September 2000 - cypherpunks-legacy

CDR: Karma: Max Vision FBI snitch busted
by A. Melon 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

Monday September 25 9:03 PM ET Ex-FBI Computer Informant Pleads Guilty to Hacking SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A man who officials said once was a confidential FBI (news - web sites) source on computer criminals has pleaded guilty to breaking into government computers, the U.S. Attorneys office said on Monday. In a plea agreement, Max Ray Butler, 27, also known as Max Vision, admitted to one felony charge of unauthorized access to protected computers, recklessly causing damage. Butler, who is free on bail, will be sentenced Jan. 22 and faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a fine of $250,000. Butler was indicted by a federal grand jury in March and charged with 15 counts of breaking into and damaging hundreds of computers as well as possessing with intent to defraud the passwords of 477 customers of California Internet service provider Aimnet. <snip> http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000925/tc/crime_hacker_dc_1.html

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CDR: Olympic email snooping -- FBI-style
by Anonymous Remailer 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

[From: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20000803.html] ... For the second disturbing fact we jump to the Olympics -- not this year's games in Sydney -- but the 2002 Winter games in Utah. Given the 1996 bombing at the Atlanta games and the 1972 hostage crisis in Munich, I really, really wouldn't want to be responsible for public safety at an Olympic games anywhere. So it isn't surprising that the security plans for Salt Lake in 2002 are very robust - perhaps too robust for some people, including me. At the Utah games there will be a network of kiosks set up for athletes, journalists, and the public to use for e-mail and Net access. This will be the easiest way for many people to communicate in an area that will probably have its cellphone circuits maxed-out most of the time. Try making a cellphone call in Las Vegas during Comdex or the Consumer Electronics Show and you'll know what I mean. Well, the FBI has some rather specific requirements for Olympic data security, including the ability to not only COPY e-mail from these kiosks containing passwords from users' secret list, but to actually INTERCEPT e-mail and deliver it to a security office address rather than to the intended recipient. The person manning that address is supposed to make summary decisions about what to do with the reviewed email -- maybe it gets passed along as intended by its author, maybe bounced as "undeliverable" for myriad reasons, or... Seriously, that's a technical requirement, for which a vendor has not yet been chosen. The FBI gets to read mail, steal passwords, and divert mail. By the nature of the system, they have to look at all the mail -- even yours, if you are there. Remember, given the high-roller nature of Olympic audiences, the passwords being recorded to a database will likely include America's business elite. Of course those passwords would never be used for any illegal purpose, right? And the truly amazing part of this story is that there is nothing illegal about the data gathering, itself. Since the kiosk doesn't belong to you or me, we are bound by terms of usage that allow the kiosk provider to do pretty much whatever they want with the bits we run through their system. By simply using their machine, we give up our privacy without even knowing it. Okay, so maybe I have just blown the lid off a plan that could save lives, but it is hard for me to imagine a scenario in which some terrorist will stop on his way to plant a bomb to e-mail the boss about that bomb's location. This looks to me like overkill, and I don't like it. Or am I the only one who feels this way?

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CDR: NSA family day
by A. Melon 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

National Security Agency Offers Veiled Tour of Top-Secret Operations From Reuters FORT MEADE, Md.--The super-secret National Security Agency, which eavesdrops on communication worldwide as part of U.S. spying operations, opened its doors Saturday to offer outsiders a rare glimpse of facilities that test antennas and print nuclear code books. About 16,500 employees and their families were expected at the first "family day" since 1996 held at NSA headquarters, about 25 miles outside Washington, as the spy agency makes a greater effort to inform Americans about its mission. "American people need an image of this agency so its identity is not a vacuum," NSA Director Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden told reporters. There was the "anechoic chamber," which looked like a science-fiction movie set, with blue foam spikes of different sizes poking out of the floor, walls and ceiling of the 42-foot-high room. It is echo-free and one of five rooms at NSA for testing antennas used to collect information. The antenna revolves on a high pedestal at one end, while information is transmitted from the other end of the room. The Air Force has a similar room big enough to test an entire airplane, an NSA official said. "Each cone is sized to absorb a different frequency," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Areas opened to visitors were sanitized to ensure no classified material was lying around. A 66,000-square-foot printing plant produces code books--160 million pages a year--used in U.S. military operations. Nuclear code books for use in the event the United States orders a nuclear strike are produced about four times a month, compared with nearly every day during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. The book is in a sealed plastic pouch that has a unique pattern of pink splotches and is puffy because of air inside. If there is any change in the package, such as the amount of air inside or the design of the splotches, which is videotaped before being sent out, the codes are considered compromised. "Well go back and see if the splatter diagram is the same. Weve got a video of the package," said Dan Shirko, chief of publishing. The nuclear code books are in the hands of nearly 1,000 people, mostly military officers, such as pilots and sailors on submarines and battleships. Also displayed was security equipment that identifies a user by the iris, face, fingerprint and voice. NSA produced the equipment with private industry partners. Once the computer recognizes the user by one of those methods, it allows access. "The face system actually distinguishes between twins," said Dave Murley, technical director of identification and authentication research. The iris recognition, which scans the front of the eyeball, was the most accurate of the four methods and voice recognition the least accurate, he said. Reminders of the need for security were all around. In the cafeteria, one sign read, "Dont spill the beans pardner, the steaks are too high. No classified talk." http://www.latimes.com/editions/orange/20000926/t000091246.html

