FC: Frank Sudia's proposal: Let's revive encryption key escrow

Sun Sep 16 19:51:10 EDT 2001

Hoo boy...

In light of the following, it's getting harder and harder to imagine that
Kawika Daguio, Eric Hughes and Frank Sudia all tried to start up an
open-source financial software consulting company a little while ago...

Of course, the idea of a patent pool, in the case of internet bearer
patents (blind signatures, etc.,) anyway, is not a new one in the
cryptographic business.

Nobody's gotten a chance to try it, much less see if it will fly, though.
The irony meter pegs all over the place...

Cheers,
RAH

--- begin forwarded text

Status:  U
Date: Sun, 16 Sep 2001 19:04:20 -0400
To: politech at politechbot.com
From: Declan McCullagh <declan at well.com>
Subject: FC: Frank Sudia's proposal: Let's revive encryption key escrow
Cc: fsudia at home.com, frank at sudialab.com
Sender: owner-politech at politechbot.com
Reply-To: declan at well.com

Frank Sudia's bio says that he is a programmer, a lawyer, a public policy
analyst, and a co-founder of the CertCo encryption company, formerly part
of Bankers Trust. He is also the creator of the "Bankers Trust Corporate
Key Escrow System."

His paper (see the link below)  is a suggestion for a route for Congress to
take if they "decided to require all encryption systems to be readable by
authorized legal authorities."

-Declan

**********

From: "Frank Sudia" <fsudia at home.com>
Saturday: September 15, 2001 02:14 AM
To:   <info at security-policy.org>
       <mailbox at gregg.senate.gov>
       "Dorothy Denning" <denning at cs.cosc.georgetown.edu>
       "Stewart Baker" <SBaker at steptoe.com>
Subject:  Encryption and the Restoration of National Sovereignty

Dear Policy Professional,

In response to the Attack on America, I have drawn upon my extensive work in
secure banking systems, key escrow systems, and patent licensing to bring
you the following white paper (about 10 pages of text).

Frank W. Sudia, JD, "Encryption and the Restoration of National Sovereignty:
Proposal for an Escrow Patent Pool Corporation," September 14, 2001.

     http://www.sudialab.com/sov-eppc.htm.

While at Bankers Trust (1991-98) I designed one of the largest encryption
systems in the world, the Global Trust Organization.  Chartered in 1999 as
Identrus LLC (www.identrus.com) it now includes 50 of the world's largest
banks.

In my view, encryption policy options are poorly understood.  The power of
government to protect the nation should not be in doubt, yet the debate has
been skewed by the claims of opponents that such systems will not or cannot
work.

In reality, it would be straightforward to build a system that is much more
secure than the current banking system.  However, this has not been done,
and cannot be done, because complex patent problems must be resolved.

Before anything serious and believable can ever be built, even on a test
basis, we must aggregate the required patents into product pools, using
government money and eminent domain powers, if necessary.  And we must fund
the development of prototypes.  Only after viability has been established
can the commercial sector move forward with products that are highly secure
and credible.

For further information, please do not hesitate to contact me.  If you are a
contact or friend of mine, I would appreciate comments, which will be
acknowledged in any future version.

Regards,
Frank Sudia

www.SudiaLab.com
415-648-7415

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-- 
-----------------
R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

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