[Mailman-Users] encrypted passwords/German "Datenschutzgesetz"

[Todd]

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Mark Dadgar wrote:
> Todd at Freedom_Lover at pobox.com wrote:
>> So german users should point out to their government that their law is
>> ridiculous and that legislators should stay out of software development.
>> They know about as much about this area as US legislators (or any other
>> group of bureaucratic boobs, for that matter).
>
> Yeah, that's great and noble and all, but Sven presumably has a business to
> run during the years that it'll take the German legislature to un-confuse
> themselves.
>
> Got any useful advice for him on that topic?

The archives have more than a few threads about the whole password issue.  I
would think one thing someone who wanted to follow this idiotic regulation
could do is hack mailman to not use any passwords.  Encrypting the passwords
makes the whole system much more complicated than it needs to be and would
be a large waste of effort, IMHO.

But as far as I am concerned, it is *useful* advice to tell someone that
they should fight dumb laws like this one in whatever way they can (hosting
a site outside of German jurisdiction, challenge the law in court and try to
get an injunction against its enforcement in the interim, or some other
method of resisting).  It needs to be challenged, the sooner the better.
Putting up with dumb bureaucrats inserting themselves in places they don't
belong isn't something I consider useful.

If everyone always takes the tact that "I'll follow this dumb law until
someone else challenges/changes it" we'll be stuck with this crap for a lot
longer than we need to be.  (And I don't mean to imply that this is the tact
that you or Sven are taking or suggesting. :)

Of course, I'll admit that I have much less tolerance for petty tyrants than
most other people seem to have.

- -- 
Todd              OpenPGP -> KeyID: 0xD654075A | URL: www.pobox.com/~tmz/pgp
============================================================================
The less a statesman amounts to, the more he loves the flag.
    -- Kin Hubbard

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