A newly formed privacy coalition today announced a national PR blitz to fight federal government restrictions on strong encryption and a Clinton administration proposal to give police and spy agencies back-door access to all Americans' encrypted data.
The group, Americans for Computer Privacy, is announcing in Washington a grass-roots political campaign, media blitz, and congressional lobbying effort aimed at preserving privacy in the information age.
Among its members and backers, the group counts dozens of corporations, some 30 privacy groups and associations, and a political team well-versed in Beltway politics.
"We're going to be making direct appeals to the American people," said the group's counsel, Jack Quinn, a former lawyer for the Clinton administration. "The message is that the fundamental privacy freedoms that we have here are threatened."
Led by another experienced political operative Ed Gillespie - one-time communications director for the Republican National Committee and pitchman for the Republican Contract with America - the group will make selective use of media and public relations to win popular support for unrestricted encryption. That support will ultimately make its way, the group believes, back to the halls of Congress.
In doing so, the group plans to pitch the encryption issue not simply as computer-centric, but as affecting anyone whose life is "touched by computers." Ads and promotions will cite examples of personal information, such as medical records kept in health-care databases, that rely on encryption. Securing such data through strong encryption without government keys best protects it against computer crime and unapproved use of the data, says the group.
The group's ultimate objective is the passage of legislation lifting US export restrictions on strong encryption and prohibiting mandatory key recovery. Its means include over $US10 million in corporate funding, dozens of company members including high-tech kingpins Microsoft and Netscape, and representation from many non-high-tech industries - including health care, insurance, energy, and banking companies and associations.
For help in spreading the word, the group has called up the services of the Dittus Group, a Washington-based lobbying and public relations company. On the advertising side, California-based agency Goddard-Claussen will provide the kinds of services it lent to the "Harry & Louise" campaign. Those ads, also focused on a complicated legislative proposal, were used to fight the Clinton administration's health-care reform initiative.
Americans for Computer Privacy's Quinn thinks a similar chain of political events could play out over encryption. "I think when people really realize what's at stake here, there will be an enormous swell of support for legislation."
Meanwhile, a lobbying effort in the capital will seek to educate congressional members on the issue, and overturn any impression that the encryption industry is alone in its concern about US crypto policy.
Legislatively, the Americans for Computer Privacy favors the Security and Freedom through Encryption Act as originally passed by the House Judiciary committee. It sees a solid majority of House support for the bill, which was authored by Virginia Republican Bob Goodlatte and Democrat Zoe Lofgren from California.
Those representatives, along with senators John Ashcroft from Missouri, Conrad Burns from Montana, and other politicians, will be attending the group's launch event. Also represented are the conservative group Americans for Tax Reform and the more liberal Center for Democracy and Technology.
The Americans for Computer Privacy opposes legislative variations of the SAFE bill and others that would mandate key recovery.
Key recovery provides a kind of back door for encrypted data that would set aside access keys for potential use by government agencies.
