March 1993 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Real life pseudonyms (was re: more ideas on anonymity)
by jordan＠imsi.com 01 Mar '93

01 Mar '93

From wcs(a)anchor.ho.att.com Sun Feb 28 20:56:24 1993 non-interest-paying checking accounts - remember those, from long ago ? :-) You could probably legally run a bank that didn't require SSNs for these, though most banks don't. Banks need your SSN (at least) for being able to report to the IRS anything they are required to report. This can include interest payments, but also includes things like making cash transactions of more than $10k. Bank accounts *must* be fully documented in this country. Switzerland, and certain small islands have more lax rules. The USA does not. Privacy is one thing. Money is another, at least in this country. /jordan

1 0

Re: Real life pseudonyms (was re: more ideas on anonymity)
by jordan＠imsi.com 01 Mar '93

01 Mar '93

>>> So I assume the cats must have somekind of bank accounts ... [ maybe you're kidding? ] The way those old coots leave their money to their cat is to set up a trust with an executor (human) who pays the bills incured by the cat. The cat never actually receives money, just services that are paid for by the executor. ----- This is silly. You must (under US Banking Regulations) provide a SSN to open any kind of account. This includes (but is not limited to) non-interest bearing accounts. Any bank that would open you an account without proof of who you are is asking for a lot of trouble. /jordan

1 0

Re: Real life pseudonyms (was re: more ideas on anonymity)
by jordan＠imsi.com 01 Mar '93

01 Mar '93

From thug(a)phantom.com Sun Feb 28 10:48:57 1993 For instance, can I walk into a U.S. bank, present false ID, and obtain a checking account to use for legitimate reasons? Banking and Tax regulations provide solid legal ground for requiring banks to verify identity and Tax status in the US. Answer: no. By definition, there are no "legitimate" reasons for having a checking account in this country that is unaccountable. There are plenty of other ways of hiding cash and money transactions without involving the US banking system. They don't want you to do this ... I'm not stealing any money/products/services from anybody, I'm only using a pseudonym. No, you're just avoiding the accountability of your money. This is akin to not reporting income. It's patently illegal. You can stand down your color PostScript printer now ... /jordan

2 1

Re: Future of anonymity (short-term vs. long-term)
by Marc.Ringuette＠GS80.SP.CS.CMU.EDU 01 Mar '93

01 Mar '93

Sorry, I sent my last message before it was ready (and before it got divided into two separate messages). It mostly says what I wanted it to, so I won't bother you with another version. On the SHORT-TERM end of things, I have two more thoughts on how to make truly anonymous remailers good net citizens: 1. Agree on a header line which identifies all messages coming out of our remailers. If someone wants to filter out all anonymous messages, I think we should help them to do so. 2. Here's my proposal for what kind of remailer logging to do: logging of source-to-destination mapping: NONE. destination logging: NONE. source logging: on a machine-by-machine basis, log the total input volume over a fairly long period, with some random noise added. When a source is providing too much volume, and it's not on your local list of "friendly" remailers, then take action to reduce the volume. I suggest that the first action should be to INCREASE THE DELAY to reduce the volume-per-unit-time of messages from that site. If the volume of spooled traffic from a site reaches a threshold, only then start throwing away messages. -- Marc Ringuette (mnr(a)cs.cmu.edu)

3 2

Re: anon.penet.fi hacking (fwd)
by nowhere＠bsu-cs.bsu.edu 01 Mar '93

01 Mar '93

>I'd like to point out that so far the wimsey remailer is the only >useful remailer from my point of view because it's the only one >which allows me to delete the automatic sig. This is because it >only forwards encrypted text and discards any appended unencrypted >text. > >The other remailers were supposed to add a "kill line" to do the >same thing, but as far as I know this never happened. > >-- >edgar(a)spectrx.saigon.com (Edgar W. Swank) >SPECTROX SYSTEMS +1.408.252.1005 Silicon Valley, Ca Alright, I hear you, Mr. automatic sig (you really ought to append it only when you want it). I implemented a "kill line" in my remailer. All you have to do is put the line "--ignore--" exactly as that, no spaces after it, no spaces before it, just a line precisely like that and neither it nor the rest of the message will be put into the outgoing message. Edgar, you can test it by sending to my remailer on this account. Chael Hall -- Chael Hall nowhere(a)bsu-cs.bsu.edu, 00CCHALL(a)BSUVC.BSU.EDU, CHALL(a)CLSV.Charon.BSU.Edu (317) 285-3648 after 5 pm EST [non-automatic sig]

1 0

Re: Real life pseudonyms (was re: more ideas on anonymity)
by wcs＠anchor.ho.att.com 01 Mar '93

01 Mar '93

Jordan Hayes incorrectly (IMHO) states that "Banking and Tax regulations provide solid legal ground for requiring banks to verify identity and tax status in tehe US." There are really two halves to the problem: - accounts paying interest - this is taxable, so they DO need your SSN, and you even have to tell them if they should do backup withholding. So you can have multiple accounts under different names if you're energetic about it, but they'll have the same SSN if you've only got 1. So of course the IRS will know. - non-interest-paying checking accounts - remember those, from long ago ? :-) You could probably legally run a bank that didn't require SSNs for these, though most banks don't. I haven't read through the immense pile of bank laws to find out what it takes to become a bank, or how much you can do if you're not a registered bank. As far as "true names" go, in some states in the US, you can use any name you want unless it's for fraudulent purposes, e.g. California ; in other states they have this racket called "legally changing your name", where you have to convince a government honcho to let you rename yourself, with the implication that all your future transactions will happen under your _new_ true name; New York and New Jersey are into this sort of thing. (Offering a "name registration service" is a different game entirely, though the free market is less likely to do so if there's a government service already provided that you *have* to use for some purposes.) Some places make it easier than others to build up ID under a new name; the people I've known in the acting profession haven't had much trouble, and if you're young and keeping the same first name, the line "my parents were divorced and I used the other name when I lived there" seems to work fine; if you're female and keeping the same first name you can mumble something about your first husband or maiden name. In either case, the SS number is usually something you're stuck with, so you just have to avoid using it when you can. # Bill Stewart wcs(a)anchor.ho.att.com +1-908-949-0705 Fax-4876 # AT&T Bell Labs, Room 4M-312, Crawfords Corner Rd, Holmdel, NJ 07733-3030

1 0