Re: Netscape vs. Digest (?)

Lou Montulli writes:
> Why would you ever want to use digest if you already have
> certificate support?

I think at least one reason is clear:
	Lack of export control hassles on hashing for authentication.

This means we can make it universal, and stop passwords in the clear
world-wide.  And as the #1 (and I think #2) servers on the Internet
are Apache and NCSA, which have no solution to the export problem
available to them (as I understand it, the Apache folks had their arms
twisted to even remove hooks for stronger forms of encryption or
authentication), this is a Big Issue.  It is far from clear to me that
certificate support is universally available as a result of this
action of the government.  Even if the code were available worldwide, it can't
just get dropped into a server distribution.

				- Jim Gettys