AUCRYPTO: `Germany Frees Crypto' - do you believe it?

[Pete Chown]

Mok-Kong Shen wrote:

> To my humble knowledge, there is currently no export regulation in
> Germany of crypto (at least in software). The recent paper issued
> by the government expressedly says that R&D of crypto is free but adds
> that the situation is to be reviewed in 2 years. There is some wording
> apparently related to the issue of Wassenar but it appears that the
> government wishes not to implement Wassenar if possible rather than
> to implement it.

Aren't crypto exports controlled by the EU rather than individual member
states?  As I understood it, individual governments were responsible for
granting export licences but the overall framework was set EU-wide.  The
framework is currently based on the old version of Wassenaar.  (Of
course because individual governments can grant licences they could in
theory grant an open general licence covering all crypto products, but
as far as I know none have done that.)

One other worry that I have in this area is that Wassenaar seems to
exempt PD software and software which is sold retail or by mail order. 
GPL software could fall between the two stools.  Based on my (somewhat
flawed) recollection, it would suffice if the software was offered for
sale even if the export in question was not a sale.  Thus I wonder if
there is a justification for people with crypto code on their web pages
to offer to supply it on disk in exchange for a fee, as well as making
it available for free download.  Any thoughts?

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