December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

no subject (file transmission)
by Bruce Schneier 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

APPLIED CRYPTOGRAPHY, Second Edition ERRATA Version 1.0 - 3 January 1996 This errata includes all errors I have found in the book, including minor spelling and grammatical errors. Please distribute this errata sheet to anyone else who owns a copy of the book. Page 11: Line 18, the reference should be "[703]" and not "[699]". Page 13: Fifth paragraph, first sentence, should read: "The German Enigma had three rotors, chosen from a set of five,...." Page 14: The last sentence should read: "The smallest displacement that indicates a multiple of the key length is the length of the key." Page 16: Third line from the bottom, "1.44" makes more sense as "1.544". Page 18: Table 1.1, second item. 1 in 4,000,000 is 2^22. Page 53: Second to last sentence about SKEY should read: "Similarly, the database is not useful to an attacker." Page 61: Step (3), the second message should contain A instead of B. Page 62: In the third line, there's a comma missing. Page 63: Second protocol, step (2), the second message should be "S_T(C,K_C)". Page 70: In the first step (4), the equation should be "R XOR S = M". In the second step (2), it should be "to generate U". Page 77: In step (2), the message is signed with Trent's private key. And T_n is mistakenly both the time and the timestamp. Page 82: Fourth line from the bottom, the correct expression is "up and died." Page 99: Tenth line from the bottom, delete the second word: "will". Page 104: Graph isomorphism has never been proven to be an NP-Complete problem. It does seem to be hard, and is probably useful for cryptography. Page 105: In Step (2), Peggy gives Victor a copy of H'. Page 112: Step (1) should read "Alice takes the document and multiplies it by a random value." Page 116: The protocol could be worded better. Step (3) should begin: "Alice decrypts Bob's key twice, once with each of her private keys." Step (4) should begin: "Alice encrypts both of her messages, each with a different one of the DES keys...." Page 126: The "Voting with Blind Signatures" protocol is a little more complicated. The voter does not send all the blinding factors in step (2). The CTF requests 9 of 10 blinding factors in step (3), and the voter sends only those blinding factors to the CTF. Page 134: Another problem with this protocol is that there are numerous ways that various participants can cheat and collude to find out the salary of another participant. These cheaters can misrepresent their own salaries during their attack. Page 135: Lines 13-14; technically Alice and Bob get no additional information about the other's numbers. Page 136: Lines 14-15; technically Alice and Bob get no additional information about the other's numbers. Page 144: Line 27, the odds should be "1 in n". Line 29, "step (2) should be "step (1)". Page 161: In the eleventh line from the bottom, "harnesses" should be "harnessed". Page 181: Line a should read "he does not know it" instead of "he does know it". Page 195: In line 13, the reference number should be [402]. Page 201: Error Propagation, lines 5-6. The sentence should read: "In 8- bit CFB mode, 9 bytes of decrypted plaintext are garbled by a single-bit error in the ciphertext." Page 202: Third to last line, toggling individual bits does not affect subsequent bits in a synchronous stream cipher. Page 203: Section 9.8, both equations should be "S_i = E_K(S_(i-1))". Page 209: Table 9.1. CFB, Security: Bits of the last block can be changed, not the first. CFB, Efficiency: The speed is the same as the block cipher only in 64-bit CFB. CFB and OFB, Efficiency: "Ciphertext is the same size as the plaintext" should be a plus. Page 217: The Table 10.1 headers got garbled. They should be: "Algorithm", "Confidentiality", "Authentication", "Integrity", and "Key Management". Page 246: The last line should be: "#define isEven(x) ((x & 0x01) == 0)". Page 249: Line 9, "Euclid's generalization" should be "Euler's generalization". Page 251: Lines 20-21. The sentence should read: "For example, there are 11 quadratic residues mod 35: 1, 4, 9, 11, 14, 15, 16, 21, 25, 29, and 30." See page 505 for more details. Page 258: In line 27, his name is spelled "Chandrasekhar". Page 275: Table 12.4; it should be a "48-Bit Input". Page 281: In line 4, "minuscule" is misspelled as "miniscule". Page 287: In Figure 12.6, there should be no period in X or Y. Page 292: Second line, "b_24" should be "b_26". In line 10, "1/2 - .0061" should be "1/2 + .0061". Page 295: Third line from the bottom, 2^(120/n) should be (2^120)/n. Page 300: In the first line, "56" should be "48". Page 319: In line 11, Section "25.13" should be "25.14". Page 322: Last line, the chip is 107.8 square mm. Page 338: In Figure 14.3 and in the first line, "f" should be "F". Page 340: Second equation should be "mod 256". Page 341: The current variants of SAFER are SAFER SK-40, SAFER SK-64, and SAFER SK-128, all with a modified key schedule, in response to a theoretical attack by Lars Knudsen presented at Crypto '95. Page 345: Lines 10 and 11; the + should be a -. Page 346: The reference number for BaseKing should be [402]. Page 352: In line 8, that second "l" should be an "r". Page 358: In the decryption equation of Davies-Price mode, the final D should be an E. Page 362: In the first equation, P is used to indicate both padding and plaintext. If P is plaintext and p is padding, then the