Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

dustinkirkland.wordpress.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 126 posts

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#91

Post by chernevik »

tptacek wrote: post #69
chernevik wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Sense of Congress resolutions don't create law. They're literally just statements of opinion. So the idea that this amendment would have "outlawed SSH" is directly mistaken." This is not correct, or if correct, is so in a manner meaningless for any layman. "Sense of the Senate" language is often important in judicial and / or executive interpretation. It may not be "law" but can often matter a great deal in the impl…

You don't have to read tea leaves to figure out what Biden actually believed. His name is on CALEA, which passed less than a year later. CALEA explicitly does not criminalize encryption.

I'll add to my various rantings: This is has been an unexpectedly crummy day for me. I hope that, if given a better mood and better form, I could more clear and less snarky.

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#92

Post by jfarmer »

chernevik wrote: post #83
jfarmer wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

chernevik, speaking as a neutral-but-technically-minded third party: between the two of you, Thomas comes off as as much more sensible and convincing. Maybe your your argument is too smart for me, though.

I'm arguing first that he's wrong about Biden not proposing "law". Second, and more obsessively, that his insistence on a point so obviously wrong suggests his purpose is rhetorical rather than clarifying. I.e. he cares more about how things appear than helping people see what they really are. Subsequently I don't seem to be doing much more than throwing food. Maybe I should unplug my computer until I'm in a better m…

Quoting you earlier: "defuse a true statement by making assessment of that truth so complicated that most readers won't bother"

That's how I feel now. I have no idea what you're saying.

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#93

Post by rayiner »

downandout wrote: post #44

On this issue, Biden was clearly on the wrong side of history (and some of the fundamental tenets upon which the US was founded). But I don't think anyone, even ardent Obama supporters, would argue that he's the brightest star in the sky anyway. He is perhaps the strongest protection against an Obama assassination, since no one would want him to take office. Fortunately, the system worked in this case. A dangerous la…

> On this issue, Biden was clearly on the wrong side of history (and some of the fundamental tenets upon which the US was founded).

Probably on the wrong side of history, but it's pure historical revisionism to say it opposed any principle the U.S. was founded upon. Common law courts in England had broad subpoena powers (just like modern U.S. courts). Moreover, investigators had unlimited access to private documents pursuant to a validly executed warrant. The founders never contemplated a "document the government could never get at." What they contemplated was a series of protections against the government's ability to get documents.

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#94

Post by chernevik »

chernevik wrote: post #82
FreakLegion wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I won't speak for Thomas, but I used to teach "Politics and the English Language" in rhetoric and argumentation courses. There are two important things worth pointing out here: 1. Your understanding of the problem domain of language and politics, at least in this post, is incredibly naive. For a rigorous analysis of the subject, try something like Chaïm Perelman's Treatise on Argumentation or one of Ronald Dworkin's…

Ooh, wow, arguments from authority. As you are so learned, and Chaïm and Ronald aren't here, perhaps you'd care to offer their more proper reading of Orwell. And as you're so learned, you'll immediately know my remark as a paraphrase, and of whom. Right? Because when I read a book, I do so in such a fashion as to repeat its argument, rather than assign others reading I couldn't do properly in the first place. Nor can…

Time's up.

"Meno: And did you still not think [Gorgias] knew [what excellence was]? "Socrates: I'm rather forgetful, Meno . . . maybe you know what he used to say. If so, remind me . . . . let's leave him out of it; he's not here after all."

From Plato's "Meno".

Here's another fun quote:

GLENDOWER. I can call spirits from the vasty deep. HOTSPUR. Why, so can I, or so can any man; But will they come when you do call for them?

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#95

Post by chernevik »

jfarmer wrote: post #92
chernevik wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm arguing first that he's wrong about Biden not proposing "law". Second, and more obsessively, that his insistence on a point so obviously wrong suggests his purpose is rhetorical rather than clarifying. I.e. he cares more about how things appear than helping people see what they really are. Subsequently I don't seem to be doing much more than throwing food. Maybe I should unplug my computer until I'm in a better m…

Quoting you earlier: "defuse a true statement by making assessment of that truth so complicated that most readers won't bother" That's how I feel now. I have no idea what you're saying.

