December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Regarding your check
by promotions＠web-promotions.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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Crypto DLL's/SSLeay 0.4.5
by Eric Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Just in case people are interested, I've put the most recent version of my SSL (SSLeay) library up on ftp://ftp.psy.uq.oz.au/pub/Crypto/SSL/ The big differece with this realease is that it builds under Windows 3.1. The DLL's for the libraries are there as well as the ported demo programs. I've used Borland C 4.0 and the .IDE file plus source code are in the distribution. The DLL's contain routines for MD2, MD5, RC4, DES (every mode you could want :-), IDEA, RSA, SSL and all the X509 etc stuff that is part of life with SSL. The library even compiled under MSDOS :-). Since my code base will always be unix first, the code is not optimised for 16bit and probably never will be, but still, the algorithms work and the code is free for comercial and non-comercial use. The applications need work to make them nice under Windows, but hell, I'm only writing a library :-). On the PGPphone issue, I Personally I feel SSLphone would be a much better way of doing things. If some-one has a 'voice' over modem program already, they should be able to slip SSL into it in only a few days. For phone over modem, authentication is not really required and what exists in my library is everything required for the encryption side of things. those URL's again http://www.psy.uq.oz.au/~ftp/Crypto/ ftp://ftp.psy.uq.oz.au/pub/Crypto/SSL ftp://ftp.psy.uq.oz.au/pub/Crypto/SSLapps eric -- Eric Young | Signature removed since it was generating AARNet: eay(a)mincom.oz.au | more followups that the message contents :-)

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FBI Files on Clipper Releas
by Dave Banisar 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

FOR RELEASE: August 16, 1995, 2:00 p.m. EST CONTACT: David Sobel (202) 544-9240 FBI FILES: CLIPPER MUST BE MANDATORY WASHINGTON, DC - Newly-released government documents show that key federal agencies concluded more than two years ago that the "Clipper Chip" encryption initiative will only succeed if alternative security techniques are outlawed. The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) obtained the documents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation under the Freedom of Information Act. EPIC, a non-profit research group, received hundreds of pages of material from FBI files concerning Clipper and cryptography. The conclusions contained in the documents appear to conflict with frequent Administration claims that use of Clipper technology will remain "voluntary." Critics of the government's initiative, including EPIC, have long maintained that the Clipper "key-escrow encryption" technique would only serve its stated purpose if made mandatory. According to the FBI documents, that view is shared by the Bureau, the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Department of Justice (DOJ). In a "briefing document" titled "Encryption: The Threat, Applications and Potential Solutions," and sent to the National Security Council in February 1993, the FBI, NSA and DOJ concluded that: Technical solutions, such as they are, will only work if they are incorporated into *all* encryption products. To ensure that this occurs, legislation mandating the use of Government-approved encryption products or adherence to Government encryption criteria is required. Likewise, an undated FBI report titled "Impact of Emerging Telecommunications Technologies on Law Enforcement" observes that "[a]lthough the export of encryption products by the United States is controlled, domestic use is not regulated." The report concludes that "a national policy embodied in legislation is needed." Such a policy, according to the FBI, must ensure "real- time decryption by law enforcement" and "prohibit[] cryptography that cannot meet the Government standard." The FBI conclusions stand in stark contrast to public assurances that the government does not intend to prohibit the use of non-escrowed encryption. Testifying before a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on May 3, 1994, Assistant Attorney General Jo Ann Harris asserted that: As the Administration has made clear on a number of occasions, the key-escrow encryption initiative is a voluntary one; we have absolutely no intention of mandating private use of a particular kind of cryptography, nor of criminalizing the private use of certain kinds of cryptography. According to EPIC Legal Counsel David Sobel, the newly- disclosed information "demonstrates that the architects of the Clipper program -- NSA and the FBI -- have always recognized that key-escrow must eventually be mandated. As privacy advocates and industry have always said, Clipper does nothing for law enforcement unless the alternatives are outlawed." Scanned images of several key documents are available via the World Wide Web at the EPIC Home Page: http://www.epic.org/crypto/ban/fbi_dox/ -30- _________________________________________________________________________ Subject: FBI Files on Clipper Released _________________________________________________________________________ David Banisar (Banisar(a)epic.org) * 202-544-9240 (tel) Electronic Privacy Information Center * 202-547-5482 (fax) 666 Pennsylvania Ave, SE, Suite 301 * HTTP://epic.org Washington, DC 20003 * ftp/gopher/wais cpsr.org

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Financial Cryptography '98 Call for Papers