equation should be: C = E_K3(p(E_K2(p(E_K1(P))))). Page 362: Figure 15.2 is wrong. The middle and top rows of "Encrypt," and the plaintext feeding them, are shifted right by 1/2 block from where they should be. Page 363: The parenthetical remark would be clearer as: "encryption with one of n different keys, used cyclically". Page 363: Second to last line, the equation should have an I_2 in place of the I_1. Page 367: Second equation, "P XOR K_3" should be "C XOR K_3". Page 369: A maximal period linear congruential generator as a period of m, not m-1. Page 375: Third paragraph should read: "It is easy to turn this into a maximal period LFSR. The highest exponent is the size of the register, n. Number the bits from n-1 to 0. The numbers, including the 0, specify the tap sequence, counting from the left of the register. The x^n term of the polynomial stands for the input being fed into the left end." The next paragraph is wrong. Page 379: Second line of code has an extra close parentheses. Page 380: The forth line should begin: "On the other hand, an astonishingly...." Page 393: In Figure 16.16, there should be an arrow from b_4 to the Output Function. Page 393: Second sentence should be: "It's a method for combining multiple pseudo-random streams that increases their security." Page 429: The second sentence should be: "It returns a fixed-length hash value, h." Page 431: In step (2), "prepend" instead of "append". Page 440: In item 3, there is an "AND" missing in the equation. Page 441: The compression function of MD2 is confusing without the indentations. The two for-loops are nested, and include the next two statements. Page 444: In figure 18.7, the a, b, c, d, and e variables are backwards. Page 445: Line 14, SHA should be compared to MD4. Page 447: Lines 3-4 should read: "...CBC in [1145], CBC in [55,56,54]...." Page 449: Figure 18.9, M_i and H_i-1 in the upper-left diagram should be reversed. Page 456: Table 18.2. Encryption speed should be in "kilobytes/second", and "SNEERU" should be "SNEFRU". Page 457: Lines 3 and 4, the ending "-1" and "-2" should be superscripts. Page 465: In the third line of text, the number should be n^-1. Page 470: The second to last line is missing an "is". Page 480: An additional reference for elliptic-curve cryptosystems is N. Koblitz, A Course in Number Theory and Cryptography, Springer-Verlag, 1988. This is an excellent book, and omitting it was an oversight. Page 489: Caption to Table 20.3 should specify an "80386 33 MHz personal computer". Page 495: In Step (8), the constant should be "0x7fffffff". Page 497: Delete the fourth equation in the list of verification equations. Page 499: ESIGN, seventh line: "m-1 should be "n-1". Page 505: In step 3, the third sentence should be: "If Victor's first bit is a 1, then s_1 is part of the product...." Page 514: In step (1), Alice must sent X to Bob. Page 515: In line 1, "commutitive" is misspelled as "communitive". Page 515: Hughes. Step (2): In order for step (4) to work, y must be relatively prime to n-1 else the inverse function in step (4) won't work. If n is a strong prime such that (n-1)/2 is also prime, then y can be any odd random large integer except for (n-1)/2. In step (4), Bob computes: z=y^-1 mod (n-1). Page 516: In the Station-to-Station protocol, the exponentiation is missing. In step (1), Alice sends Bob g^x mod p. In step (2), Bob computes the shared key based on g^x mod p and y. He signs g^x mod p and g^y mod p, and encrypts the signature using k. He sends that, along with g^y mod p, to Alice. In step (3), Alice sends a signed message consisting of g^x mod p and g^y mod p, encrypted in their shared key. Page 529: Line 13 should be a polynomial of degree 5, not 6. Page 535: The technique wherein Mallory leaks 10 bits of DSA secret per signature, can be sped up by a factor of 16 or so. Instead of choosing a 4-bit block randomly and then searching for a k that leaks the correct 14 bits, he can just use the low 4 bits of r to select the block of the signature to leak (no need to have an opaque subliminal channel) and he only has to check an average of 1024 k values until the bits sent out over the 10 subliminal channels match the 10 bits of the secret selected by r = (g^k mod p) mod q. Page 568: In the Kerberos Version 5 Messages, step 3, the final "s" should not be subscripted. Page 586: Figure 24.7, in the key the arrow should point from y to x. Page 586: Seventh line, "revokation" should be spelled "revocation". Page 589: Section 24.15, fourth line: "Nambia" should be "Namibia". Page 592: The equation is wrong. The structure of the LEAF is "E_KF(U,E_KU(K_S),C)", where U is the 32-bit unit ID, K_S is the 80-bit session key, and C is a 16-bit checksum of K_S and the IV (and possibly other material) used by the receiving chip to ensure that it has a valid LEAF. Page 604: Fourth line from the bottom should read: "to U.S. patent law." Page 606: In lines 12 and 13, the cross-references are to chapter 18. Page 607: In Table 25.4, the column headers are reversed. Page 610: Sixth line should read "it is filed", not "it is filled". Page 683: In reference 210, the title of the paper is "A Comparison of Three Modular Reduction Functions". Page 705: In reference 727, subscript should be a superscript. This errata is updated periodically. For a current errata sheet, send a self-addressed stamped envelope to: Bruce Schneier, Counterpane Systems, 101 East Minnehaha Parkway, Minneapolis, MN 55419; or send electronic mail to: schneier(a)counterpane.com.

