Cryptography Policy and the Information Economy

This paper is a high-level technical overview of the impact of cryptography on the computing and communications industries, with emphasis on the implications of the Administration’s recent cryptography policy initiatives. It represents the best judgement of its author, and does not necessarily reflect the position of AT&T or any other organization. We argue that unless a fundamental change is made in the direction of our cryptography policy, the United States’ dominance in the emerging “information economy” will ultimately be placed in jeopardy. In particular, current policy fails to recognize several increasingly important realities of cryptographic technology: