House Panel Rejects Crypto Key Amendment (Wired)

   House Panel Rejects Crypto Key Amendment
   by Rebecca Vesely 
   6:45pm  24.Sep.97.PDT After nearly four hours of wrangling, the House
   Commerce Committee today passed a market-friendly encryption bill,
   voting down an amendment 35-16 that would have imposed strict domestic
   controls on encryption.
   
   "Throughout this debate in the past few weeks, the members have been
   swinging towards privacy," Representative Edward Markey
   (D-Massachusetts) told reporters after the vote. "I think that's going
   to happen in every single public debate that's held."
   
   The Security and Freedom through Encryption Act, sponsored by
   Representative Bob Goodlatte (R-Virginia), passed in a 40-11 vote with
   an amendment that strengthens penalties for using encryption in a
   crime from five years to 10. The amendment, sponsored by Markey and
   Representative Rick White (R-Washington), also establishes a "national
   encryption technology center" in which companies would work with law
   enforcement on encryption technologies, although where funding for the
   center would come from or who would participate is undefined.
   
   But the committee and the House remain deeply divided over just how
   much access law enforcement should have to digital communications.
   Despite two weeks of 'round-the-clock staff work and lobbyists
   haunting members and aides, panel members could not find a compromise
   between law enforcement and privacy concerns. In fact, many could not
   understand why technology can't sort the whole mess out.
   
   "If these cryptographers are so smart, why don't they invent some
   decryption devices for law enforcement?" asked Representative Mike
   Oxley (R-Ohio), a former FBI agent and chief sponsor of the
   pro-law-enforcement amendment that failed.
   
   Arguments for the need for law enforcement to access encrypted data
   surfaced again and again, as members pointed out that drug cartels use
   strong encryption to secure their data.
   
   "Computers and the Internet have become fertile ground for terrorists,
   drug cartels, and child pornographers," said Representative Greg
   Ganske (R-Iowa).
   
   But the committee majority appeared to be swayed by the argument that
   the wide availability of strong encryption on the global market made
   Oxley's proposal - to prevent all Americans from using encryption
   without immediate access to plaintext by law enforcement - illogical.
   
   "This is the Prohibition of the electronic age," said Representative
   Anna Eshoo (D-California). "People drank anyway. Liquor was out there,
   and it was easy to make."
   
   Markey pointed out another weakness in the Oxley proposal - its
   requirement for creation of a system to safeguard keys to every
   person's encrypted data. That would be a huge undertaking that many
   experts have warned would be immensely expensive and unwieldy. Markey
   said such a system could become the "Achilles' heel of electronic
   commerce."
   
   The bill's next test: the House Rules Committee, which will decide in
   what form, if any, the bill will reach the House floor. Two weeks ago,
   the House Intelligence and National Security committees passed a
   series of amendments, one similar to Oxley's, that would undercut the
   intent of Goodlatte's original legislation.
   
   Rules Committee chair Gerald Solomon (R-New York) sent a letter to
   Commerce Committee members warning them that he will block any
   variation on the Goodlatte bill that does not carry the strong key
   recovery provision Oxley tried to get passed.
   
   Goodlatte told reporters after the Commerce panel session that he is
   going to work immediately to try to get the bill over the next hurdle.
   
   "We are certainly going to be working with the leadership and the
   Rules Committee to make sure everybody who has an opinion about this
   gets heard and that we design a bill that will have strong bipartisan
   support," he said.
   
   Goodlatte still faces a long road. The bill has 252 House co-sponsors
   - a solid majority should it reach the floor. But it would still have
   to be reconciled with radically different Senate legislation and gain
   President Clinton's signature before it becomes law.

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