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CDR: RE: CRYPTIC SEDUCTION -- CYPHERPUNK SPECIAL
by Templeton, Stuart 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

here's something i dug up... at...... http://www.techweek.com/articles/3-8-99/needle.htm it's down there.... ============================================================================ ============= "McPherson says she gets excited by the drive-by shootings. "It takes me about a half hour afterwards to calm down," she says. Cryptic seduction Juicy Mango is one of thousands of porn sites on that geek-inspired communications platform known as the Internet. Now, the more traditional (video) porn industry is starting to take notice of geeks. "Cryptic Seduction" is the name of a geek-centered porn flick coming, perhaps, to a screen near you. The film was screened for a meeting of Cypherpunks in Oakland where it received raucous approval, according to Wired News. Cypherpunks is a group of privacy advocates and encryption developers who support a strong code to safeguard one's personal data on the Net. " ============================================================================ ============================= hey, guys, is this uhm, wasn't there a "Cryptic Seduction II" in '99 , i think i saw it in the archive??????? -----Original Message----- From: owner-cypherpunks(a)Algebra.COM [mailto:owner-cypherpunks@Algebra.COM]On Behalf Of jim bell Sent: Sunday, September 24, 2000 2:51 PM To: Sandy Sandfort; cypherpunks(a)cyberpass.net Subject: Re: CRYPTIC SEDUCTION -- CYPHERPUNK SPECIAL So what's "Cryptic Seduction"? Sorry, but I've been, uh, "away." Jim Bell ----- Original Message ----- From: Sandy Sandfort <sandfort(a)mindspring.com> To: <cypherpunks(a)cyberpass.net> Sent: Sunday, September 24, 2000 10:37 AM Subject: CRYPTIC SEDUCTION -- CYPHERPUNK SPECIAL > C'punks, > > Many of you have asked when CRYPTIC SEDUCTION would be available on video. > I have held off making copies available because I have been looking for a > good deal with a distributor. I've decided not to wait any longer. It will > soon be available through several sites on the Web. > > Because of the heavy Cypherpunk influence/involvement in the making of > CRYPTIC SEDUCTION, I've decided to make a special Cypherpunk offer. If you > would like to get an advance copy of CRYPTIC SEDUCTION, send a check or > money order for $19.95 (plus appropriate sales tax if you are in California) > to: > > Desdaemona Film Production Trust > 123 Bay Place, #301 > Oakland, CA 94610 > > Your check or money order should be made out to "Desdaemona Film Production > Trust." If you have any questions, e-mail me or call me at 510-839-3441. > > Thanks, > > > S a n d y > > P.S. Many of you have seen the soft-core version of CRYPTIC SEDUCTION on > the Spice Channel. The video version, however, is hard-core. >

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CDR: Re: And you thought Nazi agitprop was controversial?
by Eric Cordian 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

The Lovely and Talented Jodi Hoffman <jlhoffm(a)attglobal.net> wrote: >You are wrong to protect them without knowing what they're about, Jay. >Their motto is, "Sex before eight, or it's too late." I'll never understand the ability of Child Sex Hysterics to look at one thing and see another. "Sex Before Eight" was a slogan of the Rene Guyon Society, named after a deceased French world traveler who thought that American puritanism and prudery could be cured with a healthy dose of the kind of sexual openness found amongst primitive tribes. It has nothing at all to do with NAMBLA. Never has. > They are referring to grown men having sex with an under-eight year old > little boy. NAMBLA was formed to protest a witch hunt against gay teens. Like most gay organizations of its era, it calls for the repeal of all laws which criminalize sexual activity using age alone as the sole criteria for determining whether someone has been taken advantage of. Other organizations with similar platforms have been pressured by people like Jesse Helms to sell out, without which the current mainstreaming of gay sodomy rights for adults would not have been permitted. This has resulted in the current zoo of "adults only" alleged gay rights organizations, who run screaming in the opposite direction when anyone under 18 makes an appearance. Indeed, it is pretty nearly impossible today to do anything in the area of gay rights without having to pass some Fundie-authored litmus test on support of consent laws, and to be forced to pay lip service to the disempowerment of young people to make any sort of sexual decisions for themselves. > Surely you don't mean to suggest that a website promoting > intercourse with a little boy should be protected speech, do you? Well, since the alleged intercourse with little boys exists entirely in Jodi Hoffman's brain, and not on the NAMBLA website, I think we should take any and all measures to prevent people from coming in contact with the harmful material in Jodi Hoffman's brain, before more people are turned into idiots. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law"

