December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Privacy/Money Orders
by an15489＠anon.penet.fi 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Many people use local check cashing stores to cash pay checks and buy money orders. Money orders are particularly useful when you want to retain some level of privacy when purchasing things like dirty magazines, subversive literature, etc. There are currently two bills in the House that may force these businesses to close. HR 1448 and HR 3235. I don't have the text of these bills, but some of the check cashing stores in my 'hood are asking customers to write their Hon. Misrepresentative immediately and ask them to block these bills. Does anyone have access to the text of these bills? Jack ------------------------------------------------------------------------- To find out more about the anon service, send mail to help(a)anon.penet.fi. Due to the double-blind, any mail replies to this message will be anonymized, and an anonymous id will be allocated automatically. You have been warned. Please report any problems, inappropriate use etc. to admin(a)anon.penet.fi.

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Re: All our eggs in one basket?
by jim＠bilbo.suite.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Eric Hughes writes > > Jim Miller writes > > > >If I failed to reply with a signed receipt, the bank could invalidate the > >digital coin. > > Unfortunately for this idea, when the bank uses a blind signature to > issue coins, it doesn't know what coin it just issued actually looks > like. The bank signs a blinded form of the coin. The blinded form is > unblinded by the withdrawer, and the bank cannot know what it looks > like. > I just got "Applied Cryptography" so now I know what you mean by "blinded form of the coin". I was thinking that the bank actually constructed the coin, but in fact the bank merely signs one of my blinded money orders. This signed blinded money order becomes the "coin" (at least in this scheme). That being the case, I still not sure how I am protected from a bank that cheats by bring the protocol up to the point where I unblind 99 of the money orders and the bank deducts the amount from my account but never sends me the money. I have some more reading to do, it seems. Perhaps I can simply trust the bank not to do this because it wants my future business. Still, if it were possible, I'd prefer not to have to trust the bank. After all, the bank doesn't have to trust me. Jim_Miller(a)suite.com

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Re: Privacy/Money Orders
by smb＠research.att.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Many people use local check cashing stores to cash pay checks and buy money orders. Money orders are particularly useful when you want to retain some level of privacy when purchasing things like dirty magazines, subversive literature, etc. There are currently two bills in the House that may force these businesses to close. HR 1448 and HR 3235. I don't have the text of these bills, but some of the check cashing stores in my 'hood are asking customers to write their Hon. Misrepresentative immediately and ask them to block these bills. Does anyone have access to the text of these bills? You can get some information on bills via telnet to locis.loc.gov, the Library of Congress Information Service. Here's what I found on those two bills -- it may be possible to get more, if you know how to work the search engine, which I don't. ITEM 1 OF 1 SET 1: BRIEF DISPLAY FILE: C103 (ASCENDING ORDER) 1. H.R.1448: SPON=Rep Fields, C., (Cosp=34); OFFICIAL TITLE: A bill to establish a limit on the fee which certain persons may charge for cashing checks and other instruments, to require despository institutions to cash checks issued by the United States or a State, and to provide that checks drawn by the Federal Government may be mailed only to the personal residence or primary place of business of the payee, to a Federal post office box, or to a federally insured depository institution at which the payee holds an account. ITEM 1 OF 1 SET 2: BRIEF DISPLAY FILE: C103 (ASCENDING ORDER) 1. H.R.3235: SPON=Rep Gonzalez, (Cosp=6); OFFICIAL TITLE: A bill to amend subchapter II of chapter 53 of title 31, United States Code, to improve enforcement of antimoney laundering laws, and for other purposes.