by Ray Hirschfeld 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Financial Cryptography '98 Second International Conference February 23-26, 1998, Anguilla, BWI CALL FOR PAPERS General Information: Financial Cryptography '98 (FC98) is a conference on the security of digital financial transactions. Meetings alternate between the island of Anguilla in the British West Indies and other locations. This second meeting will be held in Anguilla on February 23-26, 1998. FC98 aims to bring together persons involved in both the financial and data security fields to foster cooperation and exchange of ideas. Original papers are solicited on all aspects of financial data security and digital commerce in general, including Anonymous Payments Fungibility Authentication Home Banking Communication Security Identification Conditional Access Implementations Copyright Protection Loss Tolerance Credit/Debit Cards Loyalty Mechanisms Currency Exchange Legal Aspects Digital Cash Micropayments Digital Receipts Network Payments Digital Signatures Privacy Issues Economic Implications Regulatory Issues Electronic Funds Transfer Smart Cards Electronic Purses Standards Electronic Voting Tamper Resistance Electronic Wallets Transferability Instructions for Authors: Send a cover letter and 12 copies of an extended abstract to be received by November 17, 1997 (or postmarked by November 7, 1997 and sent via airmail) to the Program Chair at the address given below. The extended abstract should start with the title, the names of the authors, and an abstract followed by a succinct statement appropriate for a non-specialist reader specifying the subject addressed, its background, the main achievements, and their significance to financial data security. Submissions are limited to 15 single-spaced pages of 12pt type. Notification of acceptance or rejection will be sent to authors no later than January 12, 1998. Authors of accepted papers must guarantee that their paper will be presented at the conference. Proceedings: Proceedings of the conference will be published by Springer Verlag in their Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) series. Preproceedings will be available at the conference, but final versions will not be due until afterwards, giving authors the opportunity to revise their papers based on presentations and discussions at the meeting. Instructions and deadlines for submission of final papers will be sent later to authors of accepted papers. Rump Session: In addition to the regular conference program, a rump session will be held to provide an opportunity for less formal presentations. Although the rump session will be organized during the conference itself, any advance proposals may be sent to the Program Co-Chair at the email address given below. Rump session contributions will not appear in the conference proceedings. Stipends: A very limited number of stipends may be available to those unable to obtain funding to attend the conference. Students whose papers are accepted and who will present the paper themselves are encouraged to apply if such assistance is needed. Requests for stipends should be addressed to one of the General Chairs. Registration: Information about conference registration and on travel, hotels, and Anguilla itself will follow in a separate general announcement. There will be special discount registration rates for authors of accepted submissions, full-time academics, and students. Workshop: A workshop, intended for anyone with commercial software development experience who wants hands-on familiarity with the issues and technology of financial cryptography, is planned in conjunction with FC98, to be held during the week preceding the conference. For information, please contact one of the General Chairs. Send Submissions to: Rafael Hirschfeld FC98 Program Chair CWI Kruislaan 413 1098 SJ Amsterdam The Netherlands email: ray(a)cwi.nl phone: +31 20 592 4169 fax: +31 20 592 4199 Send Rump Session Contributions to: Matthew Franklin FC98 Program Co-Chair email: franklin(a)research.att.com Program Committee: Matt Blaze, AT&T Laboratories--Research, Florham Park, NJ, USA Antoon Bosselaers, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium Yves Carlier, Bank for International Settlements, Basel, Switzerland Walter Effross, Washington College of Law, American U., Washington DC, USA Matthew Franklin, AT&T Laboratories--Research, Florham Park, NJ, USA Michael Froomkin, U. Miami School of Law, Coral Gables, FL, USA Rafael Hirschfeld, CWI, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Alain Mayer, Bell Laboratories/Lucent Technologies, Murray Hill, NJ, USA Moni Naor, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel Frank Trotter, Mark Twain Ecash/Mercantile Bank, St. Louis, MO, USA Doug Tygar, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA Moti Yung, CertCo LLC (formerly: Bankers Trust E-Commerce), New York, NY, USA General Chairs: Robert Hettinga, Shipwright, Boston, MA, USA email: rah(a)shipwright.com Vincent Cate, Offshore Information Services, Anguilla, BWI email: vince(a)offshore.com.ai Exhibits and Sponsorship Manager: Julie Rackliffe, Boston, MA, USA email: rackliffe(a)tcm.org Workshop Leader: Ian Goldberg, Berkeley, CA, USA email: iang(a)cs.berkeley.edu Those interested in becoming a sponsor of FC98 or in purchasing exhibit space, please contact the Exhibits and Sponsorship Manager. A copy of this call for papers as well as other information about the conference will be available at URL http://www.cwi.nl/conferences/FC98.

