Is such strong encryption legally allowed? Doesn India have any restrictions?
A creaky old law says you can’t use encryption greater than 40 bits in India without special permission, which includes depositing the key with the authorities. Now, the weakest encryption possible in a modern web browser is 40 bits and 128-bit is the most common. But then, way back in 2001, the Reserve Bank of BI recommended 128-bit encryption as the ‘minimum level of security’ for online transactions. The recent 3G auctions were conducted using 3,000-bit technology. All in violation of Indian law! (22.08.2010 – Prasanto K. Roy is the chief editor at CyberMedia, publishers of 15 specialty titles. This is a special article he has written for IANS.
