Encryption is also an essential part of new ``digital signature'' techniques used to identify parties and authenticate transactions online. These techniques are widely viewed as an essential feature of electronic commerce. The use of digital signatures raises complex business and privacy issues, but these issues are completely separate from the questions raised by encryption used for confidentiality. There is a great deal of ongoing activity in the private sector and at the state level attempting to sort out these complex issues of business use and consumer protection. Federal digital signature legislation is clearly needed, but should be dealt with separately from encryption reform legislation.
Editor's note · Context
Discussing the importance of encryption and digital signatures in electronic commerce.
Share
More from Joseph T. Burns
I rise today to discuss one small piece of this legislation which will make a big difference in rural States such as Montana. I am talking about the broadband expensing provision, which would encourage broadband providers to extend their…
I want to say one thing, and that is that the general premise of this bill is in the right direction. The emphasis is on renewables and things we can do that are good for the environment and still produce energy. All this other chaff and…
Mr. Chairman, we have had this debate before. We had it in subcommittee, we had it in committee, and the same rhetoric is here on the floor today. The opposition and the Woolsey amendment would roll back time and take us back prior to 1998…
once or twice a century we are given a President who stands above the rest. President Reagan was such a leader. He united this country in a way that we have not been united since. He did so by simply speaking out for what the vast majority…