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DigSig laws
by Donald M. Kitchen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Being a resident of Utah, I was interested in exactly what Utah's digital signature law was about. I knew it had to be somewhat level-headed, since a number of people in little silicon valley must have had their fingers in it... Unfortunately, IANAL for me is more than just a legal disclaimer. Anyone know of any of the legal eagle (ie, judge-l, eff, etc) have analyzed it, or know of any summaries that my search didn't find? (I was lucky to find this link in the first place...) Here is the utah law: gopher://gopher.utah.edu/11/Off%20Campus%20Information/State%20of%20Utah/ Utah%20Legislative%20Bills/1995 (I had to manually gopher it, it's under search bills, it's SB0082) Or perhaps any of you IANAL types would care to try reading it...it sounded like the key had to be escrowed with a legally recognized agent. PS: my compliments to Damien. Oh, I mean, the SSL crack looked nice leading the SF Chronicle's Business headline, but I'm especially thrilled the way the Signal/Noise ratio suddenly improved overnight. It will make reading what happened during my vacation much more interesting from that point on... And for those of you who think that PROMIS is squarely on-topic, <PLONK!>. When I can get grep routing results to /dev/null for "whitewater", etc, I'll be sure to share.. Don -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQB1AwUBMDwC48La+QKZS485AQHnnQL9FllVv82m5a0bl0xg5einnt3KR2X4FhPj jdTMiWeCPRW6H84/GWzPdhcHrn0ilvtgnwZTYqaL+1KS6wuPkuMcjOLw8VgxLmO9 CyUAee/zipkTyPnSPlgYp5Nvw0vm+gFn =qurO -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- <don(a)cs.byu.edu> fRee cRyPTo! jOin the hUnt or BE tHe PrEY PGP key - http://bert.cs.byu.edu/~don or PubKey servers (0x994b8f39) June 7&14, 1995: 1st amendment repealed. Death threats ALWAYS pgp signed * This user insured by the Smith, Wesson, & Zimmermann insurance company *

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Tim 1 - Joichi 0 - DreamMonger NULL / Re: Joichi gives up / Tim Throws a "Leaner" / Re: Tim Speaks the
by TruthMonger 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Joichi Ito wrote: > > OK. I give up. I think DreamMonger's last comment about at least sort of > believing in my intentions is about the best it will get for me here. Sure, quit before we even have a chance to use the cheap shots we've thought up since our last posts. Spoilsport. > Tim, you're in my killfile now too so I'm not going to respond directly to > your comments. Me neither. I'm going to use email. > Now at least when I am going through the meatgrinder, I won't know if it is > a cypherpunk or a Japanese fascist who's sending me through. It would probably be considered Politically Incorrect for me to mention that eye-shape might be a good indication, so I won't. Another indication might be whether your torturers are shouting, "Confess! You all an Ameliclan SPY!" or, "We kicked your ass in 'The Big One', pal." If you haven't figured it out by the time you've been put completely through the meatgrinder, you can still figure it out by noting whether your remains are being mixed with rice and put in cabbage leaves, or being coated with barbeque sauce and thrown on a grill. > At 05:46 97/08/04 +0200, Anonymous wrote: > > I hope Joichi Ito paid enough attention to the OKC bombing to realize > > that some surgeons are less skilled than others, and that there is a > > risk in remaining too long in close proximity with cancerous tissue. > > Some Japanese conservatives probably think *I* am the cancerous tissue that > their people shouldn't hang out with... "Everybody needs somebody that they can look down on. That they can feel better than, at any time they please. Someone doing something dirty, decent folks can frown on. And if you can't find nobody else, then help yourself to me." - Kris Krisofferson It has been my experience that it is more fulfilling to be tortured by CypherPunks than by Conservatives. <ymmv> (And the physical meetings are more fun, too.) TruthMonger

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The Theory of Nymity (value of True Names)
by an366601＠anon.penet.fi 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

