Date: Thu, 06 Jul 2000 13:56:52 +0100 From: Tim Priebe <tim@polytechnic.edu.na> To: Robert Watson <rwatson@FreeBSD.ORG> Cc: cjclark@alum.mit.edu, Kris Kennaway <kris@FreeBSD.ORG>, Susie Ward <sward@voltage.net>, freebsd-security@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: SecureBSD (Was: Re: Firewalls and the endless story!) Message-ID: <39648214.A63C423B@polytechnic.edu.na> References: <Pine.NEB.3.96L.1000706074516.46768A-100000@fledge.watson.org>
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If they get a patent, you are in the same boat if you looked at the code or not. As I understand to be in violation of patents, you do not even have to know anything about the holder of a patent, their products (if any) or that they ever had such an idea. This is not to suggest you should look at their product. It seems to me that many of these ideas were discused on this list. Tim. Robert Watson wrote: > > On Wed, 5 Jul 2000, Crist J. Clark wrote: > > > You can't copyright a concept. So I ask, did they get some patents? I > > did not see specific mention in the license of any new patents. > > 2.3 Ownership. Except for the FreeBSD software, versions 3.4 and 4.0, > included in the Program, if any, 2 Cactus will retain all rights, title > and interest in and to the patent, copyright, trademark, trade secret > and any other intellectual property rights in the Program and any > derivative works thereof, subject only to the limited licenses set forth > in this Agreement. Customer does not acquire any rights, express or > implied, in the Program other than those rights expressly granted under > this Agreement. > > Due to the vaguarities of patent law in the US, the authors of SecureBSD > may publish their patentable ideas, and file for patents within one year > of the publication date. This was the case, for example, with the RSA > patent, and usually does not hold for international patents. That said, a > patent in the USA has in the past proven sufficient to restrict the > distribution of software implementing the patented invention. This > license specifically allows for that eventuality, claiming ownership of > any intellectual property (copyrights, patents, ...) currently or in the > future covering the body of work. Personally, I do not want to risk the > TrustedBSD work by agreeing to a license such as this. > > You are welcome to agree to the license, and I am not in any way > criticizing the usefulness of the SecureBSD work: it sounds like a number > of the features described to me (syscall masking, improved logging, > immutable processes of some sort) are very useful, and in fact will be > covered by the TrustedBSD project in some form or another (least > privilege, auditing, integrity protection). The license merely leaves me > in a position where I'm unwilling to inspect the software, or recommend it > since I cannot inspect it. It also leaves me in a position where I cannot > feel qualified to answer questions about it or derived works in standard > BSD forums, including freebsd-security. :-) > > Robert N M Watson > > robert@fledge.watson.org http://www.watson.org/~robert/ > PGP key fingerprint: AF B5 5F FF A6 4A 79 37 ED 5F 55 E9 58 04 6A B1 > TIS Labs at Network Associates, Safeport Network Services > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-security" in the body of the message To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-security" in the body of the message
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