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CIA intelligence info
by Vladimir Z. Nuri 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

some interesting info on apparent efforts by the CIA spooks to get into economic espionage and be more "user friendly" .. (blecch) ------- Forwarded Message From: "Ron Pappas" <rpappas(a)ix.netcom.com> Date: Sun, 31 Dec 1995 18:17:52 +0000 Subject: Intelligence Anyone? FRM: Ron Pappas FOR: All - - -=> Quoting Paul McGinnis <=- April 12, 1994 -- the CIA released a document in February 1994 called "A Consumer's Guide to Intelligence". My copy arrived today, so I will provide a review for interested parties. This item has a slick marketing feel to it, similar to that of a prospectus for a new stock or something given to prospective car buyers. It's even printed on glossy paper. About the only thing missing, that other marketing documents have, is color photographs of happy employees. Apparently, in this era of shrinking budgets, it was prepared to "sell" the Intelligence Community to various government officials. In fact, inside the front cover, is the statement "This publication is prepared for the use of US government officials, and the format, coverage, and content are designed to meet their specific requirements." So, what's the content like? It discusses what various intelligence agencies actually do, types of intelligence, how intelligence is collected (helpful tip: if you have just come back from an exotic foreign country, the U.S. government would really like to have a friendly chat with you...) and the reports that can be provided to policymakers. For example, if you have enough political clout, you can get a free subscription to the following (quoted verbatim from page 23 of the CIA publication): Defense Intelligence Agency Current Assessments _______________________________________________ A tabloid product that provides a brief and timely assessment of an ongoing military or military-related situation or recent development considered highly significant to national-level decisionmakers. Given the word "tabloid" one wonders if it features lurid New York Post style headlines, such as "Serbian general's secret Bosnian girlfriend"... There are a few surprises though. For example, among current large consumers of intelligence information, it lists the Department of Agriculture and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). They also discuss the rarely mentioned MASINT field (Measurements and Signatures Intelligence). MASINT involves using scientists and engineers to study other characteristics of intelligence information gathered. For example, although it is not stated in this publication, it is believed that MASINT specialists studied the spectral characteristics of Soviet rocket exhausts to determine the fuel mixture used in the rocket. How does one obtain a copy of this document? It is available for $12.50 to addresses in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, and $25.00 elsewhere. (There was an error in the NTIS database entry I posted earlier which indicated the price was $17.50). Also, you need to add $3.00 for postage per order (not per copy) in the U.S., Canada and Mexico, and $4.00 for postage elsewhere. To order, make checks payable to NTIS, and request item # PB93-928021 from U.S. Department of Commerce National Technical Information Service Springfield, VA 22161 phone (703) 487-4650 Ask for a free copy of their catalog of products and services. So, is it worth ordering? If you are interested in intelligence, I recommend this publication. Also, it might be a good thing to leave laying around on your coffee table if you have "politically correct" visitors... Paul McGinnis / TRADER(a)cup.portal.com - - ------------------------------------------------ (This file was found elsewhere on the Internet and uploaded to the Patriot FTP site by S.P.I.R.A.L., the Society for the Protection of Individual Rights and Liberties. E-mail alex(a)spiral.org) Peace, Pap... The College Board 864.878.7340 FIDO - 1:3639/60 - ------- End of Forwarded Message ------- End of Forwarded Message

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Re: Why Net Censorship Doesn't Work
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 8:17 PM 1/2/96, Duncan Frissell wrote: >That would require outlawry of crypto over the backbone and some way of >convincing the backbone to run government approved code. Quite a bit of >resistance would ensue. Have the Feds ever successfully mandated that large >numbers of people run government code? Aren't we all using Ada? --Tim May We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^756839 - 1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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New year's letter picked up by Netly News
by Raph Levien 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Hi cypherpunks, In case anyone missed it the first time, or just prefers to see it in HTML (with URLs), my new year's eve letter got picked up by the Netly News, Josh Quittner's daily column on Time's Pathfinder Web site. http://pathfinder.com/@@noje*HGS0AMAQNl0/Netly/nnhome.html The second part will run tomorrow. Raph

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Re: Foiling Traffic Analysis
by Carl Ellison 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>Date: Tue, 02 Jan 1996 19:44:53 -0800 >From: shamrock(a)netcom.com (Lucky Green) >Subject: Re: Foiling Traffic Analysis >At 20:02 1/2/96, Jon Lasser wrote: > >>When the group of packets arrives at a given station, it replaces its >>current encrypted packet with a new packet; >All participants in this network are clearly guilty of conspiracy. Their >assets will be confiscated under RICO. Sounds like disasterizing to me. This is merely a technical means for producing anonymous communications. Anonymity = conspiracy? - Carl +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Carl M. Ellison cme(a)acm.org http://www.clark.net/pub/cme | | PGP: E0414C79B5AF36750217BC1A57386478 & 61E2DE7FCB9D7984E9C8048BA63221A2 | | ``Officer, officer, arrest that man! He's whistling a dirty song.'' | +---------------------------------------------- Jean Ellison (aka Mother) -+

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Shut 'er down
by Duncan Frissell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 03:06 PM 1/2/96 -0500, Brian Davis wrote: >BTW our office collects more every year (from fines, foreclosures, >bankruptcies, affirmative civil cases, etc. etc.) than our total office >budget. We make money -- so why am I unpaid this week! :-) The courts cost too though. Also there's your share of general government overhead. You may cover variable direct costs but perhaps not indirect and fixed costs. I take it you are unpaid but working. Couldn't we reverse the process and pay you not to work? Sort of like protection money. It would be worth it I think. DCF "Some of my best friends are public employees but I wouldn't want my sister to marry one. She needs someone with a steady income and future prospects."

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Re: Guerilla Internet Service Providers (fwd)
by shamrock＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 22:11 1/2/96, Anonymous wrote: >frantz(a)netcom.com (Bill Frantz) wrote: > >> Don't forget about infrared to cross public rights-of-way. > >What about fog? Infrared and laser are not very reliable between buildings during fog. Between your house and your neighbor, a low cost 900MHz bridge would be the best way to go. On such short distances, an omni-directional antenna will work just fine. Check out Solectek (cheaper) or Cylink (faster). Both offer DES link encryption. -- Lucky Green <mailto:shamrock@netcom.com> PGP encrypted mail preferred.

