Daniel Bernstein seems intent on striking the deathblow to U.S. government regulations on cryptography.
The latest chapter in his decade-long battle began to unfold on Friday, when lawyers representing both the
Department of Commerce and
Bernstein , a University of Illinois associate professor of mathematics, statistics and computer science, prepared to ask federal district court judge Marilyn Hall Patel to grant a summary judgment. At stake: the last remnants of a system that once prevented U.S. citizens from releasing software code that creates secure, electronic communications.
Bernstein is trying to eradicate the last of the export laws that previously kept Americans from distributing any work related to cryptography.
It's a bit confusing to some in the cryptography arena who feel that the current laws allow anyone to distribute their programs without fear of reprimand. Bruce Schneier, security expert and author of Applied Cryptography, said the future battle over encryption won't be trying to free software code, but rather preventing corporations from using it to limit rights.
"We always thought about cryptography as being a tool to protect the little guy versus the big guy," said Schneier. "It never occurred to us that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act would get passed."
Even with the
looming fight over the DMCA, many are still uncomfortable with the court battle Bernstein continues to wage.
"When you empower people to do things, we empower them to do bad things," said Mike Godwin, staff council at the
Center for Democracy and Technology . "It's a hard problem: What do you allow people to do in a free society? This is the hard part of democracy. You have to end up trusting people."
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