The Clipper Chip Controversy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

The Clipper Chip Controversy - Essay Example The clipper managed to  perform  the above task with the  help  of certain numerical keys. Controversy sprung from the fact that the US government sought to  retain  exclusive  but regulated knowledge of such algorithms. That way, the government could eavesdrop on any conversation it considered  suspect. However, this would only be possible with a nod from the courts. As it happened, from ordinary citizens through  business  people to senior military personnel,  virtually  everyone had an opinion on the issue. On one hand,  there were civil libertarians glibly expressing their fear of the technology  being used  to  aid  a  big  brother regime that would  easily  stifle freedom of speech. On the other, cogent arguments in favor of keeping an eye and ear on the criminal  activity  were made. This paper endeavors to present arguments on both sides of the divide all through to the final part of the debacle. The privacy constituency rooted it s opposition to the clipper on the way it  was envisioned  to operate. ... stance if an ordinary citizen happened to stumble upon damaging information about the government, it was an  act  in futility for  him or her  to  attempt  to  pass  an encrypted  dossier  to someone in the media. The government’s operatives would work relentlessly to  intercept  it before some loudmouth spilled the beans if it (the government) knew about the leak. In such situations, no one was willing to tell the truth about anyone because the risk of  being caught  would be  unbearable. Similarly, it is quite thinkable that the government would use its backdoor privileges to access information otherwise supposed to be  confidential  about political competitors. In short, the charge from this end was that the chances of a  regime  turning  rogue  and harassing people for having unfavorable opinions, are exceptionally high with the clipper chip. The Clinton Administration countered this line of reasoning with a poignant statement that read; unfortunately, the same encryption technology that can help Americans protect  business  secrets and personal privacy can also be used by terrorists, drug dealers and other criminals (Lewis 26). Even during those pre-9/11 days, it was easy to see how a determined and sophisticated terrorist could benefit from access to encryption technology that no man, woman or  spirit  can penetrate. Plans to smuggle  would-be  murderers, take  flight  lessons, hijack airplanes and  crash  them into skyscrapers would be swapped across cyberspace without detection. Although the usefulness of the clipper in matters of defense is  somewhat  clear, its  inadequacy  is even clearer. Thoughtful opponents of the clipper observed no criminals or terrorists smart enough to use a  system  to use data encryption would be  dumb  enough to use

Latin Western European Business Culture Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Latin Western European Business Culture - Essay Example Collectivism, the propensity of people to stay within a long-term group, is also rated high. The Masculinity rating corresponds to emphasis laid on the traditional viewpoint of men's and women's roles, while Uncertainty avoidance rating indicates that rules and long-term employment within the same structure are preferred. Finally, the long term / short-term rating is in favour of longer term attitudes, based on perseverance and relationships ordered by status. These cultural dimensions give a basis from which to assess certain aspects of Latin Western European Business Culture. However it is not the complete picture. In the areas of business communication, particularly in face-to-face communication and business negotiations, it is also of interest to compare the concepts advanced by Hall (Hall) and in particular that of the high context and low context cultures. According to Hall, in a high context business culture, the information transmitted in a communication is minimised because implicitly much of the information required is already present in the setting. Low context cultures are the reverse: the communication contains far more information because this information is not present in the setting. According to this model, Latin culture is high-context. Besides the situations already mentioned, this model also finds particular application in the advertising and promotional activities that most businesses engage in. This kind of communica tion remains somewhat basic and even terse in Latin countries as compared to the other Western European groups (Anglo, Germanic and Nordic). Hall also elaborated a second theory of how different cultures structure their time, which he refers to as polychronic or monochronic time orientation. A top-level approach for Latin countries puts them into the polychronic category. The immediate implications are of the priority of interpersonal relations over schedule and appointments, the simultaneity of tasks and the mixing of work time and personal time. Like the other theories alluded to above, this generates different results when we consider the four countries on an individual basis. Because the creation of the European Community has encouraged the individual member countries to trade more among themselves and, by extension, with the rest of the world, it is interesting to note how the Latin Western European countries and their businesses fare in a cross-cultural context. In particular, a different principle is applied here, that of the Self Referencing Criteria or SRC defined by Lee (Lee). In essence, this describes the cultural trap of assuming that other countries use the same cultural values as one's own. It is the failure to perceive things from the standpoint of a person of a different culture. The Latin countries that we are dealing with here display marked differences in this regard. The first country to be examined using these tools of cultural investigation is France. It is a country which at the same time is Mediterranean and Latin, but which also exhibits a number of non-Latin characteristics, in keeping with its proximity to, or common borders with, a number of (mainly) Germanic countries such as Germany, Belgium and Switzerland. Of the five cultural dimensions, French business culture can be classified as follows. Power-distance is relatively high with top