the thread has been going around about the value of "true names". this is a complex study of the value of "true names". it dissects the issue and gets to the core of the matter. it suggests there is a valuable *psychological* benefit to the use of true names and that it may even be necessary for "honest communication" in any "society". those of you that argue that true names are irrelevant, why is it that you are the same ones that try to "out" L.D. behind whatever tentacle-of-the-moment he is hiding behind? do you really care, or don't you? actions speak louder than words!! part of L.D.'s demonstrations were the harm that someone with some ingenuity, flair, malice, and boredom could wreak on any cyberspatial community through the use of unrestrained anonymity/pseudonymity. and it appears that some of you still don't get the point. perhaps another reminder or demonstration is in order <g> | /\ |\| /~ L~ ``I have to spew this stuff, or I'd be on the L_ /~~\ | | \_ L_ roof with a high power weapon.'' -Jim Carrey http://www.csn.net/~ldetweil === The Theory of Nymity Detweiler was the first to pioneer the "theory of nymity". Observing that various forms of anonymity and pseudonymity were blurred in the popular consciousness and that the subject was awash with irrational emotionalism and ill-defined terms, he sought to formalize and crystalize the fundamental concepts and distinctions involved. The cypherpunks definitely pioneered forms of nymity, and passionately champion the general issue, particulary its ramifications in cyberspace; however they refuse to confront the issue openly and overtly, suggesting they perceive some sort of stigma or taboo associated with their practices. They also refuse to contemplate negative or potentially disastrous social effects of the associated scenarios, asserting all forms of nymity are either indistinguishable or essentially morally neutral practices that invariably extend the rights of the individual in the face of the oppressive State or massive corporations. They see all forms of nymity as merely one unified hacksaw of the serf, useful and effective in cutting away chains of bondage in the Sisyphean struggle for privacy. Detweiler confronted the diverse implications of nymity by elevating the subject of "nymity" to a study complete in itself. Abstracting from his writings, Detweiler considered the concept of a "nym spectrum" involving the key concepts of receiver of a message, sender, and identity. At various points on the nym spectrum, the receiver has varying degrees of knowledge about the identity of the sender. In a Detweilerian model of nymity, an abstract communications space exists in which messages and their identification can be dissociated from their senders while still being directed at receivers. A set of "formal senders" is juxtaposed or overlaid on top of the "actual senders" analogous to the way formal and actual parameters in structured computer programs are defined and related. A "formal sender" is the labeled origination of a message sent by an "actual sender", who may or may not be identified. The "formal sender" may be identified in some way that is independent from the "actual sender" identification. If an actual sender A is identified as sender B in the message, B is the "formal identification" for the sender whose "actual identity" is A. Detweiler defined the various forms of nymity based on the knowledge of the sender, say party C. This is his critical distinction that cypherpunks denied, arguing that all the forms of nymity he saw a difference between were really interchangeable and indistinguishable, and therefore identical. They do not recognize any relevance of the "knowledge" or mental state of the receiver in regards to messages. (In a sense the philosophy is similar to behaviorism in asserting the invalidity of internal mental state.) A "true name" is defined as a situation where the message is identified from the actual sender, e.g. message sender is identified as "A" who actually sent it. An "anonymous" message is a message with no identification whatsoever. Detweiler sometimes called this "hit and run anonymity". There is no attribution in the message to any sender, either formal or actual. Entity "C" knows the message could be from anyone. A "pseudonym" is defined as a situation where the message has an identification, but the receiver is correctly aware that the identification on the message is not the actual identification. I.e. C receives a message labelled as originating from "B", but C knows that "B" is a nym for some other party that *could be* (but not *necessarily*) actually identified as "A". Detweiler defined "pseudoanonymity" as the blurred situation between the anonymous and the pseudonymous message. The receiver C sees a message as originating from "B", but C is not aware that "B" is a formal nym that may actually identify some other party such as A. Entity A is said to be "pseudospoofing" entity C. The cypherpunks argue that there is in principle no difference between Detweiler's "pseudoanonymity" and the classic "pseudonymity", stating that anywhere there is an "actual" nym, a receiver cannot be sure it is not really a formal one, and vice versa (i.e., any nym is potentially a pseudonym or true name). In fact they say there is fundamentally no distinction to be made between formal and actual nyms. The critical question is of course is how "actual" and "formal" nyms are defined. What does it mean to "identify" a sender with a nym? Detweiler adapted to the ambiguities in the following way. He defined the "actual nym" (or, interchangeably, the "true name") as an identification for party A if