On Fri, Jul 21, 2000 at 07:21:49PM -0400, SteveC wrote:
> At the risk of going against the tide, I would rather be in a country
> where they did search some percentage of the incoming passport holders
> belongings than one where they didn't.
The problem here is not criminals. It's you getting convicted of something
you did not even realize was illegal.
Suppose you go to Europe and snag a copy of the video from prime-time TV
which is the Coppertone suntan lotion commercial. You just want to show
your friends the difference from American TV. You'd better encrypt it
and hide it if you bring it back on your computer because it can get
you arrested at Customs for possesion of child pornography. You can become
another political prisoner.
> A combination of intelligence and criminalality does not happen that
> often, so criminals encrypting all their secret stuff is not of import to
> me. What I do worry about is paying my taxes so people can walk in the
> country and claim benefit.
Why is it Ok for tax money to be spent on various entrapment schemes
by law enforcement? Why is Ok for tax money to be spent for Customs
to enforce the American right-wing religious nut standard of pornography
on world travelers?
> Not that I am in favour of the RiP bill, it is terrible but in order to
> have some kind of democracy you have to protect it from other forms of
> government, terrorism and criminals. The best thing for us to do is
> promote tools like pgp or hushmail, so those who really do need free
> speech can get it.
People should have a right of free speech whether they need it or not.
Even simple cryptography should be sufficient in the Western World to
indicate your expectation of privacy and require law enforcement to have
probable cause before searching it.
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