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PRZ on Pseudospoofing
by L. Detweiler 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Mr. Zimmermann gave a fantastic talk yesterday to a packed house at a Boulder (CO) Unix meeting. I really am extremely depressed that none of the CA cypherpunks showed up (NOT! <g>). He talked about the complex issues associated with his program. He's opposed to the Internet PEM standard because it is a weaker standard than PGP in the sense that it has a standard initialization vector, exposes recipients & senders of messages in plaintext (if I'm not mistaken, sorry, I'm not an expert but do play one on the cypherpunks list). Interestingly, he said that he thought that RSA was somewhat afraid of him because (according to an insider) they didn't want to confront his `folk hero' status. Mr. Zimmermann also had many comments on America as a police state. Unfortunately, I missed most of the talk because I am rather feckless in real-world navigation vs. cyberspace and had a difficult time zeroing in on the meeting geography coordinates (hee, hee). I would have taken copious notes that would have shamed the best CA cypherpunk and reported them wholesale if I had got there in time. I would be interested in hearing anyone else's impressions of the meeting. Mr. Zimmermann appeared to be somewhat sympathetic to my concerns about pseudospoofing, particularly on the part of cypherpunks. He entertained my suggestion of `signature revocation certificates' that would spread virus-like to revoke trust through the `web of trust' when someone realized they had been spoofed (betrayed). He seems to think that as long as everybody follows the guidelines in the PGP documentation, the `web of trust' would not really ever be corrupted. But he seemed to come around in thinking that a `signature revocation certificate' might lead to a more dynamic and responsive (and hence pure) web of trust. An audience member asked Mr. Zimmermann if his arrangement with ViaCrypt and licensing of RSA patents was `making stronger' RSA Inc. and (implicitly) their stranglehold lock on public key patents. He replied that the agreement actually made PGP stronger. BTW don't `harass' Mr. Zimmermann over any features, at least don't expect to see major revisions soon, they are all on the top of the queue while he is in the `promotion of Viacrypt' stage vs. the `major development and feature push' stage. ===cut=here=== To: prz(a)acm.org Subject: a simple question Date: Wed, 17 Nov 93 22:11:31 -0700 From: "L. Detweiler" <ld231782> [Some] cypherpunks have made it clear to me they condone, and perhaps widely practice, the following scenarios related to PGP: 1) real people signing imaginary identity's keys. I.e., I could make up different identities (pseudospoofing) and sign their identities, and have others sign these identities. 2) putting imaginary identities on the key servers. do you have some kind of opinion on these practices? they seem rather dishonest to me, to say the least. But what do I know? Subject: Re: a simple question To: ld231782(a)longs.lance.colostate.edu (L. Detweiler) Date: Thu, 18 Nov 93 1:39:13 MST From: Philip Zimmermann <prz(a)acm.org> It's not something I would do myself. It strikes me as having potential to lead to bad situations, as you have described in earlier notes. I prefer to deal with people only as my real self. It strikes me as unethical if used in fraudulent ways. That's my opinion. [...] Regards, Phil

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War of the Worlds
by L. Detweiler 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Apparently, many Cypherpunks hold the Wells' program `War of the Worlds' up as a masterpiece of public deception. `The problem was that people trusted their radios.' Actually, I think the problem was that their radios betrayed them. The radio had been built up as a medium of trust -- with news reports by anchormen that were among some of the most admired and respected public people. They were betrayed by Wells. Wells had the sense to apologize, and many new safeguards and taboos evolved from the fiasco. War of the Worlds, on the radio, is similar to Medusa building up trust with tentacles in cyberspace, and then betraying trust by unplugging them when the going gets tough. Except, however, that Wells and other officials apologized for their lapse in judgement. With Medusa, there is no concept of `plugging away' to resolve an unpleasant situation. Medusa just severs a snake and runs away like a coward or a criminal. There is nothing but disreputable shame in this. When CBS (?) broadcast `the day after', a simulation of a nuclear holocaust, there was a great hullaballoo about all the care they had taken to ensure that no one took the dramatization seriously. Also, NBC ran into intensely unpleasant repercussions for their `fake exploding pickup' piece (didn't someone resign over this)? The point is that the media takes Truth very seriously. They go to the greatest lengths to achieve it. Psychopunks love to cynically talk about how the entire media is just another disinformation outlet. *You're* just another grotesque disinformation outlet, deceiving honest reporters and infecting respectable outlets like Wired and NYT with your soothing lies about `privacy' and `Big Brother' when really talking about `rights and protections for criminals'. The King is Dead. Long Live the King.

