-- Matthew Lyle (214) 888-0474 OpenConnect Systems matt@oc.com Dallas, TX "...and once you have tasted flight, you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you long to return..." Computer Group, Libertarians Question Clinton Phone Privacy Stance By Rory J. O'Connor, San Jose Mercury News, Calif. Knight-Ridder/Tribune Business News SAN JOSE, Calif.--Apr. 17--Civil libertarians and a major computer industry group raised concerns Friday about how much protection a Clinton administration plan would afford private electronic communications, from cellular telephone calls to computer data. The administration Friday said it would begin using technology developed by the government's National Institute of Standards and Technology to balance two competing interests: the desire of citizens to keep their conversations private and the need for law enforcement agencies to monitor those conversations after getting a court order. The technology that enables this is a computer chip called the Clipper Chip that scrambles a telephone call or computer message using a secret algorithm, or formula. But each chip also comes with a pair of electronic "keys" that could be used by law enforcement agencies to decipher the secret messages generated by the chip. The Clinton proposal calls for one key to be held by each of two separate "trusted" third parties, who would release them to law enforcement agencies that obtained legal authority to intercept the communications. Both keys would be needed to decipher a message. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a not-for-profit civil liberties group, praised the administration for considering the issue. But it criticized the lack of public input into the plan. "They've announced a big inquiry with public input, but they've reached a conclusion before they started," said Daniel J. Weitzner, staff counsel for the Washington-based foundation. Although the administration's plan calls only for equipping government telephones with the security devices, some groups are concerned the plan might become a standard for all manner of electronic communication before the public has a chance to debate its merits. "I don't want to sound too stridently opposed to this," said Ken Wasch, executive director of the Software Publishers Association (SPA) in Washington. "But...we feel blindsided." The SPA was discussing data security issues with Clinton administration officials but had not expected any White House action until August, said Ilene Rosenthal, general counsel. Besides the lack of initial hearings, both groups said they had two major concerns about the Clinton plan: - Because the algorithm itself is secret, the groups say it is impossible for the public to discern if it is truly secure. Users can't be certain government spy agencies have not hidden a "back door" in the software that will allow them to read anything they want. "So far there hasn't been a credible explanation about why the algorithm has to be secret," Weitzner said. - The administration hasn't decided who will be the escrow agents, and it seems unlikely any government agency, corporate entity or other organization would be deemed trustworthy by every user. Even assuming all concerned can agree on who will hold them, civil libertarians are concerned that the keys, by giving law enforcement agencies access to individuals' private communications, might pose a threat to constitutional protections against self-incrimination. Washington sources who requested anonymity suggested the White House might have drafted its plan quickly because of concern over sales of an AT&T device that encrypts phone calls using an older standard, Data Encryption Standard. The sources said law enforcement officials feared the device would create an explosion in secured telephone traffic that would severely hamper their efforts to wiretap calls. American Telephone & Telegraph Co. announced Friday it would adapt the $1,200 product, called the Telephone Security Device, to use the Clipper Chip by the end of this fiscal quarter. AT&T makes a related device, which encrypts voice and computer data transmissions, that could be converted to the Clipper technology, said spokesman Bill Jones. Jones said he wasn't aware of any concern by the government over the current model of the Telephone Security Device, which has been sold to government and business customers. At least one company was quite pleased with the plan: San Jose chip maker VLSI Technology, which will manufacture the Clipper chips for a Torrance company that is selling them to the government and to AT&T. VLSI, which invented a manufacturing method the company said makes it difficult to "reverse engineer" the chip or discern the encryption scheme, expects to make $50 million in the next three years selling the device, said Jeff Hendy, director of new product marketing for the company. END!A?SJ-SECURITY Transmitted: 93-04-18 21:06:00 EDT