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Re: Guerilla Internet Service Providers (fwd)
by shamrock＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 22:51 1/2/96, Steve Gibbons wrote: >I had a similar thought about a month ago. In particular, I was thinking that >skyrise office buildings would be a great market for ISPs to target. Rent a >closet in the basement/top floor close to the telco demarc. Run lots of >UTP to >the cients through the existing conduit, ceiling acces, air ducts, or whatever >and boom, lots of clients, low overhead, telco bills cut to 1/2 of the >competitions'. Up-front costs might (or might not be) higher, since the wire >installation would now be the burden of the ISP. [...] >FWIW, (and if anyone winds up doing something like this, I want a "finders >fee" ;-) ) Sorry, I thought of this months ago :-) But there is an even better business opportunity out there. Wireless T1 service covering a whole downtown area. I speced the whole system for the last company I worked for before they ran out of money. My calculations show that you can deliver close to T1 speed to corporate customers at fraction of the cost using land lines. In the best case scenario, you can produce the individual connection at below $200. No land line based ISP can ever touch that. The total cost for a land line based IPS is at least $395/T1. Set-up fee is lower too. Best, the whole thing can be set up self financing. If I wasn't so busy with other projects, I'd implement it myself. -- Lucky Green <mailto:shamrock@netcom.com> PGP encrypted mail preferred.

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Re: Guerilla ISP's...
by shamrock＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:49 1/2/96, Ed Carp [khijol SysAdmin] wrote: >And the servers could really be set up anonymously. Pay cash to an ISP >for a SLIP or PPP account, get a phone line under a ficticious name, set >up a PO box for the (few) bills, find somewhere to set up the machine, >and away you go... Only to have the box impounded within a few days after going on-line. A very costly and likely short lived hobby. -- Lucky Green <mailto:shamrock@netcom.com> PGP encrypted mail preferred.

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Re: Guerilla Internet Service Providers (fwd)
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 22:11 1/2/96 -0800, Anonymous wrote: >frantz(a)netcom.com (Bill Frantz) wrote: > >> Don't forget about infrared to cross public rights-of-way. > >What about fog? How much reliability do you need? As a first approxmation, look out your window. How often is it that you can't see your neighbor's house? Here in California, power failures are more frequent. (N.B. higher level protocols will recover from interruptions due to, e.g. large trucks.) I first heard of people using the technology to extend an IBM mainframe channel across a freeway 15 or 20 years ago. Bill

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Re: Why Net Censorship Doesn't Work
by nobody＠REPLAY.COM 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Ed Carp: >Tell that to folks in the contries of used-to-be-Russia. Lots of old >Communist leaders getting back into power - some folks are even saying >that the old days under the Communists were better than living in a free >market economy. > >Never underestimate the value of human stupidity and shortsightedness. Definitely. The number of warm and well-fed people who are willing to lecture the cold and starving on morals and higher principles is mind-boggling.

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RE: Guerilla Internet Service Providers
by Kurt Buff (Volt Comp) 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Another suggestion: The Republic of the Seychelles. Saw an AP article on them over the weekend. Seems they now (since November, if I remember the article correctly) offer unconditional haven for anyone who has $10,000,000 (didn't specify if in US$). No extradition, guaranteed, no matter what the crime, if perpetrated anywhere else in the world. Instant citizenship, no questions asked. Kurt ---------- From: nobody@REPLAY.COM[SMTP:nobody@REPLAY.COM] Sent: Monday, January 01, 1996 22:40 To: Cypherpunks(a)toad.com Subject: Re: Guerilla Internet Service Providers -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- On 1/1/96 at 3:11 pm Lucky Green replied to Andreas Bogk about: >>So I guess we'll need some computers in outer space, on offshore boats >>or in well-bribed stable dictatorships. >o Outer space: not very realistic >o Offshore boats: see the fate of drug trafficers in international waters >after the Coast Guard is through with them. What about using converted freighters offshore in international waters for storing the computers? i.e. Sameer the Wolfman Jack of Pirate Internet Services (tm) I was told that Belize is offering passports for the next two years for $50,000 and that might be even less if offers were made to the government to provide low cost Internet access to the citizens of Belize. http://www.belize.com/citzdoc.html Belize has always been known as a home for pirates, A wonderful Cypherpunk candidate for an offshore data haven! L. Malthus -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMOjOmQJo+wOswDgJAQEdGgP8CzcIf7/p1QS8yYc7uelApYLWcDUHo1AE LHBz4kWg8bdrvWEqck1oIgY/Z+gvr88tKP3l7TDei8y+mJFoqYeSM27aE0ohvS2a XVq7YwbGs+/CKTWJTWsyxwsQEQHyj+Ig7oY+JB76wUN9WTz9pfuwXQ7oaF4RXHcf WqFOXM6ogMA= =0UFR -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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How the Gov't. "Deputizes" Corporations to Enforce Laws
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 4:27 AM 1/2/96, Felix Lee wrote: >compare with software piracy. when was the last time a kid in your >neighborhood was busted for unlicensed copying of software? and >software is big business, lots of suits and $$$. they can try to make >disassemblers illegal, but it's not likely to succeed. Though I generally agree with the point that laws can and are skirted (I've argued this too many time myself to repeat it again here), this point about software piracy needs to be critiqued. The software piracy laws are usually targetted at _corporations_. The Software Publisher's Association has very effectively caused corporations to launch extensive anti-piracy programs (including the very audits of disk drives that so many on this list think is a violation of their human rights). As with the drug laws, which corporations have been "deputized" (= threatened) to enforce via drug testing, urine tests, random searches, etc. Whit Diffie has been making this point for several years, that the drug laws may not be very enforceable on street corners, but by threatening corporations with loss of contracts, shutdown of plants, seizure of assets, and even criminal prosecution if they fail to take approved steps to create a "drug-free workplace," the long arm of the law is supplemented by corporate enforcement. The "War on Drugs," "Just Say No," and "FooCorp Maintains a Drug-Free Workplace" sorts of campaigns. (When I was at Intel, 1974-86, nobody cared what drugs were used in the evenings, weekends, etc., so long as one did not come to work stoned or otherwise impaired. Now, like most other large corporations, there are posters up on the walls with childish slogans about the dangers of "substance abuse," extensive drug tests for new employees (not sure about existing employees), employee training seminars devoted to substance abuse, etc. Not because Andy Grove sees a drug problem, but because of the drum beat of "Just Say No!" hysteria and the threats of government sanctions. Corporations have been enlisted into the War on (Some) Drugs.) The same applies to software piracy. Nobody expects casual, personal copying to stop, but anyone in a company can anonymously narc out the company to the SPA and law enforcement. The SPA and cops may then decide to "make an example" out of the company, launching raids, detailed audits of all machines, and the levying of huge fines for copies of software which are thought to be illegal. (This course of action seems to happen regularly in the Bay Area...the press is usually invited along or tipped off, and the evening news shows some company shut down for a day as SPA and law enforcement agents carry off dozens of bootlegged copies of WordPerfect and Excel.) The drug and software piracy cases give us some hints about how restrictions on "illegal crypto" are likely to be enforced. The "casual user" will not be targetted. He can pretty much expect to see no effective enforcement. However, the Lockheeds and Apples will face sanctions, loss of contracts, asset forfeiture, etc., unless they take "positive steps" to ensure that PGP, BlackNet, non-GAKked crypto, anonymous remailers, and other illegal programs are not being used on their systems. This will entail packet sniffers checking for the usual signs, audits of employee workstations and PCs, posted policies on "cybersubstance abuse" and its dangers, etc. (I'm only slightly joking here.) While this will still not stop all crypto use--just as tax evasion continues, drug use is rampant, and software piracy is done to some extent by nearly everyone--it will halt certain types of rapid deployment, pushing crypto use to the fringes and away from mainstream use. It will terrorize the Intels and Merrill Lynches of the country into being enforcers of the laws. This is how things are being done in these waning years of the 20th Century. --Tim May We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^756839 - 1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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NSA gets into the ISP business
by nobody＠flame.alias.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Recently I went out shopping for a cheaper ISP. I found one which was very inexpensive. Too inexpensive. At first I was thrilled...then I began to wonder how they could charge so little. Pcix.com is offering static ip address, domain name, etc, the whole schebang for $20 a month, or $75 if you want a dedicated line. That's less then TLG, and TLG is a non-profit organization. As the saying goes, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. It seems our government friends have found themselves a new hobby. I'm not sure exactly what this sting operation was set up for, but I'm sure you can use your imagination. The user agreement is very interesting. It states: 1) You're not allowed to upload any encryption software (even if you don't export it) or have any strong crypto in your shell account, and 2) They are allowed to monitor anything you send over their network. Spooks' dream ISP. Highlights from the user agreement: Section 2.7(b) > Member further agrees not to upload to the PCIX services any data or > software that cannot be exported without the prior written > government authorization, including, but not limited to, certain > types of encryption software. Section 4.1 > PCIX may elect to electronically monitor any and all traffic > which passes over our Wide Area Network. This monitoring may include > public as well as private communications and data transfers from our > Members and to our Members as well as any and all communications and > data transfers to and from any other internet sites. PCIX will > monitor our Members and those who use or transmit communications or > other data over our network to try and ensure adherence to > international, federal, state and local laws as well as the PCIX > Terms of Service Agreement.

