Encryption as a Munition

I caught the back end of someones email chain earlier. They were the two people involved were planning on zipping up a large data set. Encrypting it and sticking it on an FTP server for someone else in Vietnam to download.  Did you know – there is a large chance that this is illegal? Encryption and Encrypted data can put you to jail in some countries.

First of all, if you were to send the technology that allows someone to encrypt data to an unfriendly nation, you could (in the extreme) be tried for treason.  That’s because encryption and encrypted data are considered a munition in international law.  If you take a look at things like the Wassenarr Arrangement and older versions of the U.S. Auxiliary Munitions list you will find “strong” encryption.  The prevalence of the Internet and the largely uncontrolled access it provides to people ideas. Technology has generally made the export controls around encryption unenforceable. That said it would not surprise me if they were still used in anti-terrorist legal cases.

Encryption as a Munition in Vietnam

The bit that concerned me far more was that whilst in the western world. Using encryption and thereby maintaining privacy is seen as a fairly basic human right. (See article 12 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights), In other countries that is not necessarily the case. 

I did a little searching on the status of encryption.

In Vietnam and it turns out that in Decree 73/2007 it has very broad-sweeping laws about the use of encryption. But the laws are such that they can be interpreted in many different ways.  I also found some indication that as yet there haven’t been any trials that use this law. Also, the Vietnamese government doesn’t appear to be enforcing this law.

I passed on this information to the email chain from my colleagues. I believe they resolved this getting the individual in Vietnam to sign off to say they understand the situation and that they were happy to proceed.

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