Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!isishq!doug From: doug@isishq.FIDONET.ORG (Doug Thompson) Newsgroups: comp.society.futures Subject: Re: Digital Information Rights Message-ID: <825.2396037C@isishq.FIDONET.ORG> Date: 2 Dec 88 07:30:00 GMT Organization: International Student Information Service -- Headquarters Lines: 42 WAC>From: faustus@ic.Berkeley.EDU (Wayne A. Christopher) >How about discussions of using public-key cryptography for >identificati on? Why hasn't this become more widespread? Is there >really not that much of a need for reliable authentication? The newsgroup sci.crypt has carried on some useful discussion. The software is pretty straightforward. I wrote a pretty straightforward implementation some months ago. I dropped the project when some good friends in several countries assured me in very emphatic tones that the security and intelligence authorities in the USA would take extreme interest in my work. I have no way to evaluate the merits of those concerns. Suffice to to say that good software exists, the technique is exceedingly simple, and the lack of implementation does lead one to scratch one's head. There seems to be, especially in the USA, a profound fear that even mentioning the topic, let alone implementing PKE techniques will result in unpleasant correspondence with Big Brother. As I said, I have no way of appraising the validity of the concerns expressed. I sometimes wonder why I dropped my own PKE project. Am I chicken-shit or am I just too busy with other things?? Again, I'm really not well enough informed to make that judgement call. Or am I just chicken-shit?? Hard to say . . . . =Doug -- Doug Thompson - via FidoNet node 1:221/162 UUCP: ...!watmath!isishq!doug Internet: doug@isishq.FIDONET.ORG