Breaks of cryptography systems in general can also be expressed as numbers. Quite naturally. And so can all binary representations. The American law system certainly does view numbers as being able to be placed under copyright (or similar restrictions).
And numbers aren't a property of the universe. They are made up by humans.
But more philosophical, it's the question of `oneness' that problematic. How can you define objects? All edges are arbitrary and if you look close enough they even blur.
(Of all the numbers the `natural' numbers are the most unnatural. Though they do describe some features of nature quite well, most scientiest would agree that e.g. complex numbers and vector fields are much more closely aligned to nature.)
Leopold Kronecker thought, "God created the integers; all the rest is the work of Man." Today we now better. The integers are no exception.
(Anyway, in practice every mathematician behaves like a Platonist no matter what his philosophical viewpoints are.)
If you ask me in private, I think that copyright is no longer enforceable, and thus should be done away with. And philosophical, so called intellectual property restricts what I can do with my physical property.
My grandparent post expressed a more guarded opinion. And telling somebody that you broke his cryptosystems (or his key) before going public with it, is at least good manners.
(US laws are not in general properties of the universe, though I understand that appearances can be deceiving.)
Anyway, enough arguing. Let me just say `Hitler' to close this thread by Godwin's law.
I think that breaking cryptography should not be, as long as you inform the owner a six months before going public, and do not use the result for any personal gain.
It worries me that anyone would say something like this. I notice that 2 * 2 is 4, and I have to wait 6 months before telling anyone? Or what? What would TI do with this information? Why does TI have a right to tell me what I can do with chunks of plastic with TI's logo on it? (Remember, he's not copying their software; he wants to delete their software and use his own.) What legal framework would this fit into? Factoring numbers has nothing to do with copyright law, and a new law suppressing the publication of scientific research is a clear violation of the Constitution. Even if it is illegal, people can't be stopped; you can't police the entire Internet, and you can't stop people from installing software on their calculator. There is no way a government or corporation could monitor this.
So you basically want to make a law that is a violation of hundereds of years of American principles, that is completely impossible to enforce, and that will drastically slow down scientific and mathematical progress. All so a piece of plastic that says "TI" on it can only run TI's buggy code?
Wow. I ... just don't know what to say.
You also use the word "owner". Who owns a number? Does TI own the number because they used it to sign some software? Can I "own" the number 4 because I say I do? If you are in a situation where you have four pieces of candy, and want to split them between you and your friend, should you have to inform me of your intentions and wait 6 months before giving yourself two pieces of candy and your friend the other two pieces? Why not? I'm the owner of the number 4, and anything you do with it needs my approval.
The thing about "personal gain" is also insane. Everyone uses facts for personal gain. Big investment banks analyze market trends to make themselves billions of dollars. TI assumes you can't factor a number, and they use that to prevent you from cheating on math tests. All "personal gain" of the same variety. Should all enterprise be made illegal?
Now that I think about it, I guess your post is sarcasm... but you had me worried there for a minute.