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Could someone briefly describe...
by an4914＠anon.penet.fi 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Could someone please give a brief description of the "Republic of Desire" for those of us who haven't spent [US]$27 to see Gibson's _Virtual Light_? What is it? A gorilla organization of some sort? What's it for? Why is it such a neat thing to talk about? Thanks in advance... ------------------------------------------------------------------------- To find out more about the anon service, send mail to help(a)anon.penet.fi. Due to the double-blind, any mail replies to this message will be anonymized, and an anonymous id will be allocated automatically. You have been warned. Please report any problems, inappropriate use etc. to admin(a)anon.penet.fi.

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Re: Key Servers
by Black Unicorn 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-> Just another repulsive variation on psychopunk depravity and perversions. Honest people would be repulsed by it. <- I guess it must be because I'm an attorney, I'm attracted to it.

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Re: The Zen of Pseudospoofing
by greg＠ideath.goldenbear.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

L. Detweiler writes: > A psychopath asked a policeman to apologize for catching him. The > policeman refused. The psychopath called him an evil hypocrite. ---------- A policeman once lost his sense of right and wrong. He began to act like a criminal himself. The citizens did not trust him, as he had become what he had sworn to fight. One day, the other policemen arrested him. "We are throwing you in jail. You are a bad man. Go, be with your brothers the criminals." "You mustn't do that! I'm one of you!" the bad policeman said. And the other policemen put the bad policeman in jail. The criminals gathered around him, sneering and laughing and gnashing their teeth. "Look! A policeman! Let's eat him up!" they said. "You mustn't do that! I'm one of you!" the bad policeman said. "Heh heh," the criminals laughed. "Ask your brothers, the policemen, for help. We have no mercy for you." And, with that, they set upon him. The policemen listened to the bad policeman's cries, and they laughed too. "Ha ha," they said. "A criminal is getting what he deserves." -- Greg Broiles greg(a)goldenbear.com Baked, not fried.

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RSA Patent valid?
by Mike Ingle 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

We were having a discussion in my Computers and Society class about intellectual property, and the professor pointed out that the courts have consistently upheld patents of devices and processes which involve computers, but have shot down patents on algorithms. With that in mind, would the RSA patent stand up in court? Maybe that's why RSA has never sued anyone. They know the patent might not hold up, and it's easier to just keep their licensing fees lower than the cost of a lawsuit. If this is the case, it's good news for cypherpunks, because it means they will never take any action against us.

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McCarthyism vs. Watergate vs. Kennedy Assassination
by an12070＠anon.penet.fi 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

In all cases the people at the top could have insisted there was a paranoid `witchhunt' or `hysteria' going on. But in all cases, there *were* some intensely subversive and corrupt conspiracies going on. In the 50's, the Rosenberg-Soviet espionage ring was in full circle, stealing pricelessly valuable Atom Bomb secrets. The Rosenbergs were executed as traitors despite massive public uproar and appeals all the way to the Supreme Court and President Eisenhower (who was unmoved). The problem with McCarthyism was not that it was completely illegitimate (it was fueled by some actual conspiracies), but that it was carried to extremes. In Watergate, we had a corruption to the very highest levels of our executive branch of government, and a grotesque coverup that has so deeply shakened and poisoned honest people's trust in government for decades. The probes by Congress were met with evasion, stonewalling, and counterattacks. Nixon has been viewed as one of the most damaging presidents (to the institution of the presidency) ever to have been elected. In the Kennedy Assassination, according to a recent Newsweek, again there were coverups, but only by our own government to try to suppress the leaking of any information that might upset the American public into calling for retaliation against e.g. Cuba or the Soviet Union. They tried to comfort the public with a rapid investigation with foregone conclusions, rather than any systematic inquiry into the Truth. It seems to me that all are examples of how evasion, stonewalling, and counterattacks on Truth-seeking probes, by high-ranking officials seeking to promote unsavory or criminal personal `agendas' and their own respectability at all costs, led to monstrous consequences that demolished public trust in their most delicate and hallowed institutions for decades. Truly black consequences. Cypherpunks, you call it. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- To find out more about the anon service, send mail to help(a)anon.penet.fi. Due to the double-blind, any mail replies to this message will be anonymized, and an anonymous id will be allocated automatically. You have been warned. Please report any problems, inappropriate use etc. to admin(a)anon.penet.fi.

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