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RE: Why Net Censorship Doesn't Work
by Bob Bruen, MIT Lab for Nuclear Science 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

DCF wrote: >Thought control is a very difficult task. It always has been. The >Inquisition, Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and the People's Republic of >China tried but three of the four are no longer with us. Short of >totalitarian controls, thought controls will be ineffective. And >totalitarian controls are difficult to impose these days. While thought control is difficult, one cannot ignore the damage done trying to do it. All of the above examples were expensive in terms of human suffering and death toll for long periods of time. The controls were effective for some time with long periods for recovery. The facists may lose in the end but the price of victory is very high. I fear the current and future efforts at controls will be costly no matter what the outcome. bob

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Re: NYT's _Unmuzzling the Internet_
by Loren James Rittle 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Jaron Lanier wrote in the _The New York Times_, January 2, 1996, p. A15: ``The other day, I came up with a way to easily evade the proposed American restrictions. My simple idea would be to create a computer program, dubbed `Unmuzzle,' which would deposit incomprehensible fragments of any forbidden material in different foreign computers (though maybe not Germany's). The contraband communication would only be reassembled into a coherent whole when downloaded in the home of the user back in the United States, where it would become protected speech, as in any other medium.'' Is this the state to which the Internet must evolve to withstand attack from the possible near-future legislation contained within the current draft of the Telecommunications Reregulation Bill? The Internet technology that was designed to withstand network outages by routing around the problem must now, perhaps, also be designed to allow information to be split for storage and transmission to navigate around mere political insanity. I know: "Cypherpunks write code!", but something seems amiss with the technical solution proposed in the opinion editorial quoted above. Many questions are begged in my mind. At first, the Jaron proposal sounds like an interesting thought experiment but a total waste of bandwidth, both CPU and network, to me. The unconstitutional Bill must be defeated in Congress, by that Presidential veto pen that Clinton has become so fond of using recently or the Court system, if absolutely necessary. If none of that happens, then surely technology can be used to route around this "political" problem. It just seems like a shame to have to expend technical effort and valuable network resources to play games to meet the letter of a law, which would so clearly break the direct spirit of the Constitution, if signed into Law and later found during a Supreme Court battle to "pass constitutional muster," as they like to say. Under my model, which may be different than Jaron's, I assume the raw data is useless without a recipe, or algorithm, if you prefer. Jaron doesn't say how the ``incomprehensible fragments of any forbidden material'' are known to be joinable and how they are to be joined so I invented this as the missing glue to discuss his idea in this forum. I assume a recipe would be a new base item fetchable via a standard URL. It would disclose the location of raw data sets, how they should be joined and the resultant data-type of the information, if the recipe were to be followed. In this way, it might be possible to work a decoder directly into Mosaic/NetScape/HotJava/<name your favorite WWW browser here>. (Perhaps a self-imposed rating could be included within the recipe as additional information bits. Or, perhaps the recipe could be signed by one or more reviewers, which may be trusted by end-users. These features are mentioned only as side features, they do not affect the basic operation to circumvent the letter of the proposed Law. Back to the questions begged and partial solutions. For instance, if one provides, in a distributed fashion, data sets --- which taken apart are not indecent in anyone's mind since they appear completely random --- and a recipe to generate information from the data sets --- which may construct something which might be considered indecent --- does anyone violate any portion of the insane Indecent Bill, if passed by Congress and signed into Indecent Law by the President? Does the person who set up the information split get in trouble? Do the people pulling in recipes and various piece of random-looking data sets get in trouble? Do the data set warehousers get in trouble, even if they could have had no direct way to know the raw pieces of data that they stored were to something eventually seen to be indecent when a recipe was followed. Do the recipe warehousers get in trouble, since they could have known what might be created if all data sets were obtained and joined as proscribed by the recipe? What if end-user client software was taught to do all the steps required to follow a recipe automatically? Same as last question, except the user was explicitly asked before any recipe was followed to completion? I think that the Court would be hard-pressed to find a difference between distribution of something indecent and a recipe known to create something indecent from raw data. But, what if recipes were used for everything, not just items thought to be borderline indecent to totally obscene. Under this assumption, if it could be shown that a recipe and raw data warehousers had no knowledge of each other's contents, they could do no self-policing. It appears that raw data warehousers have "no knowledge" of recipe warehousers as long as the raw data contains no reference to the recipe. The recipe warehousers appear to have no such luck since they contain URLs