for every context where an actual nym applies, that party is identified as A. Call this the "actual nym scenario". The definition appears to be somewhat circular but he was able to derive conclusions from the premise. Suppose that a context was established in which the "actual nym" scenario applied, and a message was identified as from "A". Then "A" is the actual nym of the sender. Suppose that the context is not "actual" (the converse will be considered the "formal") and the message is identified as from B. If there is some "additional information" that B is a "true name", then B is the actual sender, and no other party sent the message (forms of the "additional information clause will be considered below). Otherwise no conclusion can be made about the actual sender. In general, in an "actual context" the actual sender is always the formal sender. In a formal context, the actual sender is dissociated from the formal identity of the message, but "independent information" may pinpoint the actual identity. But the question of how the formal or actual context is established is still unresolved. Detweiler suggested it would be based on the declarations of the message. If the message "declared" it was from an actual sender, the actual context applies. If there is no declaration, the formal context is assumed. Obviously contradictions can arise within these definitions if the sender "lies". Detweiler simply observed that a logical theory could be built up based on his premises from which conclusions could be drawn. Furthermore, there is the fundamental observation that in a formal nymity system, "true" conclusions about actual identity can only be derived from message contents if participants "don't lie". A core premise of the theory is that an entity can express statements such as "my true name is [x]" in the communication system. (This is one form of the "additional information" clause above.) The cypherpunks believe that if the communication system includes only the formal context, there is no such thing as a "lie". Detweiler however maintained that as long as the actual system exists (or more particularly the overlay of a formal system over an actual one), lies can exist, although they may be undetectable within the formal system. (In this sense it is analogous to a Godel Theorem for Nymity, making an observation about a phenomenon that "exists" but is "undetectable" within the formal system, with the parallelism of "mathematical" and "metamathematical" statements mapping to "formal" and "actual" communication systems.) The Detweiler Thesis Detweiler had a preoccupation for considering the "community", which is defined as a formal or actual context in which communication takes place in both ways between a group of entities (i.e. entity A may be a receiver of sender B and vice versa for all members of the group). He explored the implications of both the formally and actually identified communities, and consistently objected to the actual identification scheme as at least uninteresting and at most too constraining, mirroring the quintessentially cypherpunkesque position. However Detweiler diverged from the philosophy by repeatedly emphasizing a basic premise, which is currently unprovable speculation much the same way that the Church-Turing thesis is: in a formally identified community system where participants don't "lie" about actual identity, the communication of the "community" is of "higher quality". A concrete example from everyday experience is that of book publishing. Some books may exist in a "formally identified" community in which all the authors of the community agree to associate their actual identity with the book (the "message"). Other books may exist in a "formally identified" community in which authors identify themselves other than with their "true names". Detweiler asserted that a book could "lie" and state that it was to be taken in the actual context (i.e. "A is the author of this book, and A is not a pseudonym"). Cypherpunks denied there was such a thing as a "lie" this context or even a "true name" in any context. Essentially they consider any statements in the message that refer to identity or its formal vs. actual context as nonexistent, invalid, and/or meaningless. Detweiler suggested that a "scientific community" was an example of a communications system dedicated to actual identities, or at least a formal identification system where the occurence of lying was minimal and considered anomalous, and that its "success" in achieving an overall climate of "quality" communication is partly due to the convention. Detweiler emphasized that it is not the case everyone must be actually identified in the community to fulfill his thesis (which is expressly about formal communities, not actual ones), only that parties in the system "don't lie". The cypherpunks completely, either inadvertently or deliberately, misconstrue or obfuscate his position as asserting that the formal context of