Well, Y wd have presented that another way, there wd'nt have been any doubt that this was a linux asset. "Are W$$ said keys only valid under Window$$, excluding linux ? " wd have been a non-cobtroversial title which wd'nt have prevented a discussion, while trying, at once, to set an answer up. I m not sure but this simply sounds to me like my ADSL's provider's requirments : min. WIN 98,..... also on my TV Card box, .... and, also, on a lot of winmodems or scanners,...etc,...etc,.... You got hundreds out of there claiming that w98 is a minimum requirment. This doesn't prevent them from working under linux. As far as I know, the condition the UK government puts is the same as the spanish government puts : it is not that Yu use Windows but that Yu use their key. The key distributor claims that Yu have to use W$$$, and sometimes Yu cant retrieve the key online if Yur not using W$$$ but, then, there always is a way to get it on a disquette. Implementing that key in Yr browser, mozilla, netscape, communicator or konqueror is then just routine and Yr government will not prevent Yu from communicating with him from within Linux. Anyway, Yu got anglo-saxon type laws and courts (as opposed to the napoleonic system in most of the non-anglo-saxon countries). Yu cd, for such a theme, go and defend Yr point of view Yourself at the british administrative courts and ask them to compell Yr government to be compliant with an equivalent-to-constitutionnal equality (as far as I remember, in the UK, there is no Constitution) of the citizens front to the law and, also, base Yrself on the EU's treaty parts which prohibit monopolistic practices from the hand of the Union's Governments (art.90 of the Treaty). This, if Yu feel discriminated as a linux user.