that point to the raw data chunks required to form coherent information. Recipe warehousers could follow the recipe to "check" content. Finally, on a different tangent, why do the raw data pieces have to be stored on different machines in different countries, if by themselves they are unreadable? Since I believe it is the recipe, not the contributing raw data that presents a problem, it seems like this must be the piece to be stored external to the U.S. For example, only the recipe need be stored abroad in a nice little computer in the Netherlands. Assuming the recipe included only URL-style pointers to the data sets' distributed location and mixing method, a recipe should be quite small. Imagine the Government trying to explain to a jury that random looking transmissions taken together in some exotic manner --- as described by a file fetched from outside the U.S. --- equals some filthy text or image or some other unpopular political speech. Using these rules, I could probably find three passages of text in the 100,000's of pages composing the U.S. Code that when XOR'd together generate something obscene. To make the Government's job even harder before a jury, what if the recipe to be fetched from the foreign country always generated the First Amendment text when followed directly. Imagine the Government's surprise when the Defense later shows a recipe involving the exact same information sets that, perhaps, yields the text of the First Amendment, The Indecent Bill itself or another interesting historical document. What if certain implementations of software that decode these recipes could infer another recipe implicitly encoded within the fetched data sets which were required to follow the explicitly given recipe. Since the information required to regenerate the First Amendment text will have always been pulled, in its entirety, an external observer must concluded that the receiver might have plainly followed the directions in the recipe leading to its generation instead of any hidden inferred recipe for the questionably indecent text or image. That sounds like reasonable doubt to me, regardless of the facts of the case. The Defense can always argue that the client was just trying to express the First Amendment in a novel manner, which happens to be true in more ways than one in this case. :-) The Jaron proposal does have some major benefits at least as I have framed the idea. These need to be mentioned explicitly, in case the important side goal was too subtle expressed above. I reverse the location of the bulk of the data required to store the real information. The recipe, which is assumed to be small with respects to the size of the raw data, is stored in any Internet friendly location (i.e. most of the world except the U.S. after the CDA passes) and pulled into the U.S. as required. The raw data is stored within the U.S., randomly spread between data set servers. When arranged in this manner, the bulk of the data continues to be stored as it would have been before stupid U.S. regulations took affect. This final analysis might sound U.S. centric. It was not meant to be. I assume that any information replication scheme that might have been used could continue to be used. For example, one recipe might exist for each regional replication that existed. Hopefully, the recipes themselves would be replicated in many Internet friendly locations. I welcome informed legal comments on this modified proposal. Regards, Loren -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMOpKUv8de8m5izJJAQH+cgP+MDO6TK5s1MkkiWcvSKP9wwoVn0VqMM+U hPRGQJ2MjL3s7r9mPTqlbnPOllI4FO6rBQt5vqmzMnemFG1k94REvmGHuSMxZ7xV zoqYcvZzxdG2KwKBiLWiilirA0IrDV1MQJ4i7xMYYdOoOoeN1VnUbgHW9iWquwKT tIpWzbFFGO0= =m0bM -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Inter-Patch Voice Network
by J. Kent Hastings 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-- [ From: J. Kent Hastings * EMC.Ver #2.5.02 ] -- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Cpunx, This may be old hat, but now that PGPfone is available, why don't we start an "Inter-Patch" Network using PGP and ecash? Here are features to consider: * Computer users generate pre-paid phone cards for non-geeks. * Rate is say, 2 cents per minute, for near-real-time voice. * "Voice Mail" service is not subject to telco utility regs. * PIN#s can be changed by users, who can also confirm value. * Thus a user can sell remaining time on a card to others. * A local participant to the target number is selected. * Ecash is instantly delivered in exchange for communications. * Perhaps a 50 percent split, 1 cent per minute for example. * Bad participants are removed from the network. Kent - -- J. Kent Hastings Assistant Director of The Agorist Institute zeus(a)pinsight.com, http://www.pinsight.com/~zeus/agorist/ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMOn0hTTxxI221vktAQHs3AQAj/uI2xYGSfE9iSVttCncBrS7yDAUaecX +s1U8zF29zx4a/zq6yUOOJncxS7GWXavUhNLcjuruH7f9tHO1Sam8XcT59rwVlvv P+xnrV/NwaDW0q+TxWjnNhVgTJePC6Hq+6bLRiod+hOTuawkJ3vx50CmDoEKC1Fk HrNqiRLzNQc= =O3Bo -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: Errata for _Applied Crypto_
by markh＠wimsey.bc.ca 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Wink Junior <winkjr(a)teleport.com> writes: > Bruce Schneier <schneier(a)counterpane.com> has an errata file for the second > edition of _Applied Cryptography_ available on request. Hopefully he will > also make it available via the Web. Hats off to Bruce for making this > information available in a timely, cost-effective manner. It is available from the Wimsey crypto archive (thanks Bruce!) ftp://ftp.wimsey.com/pub/crypto/Doc/applied_cryptography/2nd_ed_errata-1.0 -- Mark Henderson -- markh(a)wimsey.bc.ca, henderso(a)netcom.com, mch(a)squirrel.com PGP 1024/C58015E3 fingerprint=21 F6 AF 2B 6A 8A 0B E1 A1 2A 2A 06 4A D5 92 46 cryptography archive maintainer -- ftp://ftp.wimsey.com/pub/crypto ftp://ftp.wimsey.com/pub/crypto/sun-stuff/change-sun-hostid-1.6.1.tar.gz

