Bernstein's Continued Progress in Crypto Suit

corz writes "On October 18 Daniel J. Bernstein went back to court in his battle with the government over cryptography regulations. From his post to the export mailing list: 'Department of Justice attorney Tony Coppolino told the court that the government would not enforce the regulations against cryptographers working together at conferences. He also told the court that the government would treat "assembly language" as source code.' What does this mean for us? Wired News has more."

Comments

Can the outcome of this apply to patents too?

[tchuladdiass]

As far as I know, there is nothing in patent legislation that prevents one from publishing papers which describe a patented process or algorithm. So, if it is held that source code is the same as speech, then would non-binary distributed open source programs be free from patent suits? Now, if this were the case, it would still be up to the individual that obtains and compiles the source to rectify any patent issues (i.e., paying license fees, etc.). But, does patent law prevent an individual from producing an instance of that invention for personal use, as long as it is not distributed? What about for research purposes?

In Writing

[Jahf]

... told the court that the government would not enforce the regulations against cryptographers working together at conferences.

There's a law that can make it illegal, but the US DOJ says they won't enforce it in a specific circumstance.

Ok. Probably true ... for now. But nothing changes the law if they don't enforce it ...

Get it in writing and signed. Better yet, try and get the law changed.

Complacency == Approval.