“The British Government is currently consulting Business on
legislation to regulate the use of strong cryptography in the
UK.”
Date: Mon, 08 Mar 1999 16:57:45 +0000 From: Stefan Magdalinski <stefan@isness.org> Subject: New UK law threatens to cripple Net commerce PRIVACY AND NET COMMERCE AT RISK http://www.stand.org.uk/ Like all your incoming e-mail, this message could have been read by anyone. It has passed through many computers on its way to you. Each of those machines is vulnerable to malicious monitoring. Your outgoing mail is the same. So is your Web browsing. Given enough effort, all of your Net communications, personal or commercial, are insecure. This is a problem for the Net - but there is a fix. The fix is strong cryptography. It's a simple, mathematical process which can protect data on the Net from prying eyes and mischief. It's easy to set up, straightforward to use, and all the relevant technology is in the public domain. The British Government is currently consulting Business on legislation to regulate the use of strong cryptography in the UK. We believe it is of vital importance that the wider net community make their voices heard also. We know that the Government believes that not enough people understand the importance of this technology to make a fuss. We also know that very few MPs realise the universal impact of the Net on their constituents' future, and hence the scale of the issues involved. You can change help change that. HELP REPAIR THE E-COMMERCE BILL - visit http://www.stand.org.uk/ We need to educate our MPs, and fast. The Government is determined to pass the E-Commerce bill in this Parliament. Stand.org.uk invites visitors to enter their postcode, and "adopt" their local MP. In addition for an attractive personalised adoption certificate, they can monitor their MP's activities and parliamentary performance. Even better, this one-step adoption process lets users signal their MPs that it is unacceptable for the Goverment to endanger our infrastructure in return for the unproven benefits of being able to 'wiretap' the population. Thanks for your help, The Volunteers at Stand, http://www.stand.org.uk/