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CDR: Wired News : Net Gambling Ban Not Dead Yet
by mikefreeman＠hushmail.com 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

A note from mike: i had an idea a few weeks ago about using digital money or e-gold for casinos. if this goes through then it looks like thats what people might do then. ============================================================ From Wired News, available online at: http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,39048,00.html Net Gambling Ban Not Dead Yet by Declan McCullagh 3:00 a.m. Sep. 26, 2000 PDT If you like to gamble online, your luck may be about to change for the worse. House Republicans are in the middle of closed-door negotiations over a bill that appears likely to restrict Americans from using credit cards at online casinos. After the House failed to approve the original Internet Gambling Prohibition Act in July, its champion, Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Virginia), has been rewriting it in hopes of attracting additional support. The proposal "says that no money orders or checks or credit cards can be used in an Internet gambling transaction," says Michelle Semones, a spokeswoman for Goodlatte. "If you take away that convenience of using your credit card, you'll lose a lot of customers there." Goodlatte's original legislation failed to reach the necessary two-thirds supermajority because it morphed from a straightforward gambling ban into a way for special interest groups to win exceptions. Some conservative groups pulled their support after horse racing, dog tracks, and jai alai lobbyists inserted language that would have, if anything, expanded their reach online. Another controversial point was a requirement that Internet service providers "block access" to overseas websites when requested by police. That verges on being Internet regulation, says the powerful chairman of the House Rules Committee, David Dreier (R-California), who objected to such a requirement. "Chairman Dreier has some concerns regarding the ISP provisions," a spokesman said. "That's primarily the reason he opposed the bill while it was on the floor earlier this year. He's working with the sponsors of the bill to see if those concerns can be addressed." But that change would make it difficult for the U.S. government to block access to offshore websites. As an alternative, Goodlatte says, financial institutions should become de-facto Internet police by restricting credit card transactions going to offshore casinos. Goodlatte's office said he would consider using language from a related bill, the Internet Gambling Funding Prohibition Act, approved by the House Banking Committee in June. Because conservative groups are split between supporting and opposing Goodlatte's bill, the House leadership reportedly blocked the measure from going to the House floor again this year. The Clinton administration opposes it. In response, Goodlatte and his Senate ally, Jon Kyl (R-Arizona), went on the attack. The duo showed up on James Dobson's popular Focus on the Family radio show and denounced Republican leaders as obstructionist and overly reliant on campaign contributions from the gambling industry. "It would be very, very helpful for our listeners to make calls to the Republican leadership. I am just sick about what the Republican leadership is doing," Dobson said during the Sept. 8 program. Kyl complained that Rules Chairman Dreier "feels as though it's his responsibility to protect the Internet at all costs." Goodlatte replied: "These are folks, primarily lottery companies, that stand to make tens of millions of dollars if they can start selling lottery tickets online, in people's homes, which I think is horrible." The on-the-air offensive worked. The next day, Capitol Hill switchboards were ringing off the hook with calls from irate conservatives, and Goodlatte soon got what he wanted from Republican leaders. "The leadership has requested that Mr. Dreier and Mr. Goodlatte sit down to work out a compromise," said one lobbyist opposed to the bill. "They are very close to an agreement." Another lobbyist close to the Republican leadership said that Dreier wants Goodlatte to guarantee, with a letter from 40 Democrats, that they'll support the bill. Lisa Dean, vice president of the conservative Free Congress Foundation, says that "we're not so sure that Goodlatte has the votes he says he has." Dean, who opposes the bill, likened it to the abandoned "Know Your Customer" proposal that would have required banks to increase surveillance of their customers. "If members in the House knew there was a Know Your Customer provision in this bill, they wouldn't vote for it, given last year's backlash against the Know Your Customer proposal from the federal banking agencies," Dean said. "If people knew this had been slipped in, they wouldn't vote for it." The bill could go to the House floor for a vote this week or next. Since the identical version hasn't been approved by the Senate, a vote in that chamber would be required. Another option would be for the measure's backers to attach it to an appropriations bill. Related Wired Links: Tapping Into Porn Jul. 13, 2000 GOP Wants No Net Bets Jul. 13, 2000 Gambling Regs, Gambling Judges Jun. 21, 2000 Net Gambling Bill Seen as Risky Jun. 21, 2000 Aussies' Online Gaming Debate May. 31, 2000 Let Us Play Poker and Swear Apr. 26, 2000 Net Tobacco a Smoking Issue Apr. 4, 2000 Copyright 1994-2000 Wired Digital Inc. All rights reserved.

