[as an individual]
On 10/5/18 8:17 AM, Thomas Corte wrote:
Generally, technical standards are IMHO not the appropriate place for
fighting political or societal issues.
At the IETF 98 plenary in Chicago, David Clark said something on the
topic of human rights that's really resonated with me ever since: "You
are designing the playing field, not the outcome of the game. But if you
are clever enough, you can tilt the playing field."
I think that that we're well past the point where we have the luxury of
pretending that technology has no ethical implications. I believe that
the IETF does, in the general case, have an obligation to consider the
human rights implications of its work. In the specific case of
-verificationcode, I think Andrew Sullivan's arguments are persuasive,
and that this obligation is best served by publishing this mechanism
with proper framing and considerations. There's a parallel to be drawn
between what he advocates and the conclusions drawn by RFC 2804:
- On the other hand, the IETF believes that mechanisms designed to
facilitate or enable wiretapping, or methods of using other
facilities for such purposes, should be openly described, so as to
ensure the maximum review of the mechanisms and ensure that they
adhere as closely as possible to their design constraints. The IETF
believes that the publication of such mechanisms, and the
publication of known weaknesses in such mechanisms, is a Good
Thing.
I strongly support enumerating the concerns raised in the HRPC review as
part of this document. I'm also certain that those entities that are
causing the most worry in this context [1] will implement their policies
with or without a standard. By performing this work in the IETF, we at
least have a chance to ensure that the mechanism is narrowly scoped to
its intended purpose, and that it comes with appropriate caveats about
the implications of deploying it.
/a
____
[1] Although it hasn't been brought up recently, Nils pointed to
<https://www.article19.org/resources/corporate-actors-must-not-facilitate-human-rights-violations-through-new-chinese-rules/>
in relation to this document a couple of years ago.
_______________________________________________
regext mailing list
regext@ietf.org
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/regext
