Cryptography Reference
In-Depth Information
regulators good reason to think they might strike again the appropriate
balance. The harmonization of technical standards and economic frame-
works across member states had succeeded in giving the European Union
a unified market for phone services, along with a considerable technologi-
cal head start over the United States, whose own industry struggled with
the market fragmentation wrought by competing technical standards.
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Martin Bangemann, then the European commissioner responsible for
information technology, saw the success of the GSM directive as a blue-
print for a “market-driven revolution” in which “technological progress
and the evolution of the market mean that Europe must make a break from
policies based on principles which belong to a time before the advent of
the information revolution. The key issue for the emergence of new markets
is the need for a new regulatory environment allowing full competition.”
Because of the network effects that characterize information services, it was
important to rapidly establish first-to-market positions and thus “identify
and establish the minimum of regulation needed, at the European level,
to ensure the rapid emergence of efficient European information infrastruc-
tures and services.”
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Given authenticated electronic exchanges were pre-
sumed to form an essential requirement for the blossoming of the coming
European Information Society, the Commission moved quickly to avoid
any internal market obstacles to the development of such exchanges.
In 1997, the Commission began to take steps toward an harmonized
legal framework for electronic signatures across all member states. The
framework was to be enacted through a
directive
, a uniquely European
regulatory instrument. A directive “is binding, as to the result to be
achieved, upon each Member State to which it is addressed, but shall leave
to the national authorities the choice of form and methods.”
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That is, a
directive carries obligations of results, not of means. It is thus the primary
legislative instrument for legal harmonization among member states.
Though it is up to the member states to decide which measures should be
adopted in order to comply with a directive, they are obligated to repeal
all contradictory national legislation.
In drafting the directive, the Commission's biggest concern related to
the issue of “technological neutrality.” The explanatory memorandum
attached to the initial proposal explained:
While there is much discussion and work on digital signature technologies which
employ public-key cryptography, a Directive at the European level should be tech-