nymity is never of "higher quality". Actually, Detweiler frequently expressed an aversion to the actual identity community and championed the formal context of communication as an embodiment of privacy, just as the cypherpunks. But he diverged from the cypherpunks by insisting that "lies exist" in the formal context which they heatedly denied. Another of Detweiler's observations was not only were "lies" possible in a formal communications system, but there were "worse lies" in formal systems that embodied two-way community communication. An example of this is cyberspace, where a sender can ask questions of the receiver such as "are you using a pseudonym?" or "are you communicating under formal names other than [x,y,z]"? (These are examples of the "additional information" clause above that discriminates pseudonymity from pseudoanonymity.) He noted that questions like these can be answered "truthfully" while at the same time not necessarily divulging actual identities, a distinction critical to the understanding of Detweilerian theories. The cypherpunks either asserted that such questions were fundamentally illegitimate and invariably deserved no answer by the receiver, or even that any answer (including a "lie") was justified in response. Detweiler observed that some formal identification systems have some other useful properties, such that "if [a] and [b] are different formal names, [a] and [b] denote different entities". Or, "for all formal names [a], there is a single entity actually identified as [a]." Furthermore, in a community where senders don't "lie", these properties can actually be derived by asking particular questions of the senders. (The question of whether the receiver *must* answer certain questions, or not at all, leads to additional ramifications.) Detweiler's very critical observation, however, was that even though there is additional "knowledge" about the uniqueness of identities in these systems, the mappings of formal nyms to actual identities cannot necessarily be derived. This is the basis of his claim that even if the entities in a formal system "don't lie", they don't necessarily reveal their actual identities, and that this critically desirable property of "privacy" is preserved. The idea of a "true name" is a very problematic and perplexing concept in the same way that the concept of "absolute space" is troubling to the theory of Newtonian mechanics, which Einsteinian relativity sought to remove, starting with the premise that "there is no preferred reference frame". The cypherpunks cite the absurdity of the "true name" concept in an analogous argument and attempt to discredit Detweilerian theories on this basis. However the theory is not based on "true names" but the existence of "entities", hence this cypherpunk position translated to its most basic form, becomes, essentially, "unique communication sources (such as 'humans') don't exist" (or analogously in the Einsteinian metaphor, "mass and energy do not exist"). In other words, assuming that "unique entities exist", and statements about identity can be made in the communication system, it is possible for entity A to say "my true name is 'C'" in one message and in another "my true name is 'B'", a situation which would be considered a "lie"-- the significance of the reference to the entity as "A" is irrelevant. The "true name" of an entity A is simply defined as an arbitrary but unique nym which, if considered the actual identity of A, would not contradict the statements of any of A's messages (or replies to questions). Simply put, the "true name" has the property that if two derivations in the form "[x] has true name [y]" and "[x] has true name [z]" can be made from the meanings of [x]'s statements in [x]'s messages, then y = z. Hence, if entity [x] simultaneously states "my true name is [y]" and "my true name is [z]" in any messages (the receiver is irrelevant) and y != z, then entity [x] is "lying". The essence of the idea of "true identification" is that there is a one-to-one mapping between "entities" and "true names". The representation of the "true name" is irrelevant. Detweiler certainly did not make the absurd claim that a "true name" had any special syntactic properties. He also did not claim that "true name registries" had to be erected to provide the feature, although they could support it. At the core of the concept is the idea that every entity in a "truthful" system must make a choice as to their actual name identification and not "lie" about its properties in messages that refer to it. The cypherpunks ruthlessly ridiculed this concept of communication explicitly involving "trust" and "honesty" between participants. One famous objection was that "that which cannot be enforced should not be prohibited". That is, if the unique mapping of true names to actual entities was not a precise, mathematical certainty, it effectively does not exist. Hence the cypherpunks generally base their model of the reality of