If you are a US citizen, your brain is considered US territory no matter where it is physically located at the moment. The US believes that its laws apply to its citizens everywhere, not just within the US. Providing technical assistance or advice to foreign "munitions" projects is illegal.
The US government has very little sense of humor about this issue, does not make exceptions for freely-redistributable software, and does not consider good intentions to be sufficient excuse. Beware.
The FreeS/WAN project cannot accept software contributions, even small bug fixes, from US citizens or residents. We want it to be absolutely clear that our distribution is not subject to US export law; any contribution from an American might open that question to a debate we'd prefer to avoid. It might also put the contributor at serious legal risk.
Recent changes to US crypto export policy are described on the BXA site.
Information on various challenges to these laws is indexed in the
Cryptography Export Control Archives.
A number of countries:
Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada,
Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary,
Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway,
Poland, Portugal, Republic of Korea, Romania, Russian Federation,
Slovak Republic, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine,
United Kingdom and United States
have signed the Wassenaar Arrangement which restricts export of munitions
and other tools of war. Cryptographic sofware is covered there.
Wassenaar details are available from the
Wassenaar Secretariat,
and elsewhere in a more readable
HTML version.
For a critique see the
GILC site:
The aim of the Wassenaar Arrangement is to prevent the build up of
military capabilities that threaten regional and international
security and stability . . .
There is no sound basis within the Wassenaar Arrangement for the
continuation of any export controls on cryptographic products.
What's wrong with export restrictions
Two quotes from prominent cryptography experts:
The real aim of current policy is to ensure the continued effectiveness
of US information warfare assets against individuals, businesses and
governments in Europe and elsewhere.
Ross Anderson, Cambridge University
If the government were honest about its motives, then the debate
about crypto export policy would have ended years ago.
The Internet Architecture Board and the Internet Engineering Steering
Group made a strong statement in favour of
worldwide access to strong cryptography. Essentially the same statement
is in the appropriately numbered RFC 1984.
Bruce Schneier, Counterpane Systems
The Wassenaar Arrangement
Restrictions on the export of cryptography are not just US policy, though some
consider the US at least partly to blame for the policies of other nations in
this area.
The Global Internet Liberty Campaign (GILC) has begun a campaign
calling for the removal of cryptography controls from the Wassenaar
Arrangement.
We agree entirely.
Export status of Linux FreeS/WAN
We believe our software is entirely exempt from these controls since
the Wassenaar
General Software Note says:
The Lists do not control "software" which is either:There is a note restricting some of this, but it is a sub-heading under point 1, so it appears not to apply to public domain software.
- Generally available to the public by . . . retail . . .
- "In the public domain".
Their glossary defines "In the public domain" as:
. . . "technology" or "software" which has been made available without restrictions upon its further dissemination.We therefore believe that software freely distributed under the GNU Public License, such as Linux FreeS/WAN, is exempt from Wassenaar restrictions.N.B. Copyright restrictions do not remove "technology" or "software" from being "in the public domain".
Most of the development work is being done in Canada. Our understanding is that the Canadian government accepts this interpretation. A web statement of Canadian policy is available from the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.
Recent copies of the freely modifiable and distributable source code exist in many countries. Citizens all over the world participate in its use and evolution, and guard its ongoing distribution. Even if Canadian policy were to change, the software would continue to evolve in countries which do not restrict exports, and would continue to be imported from there into unfree countries. "The Net culture treats censorship as damage, and routes around it."
Please send a note about any new archive mirror sites or CD
distributions to linux-ipsec@clinet.fi so we can update the documentation.
Our list of web references on cryptography law and policy
is here.
Web References
Click below to go to: