December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: 4th ammendment and Cryptography
by an56238＠anon.penet.fi 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Phil Karn: > ..... Indeed, many of us find cryptography so appealing >precisely because of its purely defensive nature. Phil, if you think cryptography as a purely defensive thing, you are deeply mistaken. Cryptography implies anonymous mail, which in turn implies the ability to do a lot of harm, through calomny, for example. Dont be mistaken: cryptography can be an *offensive* weapon. >Worst of all are the complete loonies (some apparently on this list) >who assert that guns are an essential protection against a tyrannical >US Federal Government. I think there's a place called talk.politics.guns somewhere. There's more than _some_ people on this list that believe in self-defense through guns. - -zap -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQCUAgUBLUnZiCk+9PttYUp1AQFj9wP4jF8u77dMj5COxqK5KC+Qp9rCmILRfKXw n52a+TabbNHsntAiBZ0YW3TCuZ8doVPtegmm2M/uChlKdpotNiZLPgi6Kf6wWzFw XJyQAirkXOxRshVwucigEa0DtmIBhMfHYVStvQtUM9lU+tO8KvZo8/KZEb0pXaTW UsfKe4WHbw== =+lKm -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- ------------------------------------------------------------------------- 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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2-way anonymous via SASE
by jim＠bilbo.suite.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Here's an idea that was inspired by Tim May's prepaid mailer example. I call it "2-way anonymous communication using Self Addressed Stamped Envelopes". The general idea is that each anonymous messages will include a SASE that can be used to reply to the sender, without revealing the identity of the sender to the message recipient. To reply, the recipient will copy the SASE from the original message and past it into a special section of the reply message. Remailers will examine this section of the reply message and use its contents to route the message back to the sender of the original message. The syntax's for describing the mechanism gets messy fast. I hope I can describe it so others can understand it. Here's how I see it working... Small example: Bob wishes to communicate anonymously with Ted via remailer R1. (With just one remailer, R1 would be able to track who sends to whom, but this is just for example purposes.) Bob constructs: (stuff1)R1 - stuff encrypted with R1's public key Where: stuff1 == Ted, (stuff2)Ted - Ted's address and more stuff encrypted with Ted's public key. stuff2 == msg, SASE - Bob's message and Self Addr Stamped Envlpe All together, it looks like: (Ted, (msg, SASE)Ted)R1 (i.e. msg and SASE, encrypted with Ted's public key, appended to Ted's e-mail address, all encrypted with R1's public key) The SASE contains the information Ted will use to send a reply message back to Bob. It looks like: R1, A, (stuff3)R1 where stuff3 == Bob, B, (stuff4)Bob stuff4 == A', B' all together: R1, A, (Bob, B, (A', B')Bob)R1 expanded R1's address, A - a one-time public-key generated by Bob, ( Bob's address, B - another one-time public-key generated by Bob, ( A' - private key paired with A, B' - private key paired with B ) encrypted with Bob's public key ) encrypted with R1's public key Ok, Bob sends (stuff1)R1 to R1. This is just like using a regular encrypting remailer. R1 decrypts stuff1 and gets: Ted, (stuff2)Ted R1, strips off "Ted" and passes the rest to Ted. Ted receives (stuff2)Ted, decrypts it and gets: msg, SASE Which is really: msg, R1, A, (stuff3)R1 Ted reads the message and decides to reply to whomever sent the message. Ted composes a reply and encrypts it with public-key A, then sends the following to R1 (he sends it to R1 because R1 was in the SASE): (stuff3)R1, (reply)A ==> R1 R1 receives this, decrypts (stuff3) and gets: Bob, B, (stuff4)Bob R1 encrypts (reply)A with public-key B and sends the following to Bob (the guy mentioned inside of stuff3): (stuff4)Bob, ((reply)A)B ==> Bob Bob receives this, decrypts stuff4, obtaining A' and B'. Bobs decrypts ((reply)A)B using B' and A' respectively and gets the reply message. If the reply message contained a SASE generated by TED, then Bob and Ted could continue to converse anonymously by including SASEs in each reply. Expanded example: Bob and Ted use combinations of R1, R2, R3 to communication anonymously Bob write a message and wants to send it to Ted via R1, R2, and R3. He constructs the following: (R2, (R3, (Ted, (msg, SASE)Ted)R3)R2)R1 In this example, the SASE will look like the following: R3, A, (R2, B, (R1, C, (Bob, D, (A', B', C', D')Bob)R1)R2)R3 ASIDE: As you may guess by now, Bob's message will go through R1, then R2, then R3, and Ted's reply will come back via, R3, then R2, then R1. However, the SASE does not have to specify the reverse route of the original message, nor even use the same remailers. Anyways, Bob sends (R2, (R3, (Ted, (msg, SASE)Ted)R3)R2)R1 ==> R1 R1 decrypts it and gets: R2, (R3, (Ted, (msg, SASE)Ted)R3)R2 R1 strips off "R2" and sends the rest to R2. R2 and R3 do similar things. Standard remailer stuff. Eventually Ted will receive (msg, SASE)Ted decrypting obtains: msg, SASE Which is really: msg, R3, A, (R2, B, (R1, C, (Bob, D, (A', B', C', D')Bob)R1)R2)R3 To reply to the sender of the message, Ted does just what he did in the first example. He constructs: (stuff3)R3, (reply)A and sends it to to R3. R3, R2, R1 do their thing and eventually the reply gets back to Bob. When it arrives at Bob it will look like: (A', B', C', D')Bob, ((((reply)A)B)C)D >From this, Bob can recover Ted's reply message, while simultaneously verifying that the remailers correctly routed the reply. If the remailers did not correctly route the reply, or failed to re-encrypt the reply with B,C, and D, then the thing Bob got at the end of the final decrypt would have been garbage. Phew. I wonder if it really works? Jim_Miller(a)suite.com

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Quantum cryptography
by Duncan Frissell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

J >Does anyone know how quantum cryptography works? J > J > - Joi Almost certainly. DCF "We'll free you sons of bitches whether you want to be freed or not." --- WinQwk 2.0b#1165

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Unsubscribe
by DBS5112＠ibm.MtSAC.edu 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Please, UNSUBSCRIBE me...

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Re: Prodigy Hard Drive Scans
by tcmay＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> I heard from a friend that Prodigy was scanning user's hard drives. > Basically, when you logged on Prodigy made a complete directory of your > hard drive and uploaded it. Prodigy was using this to find out what > applications you used so they could direct the appropriate advertising > towards you. Apparently, they're suffering several lawsuits now because > of it. > > My friend heard this on the trailing end of a radio talk show. If it was > really happening, it sounds horrible. Could Secure Drive be set up to > stop this kind of attack? > > Can anyone tell me if this is more than a rumour? If it is more than a > rumour, would you be able to point me towards some information about this? Just a rumor, disposed of several years ago. A hot topic of debate around 1990. This rumor arose because Prodigy set aside a block of user disk space for its own files. Sometimes this block had random stuff in it (recall that "erasing" a file doesn't actually overwrite the disk, it just removes pointers to the stuff being erased and allows other stuff to later be overwritten over it). Prodigy used part (a small part, given 1200- and 2400-baud modems in use then) of this block to send back to the main computers, so in principle it could see miscellaneous scraps of erased data. But this was accidental, was a tiny fraction of the disk, was not used or even looked at by Prodigy, and would have absolutely no value in determining applications used. (Think about what a samll random chunk of "erased" disk space would really mean in terms of telling outsiders what applications you use!) Ironically, an old college buddy of mine is now in charge of e-mail for Prodigy, in White Plains, New York. He visited me last summer and I showed him a _real_ computer service (Netcom) and we had a few good chortles about this Prodigy Conspiracy. --Tim May -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power:2**859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available.

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Re: your mail
by David Vincenzetti 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Some anonymous user sent me a message which is divided in three parts. I am sorry but I did not receive the first one. Can this anon guy please send me the first part again? Thank you.

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Re: New remailer up.
by nobody＠shell.portal.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Jon Boone expressed what seems to be a consensus, " I won't hack into mail.netcom.com to demonstrate that it is possible to figure out who used your remailer. But, if one of the admins from netcom wants to send me their syslogs, I'll do my best to put together a correlation." Netcom logs mail. The mail queue is viewable by most anyone willing to set up a mail queue logging routine. If someone wants to see the mail logs after it is no longer in the mail queue they have to be root on Netcom or illegally hack in. If the FDA wants your illegal smart drugs, they might get Netcom to hand over mail logs. If a hacker or the NSA taps into root, they don't need mail logs; they'll just "wiretap" the qwerty account, including its secret key and pass phrase. Is there any OTHER serious but unrelated problems with a Netcom remailer? Now I know what warnings and hints to put in qwerty's .plan: "Since Netcom keeps mail logs, people should only have contact with qwerty via other remailers or send mail out from qwerty only to public sites like Usenet or a mailing list, so the real addresses of the users never shows up on Netcom's logs or in the mail queue. It is also best to use encryption in case someone is reading the contents instead of just the logs." Routing through qwerty will add another layer of difficulty to someone trying to track down a message sender, since if forces them to get Netcom's sendmail logs after the fact or to make their own logs every day of the year from an account on Netcom. Is this legal for say the FDA to do? How about my new idea for a company called "Netlog!" in which I log the mail queue on Netcom and offer to sell CD ROMs containing a year's mail logs from Netcom? These tricks could be made more difficult with traffic analysis countermeasures. However, the issue seems more touchy than this rationalization for the existance of Netcom remailers. Not assuming qwerty remains in its current state, will adding qwerty to a mailing chain, say between extropia to hfinney@shell, using encryption, add to or decrease security? The question needs to be answered, with the assumption that someone IS collecting mail queue logs. How would you have me alter qwerty so that this link ADDED to the security of a chain? More than an hour delay must be avoided by making the scheme more sophisticated, in my view. If I add a 0-30 min. random delay, with added dummy traffic going out from qwerty in a circle through other remailers and back to qwerty's bit bucket, every few minutes, would this make it useful also to SERIOUS remailer users? Before I start throwing out ideas that I'm sure aren't new to readers here, I have a simple question that perhaps I should post to comp.unix.questions or comp.lang.perl, but.... Can I, and how would I, get a perl script to kick in and send out mail every few minutes when I am NOT logged in. Is this possible on Netcom? The question is pretty general, and involves any public access or personal account machine. So send me a remailer or tell me how to patch Hal's. -Nik (Xenon) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3 iQCVAgUBLVGOgQSzG6zrQn1RAQFGLAP+N31dNMjnArEOklm4AeruT7pu6LgfNdUM OawRDPY8CYgxYi5kJ4yByh7+uD+Asr7FCMaKacln8YwO6oOz3FlceNupC1czWFI5 NWuS9b4r5ZPKpLClv9K3oY1QvRePc1r0Ypl4SYCtZux/7U787BoyT/VUHmkfwple I6X6+irFXns= =6Klu -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: Remailer Tearline Conventions
by wcs＠anchor.ho.att.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> > That remail(a)extropia.wimsey.com is in Canada specifically makes > > communications with it fair game for NSA interception, however. > > NSA interception is world wide. On the other hand, extropia uses PGP encrypted messages to its remailer, and NSA PGP-breaking is distinctly *not* world-wide. I assume it doesn't use PGP encryption for the anonymous outgoing side, but you can always encrypt the message before encrypting it for extropia.

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finger user@wasabi.io.com
by wcs＠anchor.ho.att.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Neat stuff! You can finger billstewart(a)wasabi.io.com, even though I don't exactly have an account there... Is the source code available for your finger daemon? It doesn't seem to have any regular-expression matching; it mostly matches exact character strings, presumably case-insensitive. I couldn't figure out how to get it to match spaces, though: requesting 'bill stewart' got all the bills and all the stewarts, rather than getting the lines with bill stewart in them. Thanks!

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Re: contemplating remailer postage
by Hal 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

As Jim points out, Matthew's scheme for one-bit-per-stamp has the problem that it requires non-anonymous stamps. Jim suggested a variant on Chaum's digital cash where the stamp numbers would be re-blinded by the recipient so that the remailer would not recognize them (but could verify their validity). Matthew's bitmap idea could still be used, though. The incoming stamp numbers could be hashed down to, say, 24 bits. This could then be an index into a 2^24-bit file, which would take 2 MB. Set the bit when the stamp is used, and reject the mail if the bit is already set. Granted, this would create false rejections. But email is already not perfectly reliable. You could send 160,000 messages before you had as many as 1% false rejections (2^24 / 100). I think this would be better than trying to save this many digital stamps and check through the list each time for duplications. Hal

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