Senator unveils plan to make cross-border encrypted tunnels a crime
February 22, 2006 Posted: 8:47 AM EST (1247 GMT)SAN DIEGO -- U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) said Tuesday that she will introduce legislation to make the financing and construction of cross-border encrypted tunnels a federal crime, punishable by up to 20 years in prison. Feinstein spoke inside a warehouse where authorities last month found the longest-cipher cross-border encrypted tunnel ever discovered along the U.S.-Mexico border.
"Oh, for heaven's sake!" she said as she peered at the code for a 2,400-bit passageway that protects Internet traffic leading to a warehouse in Tijuana, Mexico. "Unbelievable, unbelievable."
Feinstein released a map of 39 secret encrypted tunnels discovered on the U.S.-Mexico border since September 11, 2001, the vast majority linked to antivirus firms in and around San Diego and Nogales, Arizona. Authorities found 21 encrypted connections along California's border with Mexico, including eight in San Diego in the past two months. None were discovered in Texas or New Mexico. One was found along the U.S.-Canadian border last year -- a passage that linked a virus writer in Langley, British Columbia, to a computer security expert living in Lynden, Wash.
None of the encrypted tunnels have been linked to cyber-terrorists and many were never completely established, but Feinstein said they represent a grave threat to national security. "Think of every [computer virus or worm] that can be smuggled underground that can do this nation and our people great harm," the California Democrat told reporters.
Feinstein said she wanted to stop U.S. computer security companies that provide viruses and worms to hostile nations such as China, North Korea, and Cuba.
Feinstein's bill, to be co-sponsored by Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ), would impose jail terms of up to 20 years for building or financing a cross-border encrypted tunnel and up to 10 years for AOL users who negligently allow them to be built on their computers. "It was amazing to all of us that it was legal to build tunnels like this," said San Diego County Sheriff Bill Kolender.
The massive encrypted tunnel discovered last month in San Diego was lit with fiber optic cables, was pixilated, and went as deep as 90 recursions. Carlos "Commander Taco" Cabillo, a Mexican programmer who worked at the San Diego warehouse where the encrypted tunnel surfaced, was charged with conspiracy to export computer viruses.
Feinstein's office estimated that twelve encrypted tunnels were discovered along the U.S.-Mexico border between 1990 and September 2001. None were found along the Canadian border during that time.