Letwin wants increased penalties for refusal to decrypt

[Owen Lewis]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: ukcrypto-admin@chiark.greenend.org.uk
> [mailto:ukcrypto-admin@chiark.greenend.org.uk]On Behalf Of
> cryptlist@ubik.demon.co.uk
> Sent: 16 August 2002 09:56
> To: ukcrypto@chiark.greenend.org.uk
> Subject: Re: Letwin wants increased penalties for refusal to decrypt
>
>
> Politicians are rarely very logical, but especially when they try
> to hitch themselves to the coat tails of a current outrage/crime.

Quite so.

But what does seem logical (and was discussed at some length here, with
greater of lesser logic, during the great RIPA dabate)is that the maximum
penalty for failure to disclose should be related to the maximum offence for
which the person is charged. Where no charge can be brought (or suspicion
removed), because of a failure to disclose, then a maximum penalty of two
years would seem about right. Anything less is simply an insufficient
deterrent to the Black Hats of this world.

As for the poor bl**dy paedos, that's another story. Yes, there are a few
who should be locked up and never let out (*not* because of their
paedophilia but because of the particularly nasty and harmful acts these few
will commit). By observation, over what is now well over half a lifetime
with reflections on my own youth, the youth of the four children I have
raised and with observation of many others, the majority of paedos are
simply inadequate and rather pathetic persons who's own emotional
development is stunted. When their hand strays, they need a sharp word and a
slap on the wrist, not to be made to subject of a mindless witch hunt that
has a potential for evil far greater than any they cumulatively possess.

I am ashamed to be associated by proximity with the great 'moral crusade' of
our time and place.

Owen