History for IPR disclosure
Reported Statement from NIST regarding use of DSA

From: http://www.ietf.org/ietf-ftp/IPR/DSA-NIST

Note: This text was extracted from an informal document (NOT an RFC,
      nor a formal communication made to the IETF, the IESG, nor the IETF
      Secretariat). The IESG/IETF take no position regarding the
      validity or accuracy of the statement below.



Digital Signature Algorithm (DSA)

The U.S. Government holds U.S. patent 5,231,668 on the Digital
Signature Algorithm (DSA), which has been incorporated into Federal
Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 186.  The patent was issued on
July 27, 1993.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has a long
tradition of supplying U.S. Government-developed techniques to
committees and working groups for inclusion into standards on a
royalty-free basis.  NIST has made the DSA patent available royalty-
free to users worldwide.

NIST has provided the following statement with regard to this patent:

Regarding patent infringement, FIPS 186 summarizes our position; the
Department of Commerce is not aware of any patents that would be
infringed by the DSA.  Questions regarding this matter may be directed
to the Deputy Chief Counsel for NIST.