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By Felicity Ussher, 3 December 1998 17:40

NEWS The French government has hotly denied it is to blame for poor distribution of Shiva's latest security software, much of which is stockpiling in US warehouses awaiting import to France. But new evidence suggests the problem stems not from bureaucracy, but from French policy. Shiva's European director of VPN Business, Eric Beaty, had blamed France's regulator of software imports, SCSSI, for not making its procedures user-friendly. He told Silicon.com that it took his team months to work out how to apply for an import licence for Shiva's 40bit encryption product. But SCSSI spokesman, Alan Bochu, denied the claim. "That is not our fault. Our laws are easily accessible on the Internet. They clearly state that it takes four months for the government to give its verdict on an import licence." Beaty retorted: "Our problem was that the French authorities were asking us for detailed technical information which would have infringed on our US export licence. They wanted us to provide traces of information that showed data before and after encryption. It took our legal department a while to sort this out." He said language problems added to the delay, as all SCSSI's documents were in French, and there was only one man at Shiva's French engineering group who could translate them. "The confusion was as much at Shiva's end as at SCSSI," he conceded. Shiva's LanRover VPN suite is being stored in US warehouses until the French government decides whether to approve its licence. Beaty expects a 40bit licence by the end of the year, and a limited 56bit licence soon after. However, Martha Bennett, VP European research at Giga Information, is less optimistic. "Companies are very naïve about the French market," she said. "Most US companies need to partner with French businesses such as Cap Gemini, Gemplus or France Telecom to get a sympathetic ear, and an understanding of French procedures. Without a French partner, it takes them twice as long and they are unlikely to get a satisfactory result."