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Re: Foiling Traffic Analysis
by shamrock＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 23:21 1/2/96, Carl Ellison wrote: >This is merely a technical means for producing anonymous communications. > >Anonymity = conspiracy? Poll after poll shows that the majority of Americans is eager to allow warrantless searches of their homes and property to aid the War on Drugs. Every non-CP person that I tell about remailers asks me "This is legal?". Meaning that they would expect it to be illegal. Surely a prohibition against anonymous remailers and especially against DC nets is a small prize to pay for perceived security against the Four Horsemen... Inevitably, a DC net or the Token Ring approach described earlier will be used for illegal purposes. Once, not if, that comes to pass all participants will be guilty of conspiracy and their property subject to forfeiture. No trial needed and it will happen to the applause of the general public. -- Lucky Green <mailto:shamrock@netcom.com> PGP encrypted mail preferred.

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Re: Guerilla Internet Service Providers (fwd)
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 05:37 PM 1/2/96 -0800, you wrote: >> It seems to me that phone line costs are turning into a floor price for >> Internet access, when they shouldn't really be. The main asset telephone >> companies have, right now, is in RIGHTS OF WAY. Put an ISP in a business >> park that allows you to run your own dedicated copper pairs, and you've >> bypassed $25/month/line business phone line charges. >> >> At some point, individual urban and suburban blocks could easily be >> "guerilla re-wired" for ISP access without serious trenching, etc. The >> phoneco would still be involved, but in a far lower-profit mode, as the >> supplier of a single T1 to a multi-block area. > >For the "last mile" to the ISP user, wireless could be a better bet. >Have antenna, will surf. Yes, you're absolutely right. It would be great if some entrepreneur could buy a T1, put up a 2000 MHz (or somewhere around that; whatever frequency was allocated appropriately) local "cellular" data system which would be able to connect to up to, say, 100 simultaneous or so local users using modems little more complicated than a current 900 MHz cordless phone. Okay, maybe all this stuff is already being worked on at a few dozen or hundred companies around the globe, but I can't wait... >(Not speaking for Qualcomm, etc.) > >Peter Monta pmonta(a)qualcomm.com >Qualcomm, Inc./Globalstar Question: Is this the "Qualcomm" that does the Internet access software, or the "Qualcomm" who builds the wireless amps/filters/hardware/etc? Or is it all the same company?!?

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Re: [local] Syracuse new york
by Daniel Miskell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Douglas F. Elznic writes: >Are their any interested people in having a meeting in the syr area? I most certainly would. I currently reside in the western ny state area. Anybody else interested? Munster --- _________________________________ *!Cheese Doctrine:!* Though cultured over time, and aged to perfection, one must not yield to produce mold. One must also not belittle themselves by conforming to the "whiz", but melt over the unprocessed ideas of Ghuda. _________________________________

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Re: Guerilla Internet Service Providers (fwd)
by Steve Gibbons 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

In Article: <v02120d01ad0fdd14e993(a)[192.0.2.1]>, shamrock(a)netcom.com (Lucky Green) wrote: # At 22:51 1/2/96, Steve Gibbons wrote: # >I had a similar thought about a month ago. In particular, I was thinking that # >skyrise office buildings would be a great market for ISPs to target. Rent a # >closet in the basement/top floor close to the telco demarc. Run lots of # >UTP to # >the cients through the existing conduit, ceiling acces, air ducts, or whatever # >and boom, lots of clients, low overhead, telco bills cut to 1/2 of the # >competitions'. Up-front costs might (or might not be) higher, since the wire # >installation would now be the burden of the ISP. # [...] # >FWIW, (and if anyone winds up doing something like this, I want a "finders # >fee" ;-) ) # Sorry, I thought of this months ago :-) But did you post/publish? :) # But there is an even better # business opportunity out there. Wireless T1 service covering a whole # downtown area. I speced the whole system for the last company I worked for # before they ran out of money. My calculations show that you can deliver # close to T1 speed to corporate customers at fraction of the cost using land # lines. In the best case scenario, you can produce the individual connection # at below $200. No land line based ISP can ever touch that. The total cost # for a land line based IPS is at least $395/T1. Set-up fee is lower too. # Best, the whole thing can be set up self financing. If I wasn't so busy # with other projects, I'd implement it myself. I'd be interested in seeing your numbers and cost breakdowns. I'd really be interested in the up-front costs that would be associated with the equipment and set-up time/training that will help "insure" data privacy over wideley broadcast media. The up-front costs for ~T1 capable tranceivers isn't insignificant either. I figure ~$10K up front (maybe half of that, maybe twice when you include management overhead) Amortize over 3 years, and compare. All of this is assuming that the bandwidth is available on the airwaves to handle ~200 ~T1s. (If we're talking $200.00/mo. for T1, sign me up tomorrow, and my neighbor, and his, and hers, and... *poof* no more bandwidth in a "decently" populated metro area or even a downtown. (Back of the envelope calculations show that ~200 T1 ~= 1 TV station [although I might be off by an order of magnitude.]) I apologize if this is off topic, but the crypto part still applies (moreso, even!) to broadcast over the airwaves. (Besides, I'm sure that this list has enough subscribers that are shelling out $200-$500/mo. for 56K/Frac T1/ISDN that they'd be interested in a less expensive alternative.) -- Steve(a)AZTech.Net