I'm largely saying he's arguing more to confuse than explain. And that he might not actually be aware he's doing so.

I think this sort of thing is important. Most people think this sort of thing is annoying. It's true that arguments like this are usually a waste of time, and this seems no different.

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#96

Post by protomyth »

philwelch wrote: post #57
jacoblyles wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feinstein won't lose because this is a solid Democratic state. Unless there is an organized primary campaign against her, elections are an auto-win for the Feinstein campaign.

If only there was some kind of civil libertarian Democratic tea party movement.

Given that the Democrats now control the state with a supermajority, and California's fiscals aren't looking like they will improve; you might see some sort of rebellion in the party. I wouldn't hold my breath though.

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#97

Post by fpgeek »

biesnecker wrote: post #40
mtgx wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Term limits would solve most of the lobbying/bribing/corruption problem in Washington. It wouldn't fix for good, but it would make paying for passing new laws a lot more expensive for companies. Also if everyone could only run once, they'd be a lot less worried about begging for donations for the next campaign. According to Larry Lessig representatives spend up to 70% of their time trying to get donations for their n…

I think term limits only make sense if you believe that you don't get better at being a legislator with experience. If you don't, then yes, absolutely, term limits will make buying votes far more expensive, but if you do, then you're constantly running the country with a team of redshirt freshmen, which may well be worse than corporate interests being able to influence policy decisions.

And those redshirt freshmen would be dealing with experienced professors of lobbying. I don't think term limits would do much (if anything) to lessen the influence of corporate interests and could easily make the problem worse.

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#98

Post by wdr1 »

tptacek wrote: post #63
wdr1 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The whole US government tried to ban encryption wholesale in the 1990s This simply isn't true. I'm not sure if you're attempting to absolve Biden of his dreadful part in banning encryption, but if the entire government wanted something to happen, it would have happened. Yes, PGP was out in the open, however, the government obviously could still have required it, still could have mandated the Clipper Chip, etc. Also…

Biden never banned encryption; the only statute I can find that bears his name says the opposite. I'm interested in the Ashcroft and Kerry references you're thinking of. Were they contemporaneous, or from the late '90s? In the late 1990s, there was a sharp shift towards liberalizing crypto, with competing bills introduced in the House and Senate by both parties. The argument shifted from "will we mandate key escrow f…

Here's a direct link to the legislation in question:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d102:s.00266:

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#99

Post by underdown »

tptacek wrote: post #49
mtgx wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope she loses in the next election. She was the one that pretty forcefully pushed the FISA reauthorization with as little debate as possible through Senate. It made me angry just hearing her talk about how the Senate shouldn't waste any time with the amendments and just quickly pass FISA before the year is over.

She cosponsored the bill they were renewing back in 2008. What did you expect her to think?

presumably learn from her mistakes?

Re: Joe Biden tried to ban email encryption back in 1991

#100

Post by Spooky23 »

declan wrote: post #25
tptacek wrote: post #7

The whole US government tried to ban encryption wholesale in the 1990s; they even attempted to standardize a bespoke algorithm (Skipjack) that provided key escrow for law enforcement. During the same period, they religiously enforced export controls that classified any encryption code, including simple hash functions, as munitions. I remember buying a "this t-shirt is a munition" shirt in '95 by giving a website the…

Although Biden's amendment by itself wouldn't have outlawed SSH, it was enough to make programmers see the writing on the wall. A bill with domestic restrictions on encryption was approved by a House committee in the 1990s, and Biden's bill was what prompted PRZ to release PGP, as PRZ himself said at the time. See: http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20032910-281.html In response to lobbying from the FBI, a House commi…

House bills that propose dumb or futile things and subsequently go nowhere are really common -- that two year term means that you need to show voters and donors that you mean business.

Tilting at some windmill that matters to the folks at home is like a public affirmation that declares a Congressman worthy of endorsement. (ie. police unions probably care about FBI endorsed bills)

Post reply on HN