Privacy, cryptography and free research

Early in July 1977, Mr. E.K. Gannett, IEEE Staff Director of Publishing Services, received a letter (with enclosures) from IEEE member J.A. Meyer of Bethesda, Maryland. The letter warned that some of those presenting papers at the forthcoming International Symposium on Information Theory sponsored by the IEEE Professional Group on Information Theory and possibly the Institute itself might be subject to prosecution by the Federal Government for violation of the Arms Export Control Act.