communications on fundamentally different premises than Detweiler which reject the existence of the concept of "truthfulness". Detweiler countered by suggesting that communities with communications based on trust and honesty and the contrary not only both exist, but that discrepancies between the two probably existed as well and furthermore were worthy of study. (Again, he conjectured that the "dishonest" communications forums led to "disharmony" without further defining the term.) All these distinctions lie in the area Detweiler denoted under the heading "morality" which again the cypherpunks generally deny exists in an abstract communications system. Hence the key formal ideas of the overall theme that communications systems could lead to significantly different scenarios based on the "honesty" or "truthfulness" of members of a community with respect to identity had been addressed for the first time by Detweiler, but at great cost to Detweiler's credibility within the cypherpunk circles, which have rebuffed, ridiculed, and excommunicated him. Detweiler tended to take this as evidence that the core cypherpunk philosophy was not about seeking privacy, which he went to pains to demonstrate existed in his "honest" systems, but rather a sort of denial of the existence of morality in cyberspace-- that the question of "whether a message 'lies' about it's authors identity" is inherently meaningless, a premise he strongly rejected. The Sociology of Cypherpunkism Detweiler went far beyond theoretical study in his research of these areas of Nymity. He considered the cypherpunk beliefs in these areas worthy of a systematic sociological survey because of the apparent taboos and stigmas the cypherpunks apparently associated with some of their positions, either applied by themselves or that they perceived were held by others. He found they were reluctant to reveal their true beliefs on the subject and consistently refused to answer even vague questions like "how many pseudonyms are you using? are you using any at all? do you think forums where pseudonyms are not used, by agreement of participants, are desirable or could have superior quality?" Detweiler believed to have found signs the cypherpunks actually have very complex beliefs, practices, and techniques in the areas of identity subterfuge which they refuse to reveal except to fellow "insiders", something like an elaborate secret religion or unorthodox sexual practice. For Detweiler, cyberspace and cypherpunkism are a microcosm of the way that humanity seems to mix the concepts of accountability, morality, and identity in an intricate, tangled, inscrutable web, a place where the ideas of "candor" vs. "privacy" are viscerally manifested. Detweiler often observed the interplay between "true name, pseudonymous, and anonymous" messages was somewhat analogous to the Freudian concept of the dance between the superego, ego, and the id, or formal vs. actual identification systems like the subconscious vs. the conscious awareness. (He once even compared pseudospoofing scenarios to demonic posession and multiple personality disorders.) Perhaps his most relentless and enduring theme was that nymity issues are an area inherently worthy of serious or even intense scientific inquiry because they lie at the core of human society and interactions. The Detweilerian distinctions are very critical in understanding the cypherpunk philosophy and the schism with conventional morality he claimed it embodied. Essentially the cypherpunks assert "lies about identity don't exist in cyberspace". Detweiler argued not only that "lies about identity in cyberspace exist", but further claimed that "lies about identity diminish the quality of communications within the community" and that "privacy is not necessarily compromised by honesty". However his position is often erroneously lampooned by the cypherpunks as a ridiculously (but hilariously) distorted charicature such as "true name identification should be enforced by strict laws of the State because pseudonyms are inherently evil" when in fact his distinctions, conclusions, and claims are far more sophisticated and subtle. Whether the Detweiler Thesis asserting "superior quality communication in honest formal indentification systems" can ever be demonstrated, and whether the unrecognizably distorted portrayals of his theories by the cypherpunks are deliberate or due to the inherent incomprehensibility of the concept to peculiar brain anatomies, are the key, unresolved, "open" questions and matters of further research in the study of the sociology of cypherpunkism and the theory of Nymity. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To find out more about the anon service, send mail to help(a)anon.penet.fi. If you reply to this message, your message WILL be *automatically* anonymized and you are allocated an anon id. Read the help file to prevent this. Please report any problems, inappropriate use etc. to admin(a)anon.penet.fi.

