitled to license to third parties. I have the documents around somewhere, but anyone seriously interested in exploitation of RSA should, I suppose, get in touch with RSA Data Security. However, I ofer my own experience to this extent: after *many* meetings with officers of the company, I came away more puzzled and suspicious (in ways too numerous, and some too subtle, to make explicit here) about just what they were about than I *ever* was in dealing with the friendly boy scouts of NSA. And as to help in implementing the system (they make a show of the fact that Ron Rivest and Len Adelman are supposedly hands-on principals of the company), well, let's just say I came to doubt there'd be any. Ditto for "certification" by R, S or A. Just to be fair (!), I guess I should mention that the company with which *I* was associated deliquesced before my uncomfortable feelings about RSA Data Security could be confirmed. Anyway, the original posting to sci.crypt concerned someone writing and publishing a public domain RSA package- you sure don't need a lawyer to do *that*. Patents reserve the right to make, use and sell artifacts which are narrowly and explicitly defined in the claims of the patent. Research and the disclosure of the fruits thereof are not among the prescribed activities, as far as I can tell. Making, using or selling such a program seems quite distinct from developing (i.e., inventing) it. A patent, even a valid and strong one (a minority) doesn't confer the right to make every other thinker curl up and die. Doug Maisel 56 Panoramic Way Berkeley, CA 94704 (415) 848-4257