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Why Net Censorship Doesn't Work
by Duncan Frissell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Sometimes in the day-to-day wrangling with the net censors, we forget the larger picture. There is an assumption here and in the media (see the Newsweek year-end piece on the nets by Steven Levy) that the prospect of 2 years in stir and $100,000 fines will quell net speech. This seems unlikely because of the nature of the medium. Thought control is a very difficult task. It always has been. The Inquisition, Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and the People's Republic of China tried but three of the four are no longer with us. Short of totalitarian controls, thought controls will be ineffective. And totalitarian controls are difficult to impose these days. It used to be said that no country would be allowed to move from Communism to Capitalism. It can now be said that it is inconceivable that a modern country will move from a Market to a Command Economy. Market discipline is strong. Since only totalitarians have a shot (for a short time) to enforce thought control, the OECD countries will not succeed at thought control. This used to be unimportant because one's thoughts were trapped in one's head. You could speak only to a few people and "mass media" from books to TV was expensive, centralized and somewhat easy to control. You were free in your mind but cut off from communicating your thoughts freely to others. Those conditions no longer exist. If you can think it (or even not think it) you can communicate it easily and cheaply to others. Since thought is free and communications is almost free, control by others is difficult. The net is a fair mapping of the consciousness of its participants onto a world spanning communications system. Large companies and even quite small businesses are concerned about legal hassles. They have an investment to lose and they are more likely to be prosecuted than ordinary individuals. Ordinary people rightly suspect that their risk of punishment is quite low. Particularly since if they are worried about it, they can take many easy steps to protect themselves. In the coming world in which millions of households have multitasking computers with full-time highspeed connections to the nets, Java-like applets running wild, etc; the opportunities to stash info in easily accessible but hard to trace forms expands without limit. I was trying to imagine over the weekend how the Feds would regulate the Net. Will Janet and her Storm troopers (wearing Nazi-style bucket helmets) smash into the next meeting of the Internet Engineering Task Force and lock everyone up or force them at gunpoint to adopt standards proposed by the government? And if they do, will their code be any good and will it be accepted by enough nodes to make a difference? Unlikely in the extreme. Where are the pressure points where regulation can be applied? To me, it looks like King Canute ordering back the tide. DCF

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Re: 2047 bit keys in PGP
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 19:52 1/3/96 -0500, Rick Busdiecker wrote: >Another point to realize is that PGP uses a combination of ciphers. >When encrypting, the RSA key is only used to encrypt an IDEA key. >That IDEA key is used to encrypt your message. Somewhere between 2048 >and 4096, you're making the RSA key stronger (harder to brute force) >than the IDEA key. At that point, the extra time that you're using >for super-big RSA keys is totally wasted. To nitpick: Getting the RSA key will give you ALL the IDEA keys. That is probably worth 200-10000 times the effort. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz Periwinkle -- Computer Consulting (408)356-8506 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz(a)netcom.com Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA

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Re: Guerilla Internet Service Providers (fwd)
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:09 PM 1/2/96 -0600, you wrote: >> For the "last mile" to the ISP user, wireless could be a better bet. >> Have antenna, will surf. > >I can easily visualize mobile and portable systems linking to an ISP, >downloading email via encrypted POP/UUCP/whatever, using itinerant 2m or >450 MHz frequencies. A mobile system connects to any ISP, gets a login: >prompt, enters "xyz(a)host.domain", gets thrown into a POP session on >host.domain, uploads/downloads, then disconnects. All it would really >require is implementing "exec rlogin -l xyz host.domain" into getty (a >very simple patch) and suitable crypto protocols... >- -- >Ed Carp, N7EKG Ed.Carp(a)linux.org, ecarp(a)netcom.com As a ham, too (N7IJS) I recognize your implicit selection of 2m or 450 MHz. But I gently object to this, for reasons that I think will be obvious. First, technology has been marching on in the last 10-20 years, and communications frequencies of 2 GHz and more are technically do-able and comparatively empty. (and with modern IC technology, even easy) Secondly, ham gear tends to be used for long-range communication (miles and watts) and generally has little or no ability to frequency hop/time hop or to automatically turn down transmitter power to be able to share frequencies over short distances (low milliwatts or even microwatts). Those high gigahertz frequencies would be ideal for communication over a few blocks distance. (Sure, packet has been done for years but it is a still-born development; they still think 9600 bps is a "fast" modem speed.) I forsee locally-owned boxes that are the equivalent of a wireless phone switch implementing re-used freuqency microcells; the cost SHOULD be far lower than the current copperline phone systems, once the telephones are paid for. And they shouldn't cost much more than current 900 MHz cordless telephones, too.

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