Restrictions on cryptography in Spain
A proposal to modify the Spanish telecommunication law threatens the free use of cryptography.
The current General Law of Telecommunications (Ley General de Telecomunicaciones (LGT) already puts some restrictions on the use of cryptography. The second part of article 52 (‘Cifrado en las redes y servicios de telecomunicaciones’, that is, network encryption and telecommunication services) says:
“Encryption is a security instrument for information. Among its conditions of use, when it is used to protect the confidentiality of information, an obligation may be imposed to notify either a General Administration State authority or a public one of the algorithms or any other encryption procedure used, in order to control it according to the law. This obligation will affect developers that include encryption in their equipment or software, the operators that include it in networks or in specific services and users that make use of it.”
The modification proposal would create an obligation for every user to hand over their encryption key and password when asked by any public authority. The revised article (renumbered as 36.2) with the modification in capitals, looks like this:
“Encryption is a security instrument for information. Among its conditions of use, when it is used to protect the confidentiality of information, an obligation may be imposed to notify either a General Administration State authority or a public one of the keys, the algorithms or any other encryption procedure used, including all the technical information related to the used system, and also the obligation to facilitate, at no cost, the encryption devices used and the technical information related to the system used in the encryption procedure, in order to control it according to the law.”
The Spanish government has not given any explanation about the need for this modification, just vague references to the need of some ‘control’.
The law would clearly give new impulse to key escrow schemes. In fact the Fábrica Nacional de Moneda y Timbre is allowed by the government to develop such schemes.
(Contribution by Arturo Quirantes – CPSR-Spain)