Re: LYNX-DEV 128 bit encryption?

[David Woolley]

> 
> Is there a version of Lynx around that supports secure http
> and 128 bit encryption?

If there is, it can't be exported from the USA and can't be distributed
in binary form.  The latter is because it would either have to use
RSAREF, which can't be distributed royalty free for commercial use,
which breaches the GPL, or it would use something like SSLeay, which
breaches a patent in the USA, which would require the copyright owners
to qualify the licence with a clause making it not distributable within
the USA, which I don't believe they have done.  This latter point is
less clear - my reading is that a derived work must be freely distributable
if the original GPLed work was, but it is possible that countries can 
be excluded as part of the derivation process.  You should clarify this 
point with the Free Software Foundation, if you can't get a revised licence
and still want to use a pre-built SSL Lynx, or any other SSL derivatives
of GPLed code.

Others have suggested looking at the SSLeay site, for SSL solutions from
outside the USA.  However you still have the problem of that the result
can't be freely distributable.

I'm not sure whether IDEA is used for 128 bit encryption, but if it
is, you should check the Swiss patent position, e.g. PGP has a licence
restriction requiring quite a large payment to the Swiss patentees of
IDEA - I think this may have been due to a misunderstanding about the
status of software patents in Europe (although it is enforced by copyright
law, so is valid regardless of patents); however Switzerland is not really
in Europe for a lot of legal purposes, so it is possible that it has
software patents.  (The email address was Swiss.)

For more details, see the Lynx web site and the O'Reilly Apache book, which
has several pages on the legal issues surrounding SSL.  You should also
read the GPL.

I foresee the day when software developers are going to need a law degree
much more than a computer science one.
;
; To UNSUBSCRIBE:  Send a mail message to address@hidden
;                  with "unsubscribe lynx-dev" (without the
;                  quotation marks) on a line by itself.
;