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CDR: RE: Olympic email snooping -- FBI-style
by Ernest Hua 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

Too funny ... not ... I remember in Taiwan when I was a kid, there was a nice little informative "truth-in-advertising" sticker right on the rotary dialer on the phone telling us not to talk about politics because the police was listening ... Hey, at least they didn't bother to hide or ofuscate the situation. Maybe NSA was "practicing" there too. For the crap we dish out about the bad evil ol' Soviet Union and the other "oppressive" governments, at least they were up front about their tactics. Ern -----Original Message----- From: Anonymous Remailer [mailto:mix@mixmaster.ceti.pl] Sent: Monday, September 25, 2000 11:50 AM To: cypherpunks(a)cyberpass.net Subject: Olympic email snooping -- FBI-style [From: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20000803.html] ... For the second disturbing fact we jump to the Olympics -- not this year's games in Sydney -- but the 2002 Winter games in Utah. Given the 1996 bombing at the Atlanta games and the 1972 hostage crisis in Munich, I really, really wouldn't want to be responsible for public safety at an Olympic games anywhere. So it isn't surprising that the security plans for Salt Lake in 2002 are very robust - perhaps too robust for some people, including me. ...

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WPI Cryptoseminar, Wednesday, Sept 27
by Christof Paar 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

Here we go again, the Cryptoseminar starts again. As alway, attendance is free and everybody is welcome. - Christof Paar ---------------------------------------------------------------------- WPI Cryptography Seminar Elliptic Curve Cryptography on Smart Cards without Coprocessors Christof Paar WPI Wednesday, September 27 4:30 pm, AK 218 (refreshments at 4:15 pm) This talk describes joint work by Adam Woodbury, Dan Bailey, and Christof Paar. This talk will discuss how an elliptic curve cryptosystem can be implemented on very low cost microprocessors with reasonable performance. We focus in this paper on the Intel 8051 family of microcontrollers popular in smart cards and other cost-sensitive devices. The implementation is based on the use of an optimal extension field (OEF) which is particularly suited for low end 8-bit processors. Two advantages of our method are that subfield modular reduction can be performed infrequently, and that an adaption of Itoh and Tsujii's inversion algorithm is used for the group operation. We show that an elliptic curve scalar multiplication with a fixed point, which is the core operation for a signature generation, can be performed in a group of order 2^134 in less than 2 sec. Unlike other implementations, we do not make use of curves defined over a subfield such as Koblitz curves. This work was also presented at the CARDIS 2000 Smart Card Conference which was held last week in Bristol, UK. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- DIRECTIONS: The WPI Cryptoseminar is being held in the Atwater Kent building on the WPI campus. The Atwater Kent building is at the intersection of the extension of West Street (labeled "Private Way") and Salisbury Street. Directions to the campus can be found at http://www.wpi.edu/About/Visitors/directions.html ATTENDANCE: The seminar is open to everyone and free of charge. Simply send me a brief email if you plan to attend. TALKS IN THE SPRING 2000 SEMESTER: 9/27 Christof Paar et al., WPI Elliptic Curve Cryptography on Smart Cards without Coprocessors 10/11 Prof. William Martin, WPI Combinatorics in Modern Cryptography 10/25 Prof. Berk Sunar, WPI TBA 11/9 Susan Landau, Sun Microsystems Laboratories Have the Crypto Wars Been Won? 11/22 Seth Hardy, WPI Elliptic Curve Point Counting with the CM Method in Java TBA Adam Woodbury, WPI Public-key Cryptography in Constraint Environments (MS Thesis presentation) See http://www.ece.WPI.EDU/Research/crypt/seminar/index.html for talk abstracts. MAILING LIST: If you want to be added to the mailing list and receive talk announcements together with abstracts, please send me a short email. Likewise, if you want to be removed from the list, just send me a short email. Regards, Christof Paar ! WORKSHOP ON CRYPTOGRAPHIC HARDWARE AND EMBEDDED SYSTEMS (CHES 2001)! ! Paris, France, May 13-16, 2001 ! ! www.chesworkshop.org ! *********************************************************************** Christof Paar, Assistant Professor Cryptography and Information Security (CRIS) Group ECE Dept., WPI, 100 Institute Rd., Worcester, MA 01609, USA fon: (508) 831 5061 email: christof(a)ece.wpi.edu fax: (508) 831 5491 www: http://ee.wpi.edu/People/faculty/cxp.html *********************************************************************** For help on using this list (especially unsubscribing), send a message to "dcsb-request(a)reservoir.com" with one line of text: "help". --- end forwarded text -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah(a)ibuc.com> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

