said by StuartMW:said by KodiacZiller:While I agree with the British government's decision to restrict the export of such software to oppressive regimes...
Ok. How would you implement such a restriction? It is trivial to get code
anywhere (with or without internet access).
I wouldn't. There's no way to do so. The Brits are using outdated crypto export laws as a way to do it in this case, but such an approach is nothing but theatre.
The U.S. tried to exercise the export laws against Phil Zimmermann in the 90's because of his dissemination of PGP. So he took the code to PGP and published it in a book and sent copies of the book abroad. A very clever tactic it was since books are protected by the 1st amendment. The government knew it was a losing battle and dropped all charges. Shortly after, Clinton and company relaxed the crypto export restrictions.
My only point was that I agree with the *intentions* of the British government, not with the practicality of enforcing it. I cringe when I hear tech companies are making money by aiding oppressive regimes in their surveillance programs. FinSpy is but one example. An example of an American company doing the same thing is Narus (owned by Boeing) with it's ISP snooping hardware (this is the hardware NSA used to tap AT&T's backbone). Narus has also sold these boxes to oppressive regimes in the Middle East and appear to be getting away with doing so. And they have a former Deputy Director of NSA on their Board of Directors. Money trumps morals in this case.
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