At 09:16 PM 7/2/2013, Sumner, Dave, K1ZZ wrote:

President Craigie is on her way to the RSGB Centenary. She has asked me to advise the Board that the Executive Committee has chosen option 6 from the encryption paper distributed to you earlier this week. Chris Imlay is drafting the comments now for review by the EC and filing by Monday's deadline.

Just so everyone doesn't have to go find the document Dave referred to and figure out what option 6 really was, here it is:

6. File comments on RM-11699 opposing the petition as unnecessary in view of our
interpretation of the current rule and the flexibility that we believe exists relative to
emcomm, and leave the HSMM network development issue for another day.

I hope we will also work on option 8 for the future:

8. Regardless of regulatory action and in addition to any other options above, generate a
QST article demystifying the application of HIPAA to Amateur Radio emcomm and the
obligations that amateurs have in traffic handling situations, and their obligations under
Section 97.113(a) of the Rules. This is not really an “option”, and should be considered
an addition to any of options 1-7 as the Committee sees fit.

I had a New England Division cabinet meeting last weekend and we did talk about encryption based on AB1PH's petition.
The input did not suggest there were any major problems that suggested we should do anything different than the EC agreed on in option 6 above.
But there was considerable uncertainty about what was really possible under the current rules.

-- Tom

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e-mail: k1ki@arrl.org ARRL New England Division Director http://www.arrl.org/
Tom Frenaye, K1KI, P O Box J, West Suffield CT 06093 Phone: 860-668-5444