FC: Feds say keystroke logger details are covered by "national security"

[Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com>]

The FBI's Kerr has been named the CIA's next deputy director for
science and technology:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30341-2001Aug3.html

EPIC has placed the documents online:
http://www.epic.org/crypto/scarfo.html

---

http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,45851,00.html
   
   Feds: Spy Tool Is a Secret
   By Declan McCullagh (declan@wired.com)
   2:00 a.m. Aug. 7, 2001 PDT
   
   The U.S. government has invoked national security to argue that
   details of a new electronic surveillance technique must remain secret.
   
   Justice Department attorneys told a federal judge overseeing the
   prosecution of an alleged mobster that public disclosure of a
   classified keystroke logger would imperil ongoing investigations of
   "foreign intelligence agents" and endanger the lives of U.S. agents.
   
   In court documents (PDF) filed Friday, the Justice Department claims
   that such stringent secrecy is necessary to prevent "hostile
   intelligence officers" from employing "counter-surveillance tactics to
   thwart law enforcement."

   [...]

   Donald Kerr, the director of the FBI's lab, said in an affidavit
   filed Friday that "there are only a limited number of
   effective techniques available to the FBI to cope with encrypted data,
   one of which is the 'key logger system.'" He said that if criminals
   find out how the logger works, they can readily circumvent it.
   
   The feds believe so strongly in keeping this information secret that
   they've said they may invoke the Classified Information Procedures Act
   if necessary. The 1980 law says that the government may say that
   evidence requires "protection against unauthorized disclosure for
   reasons of national security."

   If that happens, not only are observers barred from the courtroom, but
   the trial could move to a classified location. Federal regulations say
   that if a courtroom is not sufficiently secure, "the court shall
   designate the facilities of another United States Government agency"
   as the location for the trial.
   
   But the FBI's Kerr said that CIPA's extreme procedures aren't good
   enough. Says Kerr: "Even disclosure under the protection of the court
   ... cannot guarantee that the technique will not be compromised.... To
   assume otherwise may well lead to the compromise of criminal and
   national security investigations, and, in some cases, threaten the
   lives of FBI or other government agency personnel."

   [...]



-------------------------------------------------------------------------
POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list
You may redistribute this message freely if you include this notice.
To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html
This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------