[LINK] Article on push for more surveillance/escrow

[Jan Whitaker]

This in the Age today.  Story started out about satellite phones for bin 
Laden, but ended with this:

http://theage.com.au/news/world/2001/09/30/FFXYY4VA6SC.html

FBI investigators had been able to locate hundreds of e-mail
                    communications, sent 30 to 45 days before the attack. 
The messages,
                    in both English and Arabic, were sent within the US and
                    internationally. They had been sent from personal 
computers or from
                    public sites such as libraries. According to the FBI, 
the conspirators
                    did not use encryption; once found, the e-mails could 
be openly read.

                    Dr Brian Gladman, formerly responsible for electronic 
security at the
                    Ministry of Defence and NATO, believes that the reason 
the terrorists
                    didn't use encrypted e-mail is that it would have 
"stood out like a sore
                    thumb" to NSA's surveillance network. There is also 
evidence that the
                    terrorists used simple open codes to conceal who and 
what they were
                    talking about. This low-tech method works. Unless given 
leads, even
                    the vast Echelon network run by NSA and GCHQ cannot 
separate
                    such messages from innocuous traffic.

                    NSA's problem, says Gladman, is that "the volume of 
communications
                    is killing them. They just can't keep up. It's not 
about encryption".

                    The NSA has been trying to keep up with the Internet by 
building
                    huge online storage-systems to sift e-mail. Dr Gladman 
and other
                    experts believe that, unless primed by intelligence 
from traditional
                    agents, these massive spy libraries are doomed to fail. 
The problem
                    with NSA's purely technological approach is that it 
cannot know what
                    it is looking for. While computers can search for 
patterns, the problem
                    of correlating different pieces of information rises 
exponentially as ever
                    more communications are intercepted.

                    The new legal plans may therefore do more harm than good.
                    According to Cambridge computer security specialist Dr 
Ian Miller,
                    bringing back escrow "will damage our security in other 
ways, and
                    divert an enormous amount of effort that would far 
better be spent
                    elsewhere. It won't inconvenience competent terrorists 
in the least".

                    Phil Zimmermann, inventor of the PGP encryption system, 
thinks the
                    penalty of politicians misunderstanding technology will 
be more costly.
                    "If we install blanket surveillance systems, it will 
mean the terrorists
                    have won. The terrorists will have cost us our 
freedom," he says.

Re the satellite phone part of the story.  Couldn't the guy just change to 
a new phone and stop using the old one since it was not longer secret? duh....

JLWhitaker Associates
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
jwhit@primenet.com  --  http://www.primenet.com/~jwhit/whitentr.htm