On Thu, Sep 30, 1999 at 07:23:53PM +0300, Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho wrote: > On Thu, Sep 30, 1999 at 08:50:40AM -0400, Raul Miller wrote: > > Treaties are different from laws. > > On the contrary, ratified treaties are a binding part of the Finnish > legislation, as if they were ordinary laws passed by the parliament. > (IIRC) > > This may be different in the common law (sp?) system used in USA, though. > > IANAL, of course.
Well, technically, there are no laws against encryption in the U.S.A. There are laws against exporting munitions. There's a regulation which classifies encryption as munitions (in the same category as atomic weapons). It's probably true that this executive decision doesn't have much bearing on treaty negotiations. Then again, treaty restrictions on the use of atomic weapons don't do anything to prevent the U.S. government from classifying encryption in the same fashion as atomic weaponry for the purposes what's legal to export from the U.S. The U.S.'s first ammendment does prohibit at least some of the current restrictions, but for the most part no one with enough authority to do much about this really cares. -- Raul