[Openswan Users] FBI can revoke an American's right to use Openswan (or any software)

[Paul Wouters]

FBI to get veto power over PC software?


http://news.com.com/2061-10804_3-5884130.html?tag=pulse.tb
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-05-151A1.pdf
http://news.com.com/Wiretap+rules+for+VoIP%2C+broadband+coming+in+2007/2100-7352_3-5883032.html?tag=nl
http://www.fcc.gov/FCC-05-153A1.pdf

September 27, 2005 11:37 AM PDT
FBI to get veto power over PC software?
The Federal Communications Commission thinks you have the right to use
software on your computer only if the FBI approves.

No, really. In an obscure "policy" document released around 9 p.m. ET
last Friday, the FCC announced this remarkable decision.

According to the three-page document, to preserve the openness
that characterizes today's Internet, "consumers are entitled to run
applications and use services of their choice, subject to the needs of
law enforcement." Read the last seven words again.

The FCC didn't offer much in the way of clarification. But the clearest
reading of the pronouncement is that some unelected bureaucrats at
the commission have decreeed that Americans don't have the right to
use software such as Skype or PGPfone if it doesn't support mandatory
backdoors for wiretapping. (That interpretation was confirmed by an
FCC spokesman on Monday, who asked not to be identified by name. Also,
the announcement came at the same time as the FCC posted its wiretapping
rules for Internet telephony.)

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