[LINK] UK Police Can Now Demand Encryption Keys

[Rick Welykochy]

Lifted from the latest edition of the CRYPTOGRAM Newsletter by Schneier ...
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UK Police Can Now Demand Encryption Keys

Under a new law that went into effect this month, it is now a crime to refuse to turn a decryption key over to the police.

I'm not sure of the point of this law.  Certainly it will have the effect of spooking businesses, who now have to worry 
about the police demanding their encryption keys and exposing their entire operations.

 >From the ArsTechnica article:

"Cambridge University security expert Richard Clayton said in May of 2006 that such laws would only encourage businesses 
to house their cryptography operations out of the reach of UK investigators, potentially harming the country's economy. 
'The controversy here [lies in] seizing keys, not in forcing people to decrypt. The power to seize encryption keys is 
spooking big business, ' Clayton said.

"'The notion that international bankers would be wary of bringing master keys into UK if they could be seized as part of 
legitimate police operations, or by a corrupt chief constable, has quite a lot of traction,' he added. 'With the 
appropriate paperwork, keys can be seized. If you're an international banker you'll plonk your headquarters in Zurich.'"

But if you're guilty of something that can only be proved by the decrypted data, you might be better off refusing to 
divulge the key (and facing the maximum five-year penalty the statue provides) instead of being convicted for whatever 
more serious charge you're actually guilty of.

I think this is just another skirmish in the "war on encryption" that has been going on for the past fifteen years. 
(Anyone remember the Clipper chip?)  The police have long maintained that encryption is an insurmountable obstacle to 
law and order:

"The Home Office has steadfastly proclaimed that the law is aimed at catching terrorists, pedophiles, and hardened 
criminals -- all parties which the UK government contents are rather adept at using encryption to cover up their 
activities."

We heard the same thing from FBI Director Louis Freeh in 1993.  I called them "The Four Horsemen of the Information 
Apocalypse" --  terrorists, drug dealers, kidnappers, and child pornographers -- and they have been used to justify all 
sorts of new police powers.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071001-uk-can-now-demand-data-decryption-on-penalty-of-jail-time.html or 
http://tinyurl.com/3btatf
http://ct.techrepublic.com.com/clicks?t=40345835-0f1945960a0400a9a01bdf730f084221-bf&s=5&fs=0 or http://tinyurl.com/2o9545
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/10/03/ripa-decryption_keys_power/



-- 
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Rick Welykochy || Praxis Services

When will governments realise that we do not want to live in economies,
we want to live in societies.
      -- Les Twentyman