Wednesday, December 9, 2015

How “free” software. The method of the FSF explained by … – Rai News



How to write free software? How to register the copyright from the Free Software Foundation and the Linux Foundation? It is still safe to write open source software? Encryption can be ‘punctured’ by governments? Interview with the lawyer Carlo Piana, FSFE

Carlo Piana

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Who writes the software must then choose what kind of license and copyright attribute. Invented the program could become a free software, following the precedents of Linux, the Apache Web server, Libre Office, Firefox browser, to cite just a few examples known.
So what are the next steps to ‘invention of a program? If you follow the model of Linux, run by the Linux Foundation – which has a pattern of copyright management in distributed ownership – software that gives each contributor writes relying only on the GNU GPL.
According Carlo Piana law specialist information technology, however, the Free Software Foundation (FSF) prefer a centralized ownership model, making “assign” all copyright on contributions, so you can in the future to re-license the software and in general be able to defend Legal attacks against counterfeiting and from a position of full owner.
In Italy until some time ago to give copyright to the Foundation’s Richard Stallman needed a real contract paper with the programmer. Recently, the FSF accepts contracts copyright attribution Italy signed with GPG (GNU Privacy Guard) that implements an electronic signature system. Then leave the paper to validate the software.
What is PGP?
It is a “free” pretty smart to handle security communications without having to rely on an external service provider. It can be used in combination with the certified mail. The PEC certifies that a message was sent from user to user and has not been modified in transit. PGP / GPG creates a digital signature, which gives the subscriber the authorship of the content (email or otherwise) and encrypts the message, making it readable only to the recipient.
Security of open source software at the time terrorism Of
security of encrypted transmissions can avail themselves also, as assessed by investigators recently, users with malicious intent, is that scammers terrorists. Minister Giusizia Orlando announced most effective tools for achieving the controls .
Collect everything, then you will see
On this, lawyer’s opinion Piana is clear. “The current trend is to gather as much information as possible, you never know. The temptation is strong, but it is also unrealistic, because the abundance of information must match the ability to interpret the information. It is not just a technical issue, it is also a matter human intelligence. It would be fallacious to think you can replace the capacity of investigation, also technological tools.
To use an analogy often used in computer science, is not that putting infinite monkeys in front of an infinite number of keyboards, sooner or later jump outside the Divine Comedy.
Investing is fine, but you must do so wisely. The NSA model, we collect all the collectible, then we’ll see, is clearly a pipe dream.

Or put backdoor in the encryption?
In some countries you think instead of the solution would be to weaken the security of the encryption, requiring you to enter in all the encryption tools a “backdoor”, a magic key that would allow the police to enter any encrypted content. This proposition is even more stupid, because it would end up compromising the security of all, and there is no guarantee that this magic key would not end in the hands of criminals. On the other hand, the real criminals are not afraid of some penalties for those who trade “technology” region.
The mathematical solutions to implement encryption systems are in the hands of all, realize cryptographic software is largely a matter of writing good code of computer systems is not compromised. So it would end the “good” are less safe and the bad guys are just as safe, if not more, than they are now.

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