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WPI Cryptoseminar, Wednesday, Sept 27
by Christof Paar 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

Here we go again, the Cryptoseminar starts again. As alway, attendance is free and everybody is welcome. - Christof Paar ---------------------------------------------------------------------- WPI Cryptography Seminar Elliptic Curve Cryptography on Smart Cards without Coprocessors Christof Paar WPI Wednesday, September 27 4:30 pm, AK 218 (refreshments at 4:15 pm) This talk describes joint work by Adam Woodbury, Dan Bailey, and Christof Paar. This talk will discuss how an elliptic curve cryptosystem can be implemented on very low cost microprocessors with reasonable performance. We focus in this paper on the Intel 8051 family of microcontrollers popular in smart cards and other cost-sensitive devices. The implementation is based on the use of an optimal extension field (OEF) which is particularly suited for low end 8-bit processors. Two advantages of our method are that subfield modular reduction can be performed infrequently, and that an adaption of Itoh and Tsujii's inversion algorithm is used for the group operation. We show that an elliptic curve scalar multiplication with a fixed point, which is the core operation for a signature generation, can be performed in a group of order 2^134 in less than 2 sec. Unlike other implementations, we do not make use of curves defined over a subfield such as Koblitz curves. This work was also presented at the CARDIS 2000 Smart Card Conference which was held last week in Bristol, UK. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- DIRECTIONS: The WPI Cryptoseminar is being held in the Atwater Kent building on the WPI campus. The Atwater Kent building is at the intersection of the extension of West Street (labeled "Private Way") and Salisbury Street. Directions to the campus can be found at http://www.wpi.edu/About/Visitors/directions.html ATTENDANCE: The seminar is open to everyone and free of charge. Simply send me a brief email if you plan to attend. TALKS IN THE SPRING 2000 SEMESTER: 9/27 Christof Paar et al., WPI Elliptic Curve Cryptography on Smart Cards without Coprocessors 10/11 Prof. William Martin, WPI Combinatorics in Modern Cryptography 10/25 Prof. Berk Sunar, WPI TBA 11/9 Susan Landau, Sun Microsystems Laboratories Have the Crypto Wars Been Won? 11/22 Seth Hardy, WPI Elliptic Curve Point Counting with the CM Method in Java TBA Adam Woodbury, WPI Public-key Cryptography in Constraint Environments (MS Thesis presentation) See http://www.ece.WPI.EDU/Research/crypt/seminar/index.html for talk abstracts. MAILING LIST: If you want to be added to the mailing list and receive talk announcements together with abstracts, please send me a short email. Likewise, if you want to be removed from the list, just send me a short email. Regards, Christof Paar ! WORKSHOP ON CRYPTOGRAPHIC HARDWARE AND EMBEDDED SYSTEMS (CHES 2001)! ! Paris, France, May 13-16, 2001 ! ! www.chesworkshop.org ! *********************************************************************** Christof Paar, Assistant Professor Cryptography and Information Security (CRIS) Group ECE Dept., WPI, 100 Institute Rd., Worcester, MA 01609, USA fon: (508) 831 5061 email: christof(a)ece.wpi.edu fax: (508) 831 5491 www: http://ee.wpi.edu/People/faculty/cxp.html *********************************************************************** For help on using this list (especially unsubscribing), send a message to "dcsb-request(a)reservoir.com" with one line of text: "help". --- end forwarded text -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah(a)ibuc.com> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

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CDR: Frenchelon: The Next Generation ...
by Ernest Hua 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

http://www.sjmercury.com/svtech/news/breaking/merc/docs/003184.htm France Telecom to build American fiber network NEW YORK (Reuters) - France Telecom said Tuesday it will invest $200 million to build a 15,000-mile fiber optics network connecting 28 major cities in North America by the end of 2001. The network will be connected to France Telecom's pan-European backbone network, opened in October 1999, with international submarine cables. ... -------- Gee ... This wouldn't be used for commercial ... er ... I mean ... national security espionage ... er ... I mean ... surveillence, would it? Wink, wink, nudge, nudge, know what I mean ? Ern

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