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Re: Tim 1 - Joichi 0 - DreamMonger NULL / Re: Joichi gives up / Tim Throws a "Leaner" / Re: Tim Speaks the
by Joichi Ito 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 01:42 97/08/04 EST, TruthMonger wrote: > Sure, quit before we even have a chance to use the cheap shots we've > thought up since our last posts. Spoilsport. > > Tim, you're in my killfile now too so I'm not going to respond directly to > > your comments. > > Me neither. I'm going to use email. OK. I was trying to not-so-elegantly back out of the big hole I dug for myself. To be completely honest, I am fascinated (I don't know if this is the right word here...) by this discussion and if we were f-t-f I would probably still be engaged but I find Tim's arguments too deep to write off, but I find myself without enough time right now to engage with my full attention...and if I don't give this my full attention, I'm sure I'll lose... so, I gave up... for now. I'll formulate my thoughts and next time, I'll think before I write. Maybe I'll wait for a chance to take a stab at Tim later on. At 00:44 97/08/04 -0500, Jim Choate wrote: > Forwarded message: > > > Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 22:02:24 -0700 > > From: Tim May <tcmay(a)got.net> > > Subject: Re: Tim Throws a "Leaner" / Re: Tim Speaks the Truth > > Any journalist in Europe or in the U.S. would be seen as having irreparably > > compromised his journalistic objectivity by serving on such a panel! And > > properly so, of course. > > As long as they were representing their personal opinions and not acting as > a journalist (ie being paid by a 3rd party) and they disclose the action > there would be compromise on objectivity. Jim, I hope you meant to say "wound not be compromising" in the above statement. This may sound like an afterthought, but one of the reasons that I did such a stupid thing as post my association with a police study group here was as a part of being very open about what I was doing and trying to ask for advice on that basis. Also, FYI, I am not being paid by the government or any 3rd party. I am not a "consultant" to the government. I am an "outside expert". I am not representing the police to the people of Japan, I am trying represent the peoples' interest to the government... but I'll stop now before I get bashed again. - Joi -- Finger jito(a)nsm.eccosys.com or jito(a)garage.co.jp for PGP Key Fingerprint for RSA PGP Key ID 0x0EE23A2D 0D3A 7AAA 3DA8 E7B3 3AF1 C6FA B7ED D834 Fingerprint for DSS/Diffie-Hellman PGP Key ID 0x2D9461F1 58F3 CA9A EFB8 EB9D DF18 6B16 E48D AF2A 2D94 61F1 Home Page: http://domino.garage.co.jp/jito/joihome.nsf To subscribe to my personal mailing list send mailto:friends-subscribe@ito.com

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Two URLs of interest
by rah＠shipwright.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

--- begin forwarded text From: Tom Limoncelli <tal(a)plts.org> Subject: Two URLs of interest To: www-buyinfo(a)allegra.att.com Date: Thu, 24 Aug 95 22:26:14 EDT Cc: mp(a)allegra.att.com, drew(a)allegra.att.com, rn(a)big.att.com, skbk(a)research.att.com, tommy(a)big.att.com, rjf(a)big.att.com, varga(a)big.att.com, geoffc(a)allegra.att.com First, (and not really related to this mailing list) is an article by Arnold Kling explaining why Netscape stock was so popular, and why people who purchased stock in the first couple of hours are now $13/share in the hole. (stock opened at $71, declined to $53ish, and now hovers at $58ish) He also explains where he thinks the price will go. http://www.enews.com/contrib/bagholders.html Second, Pat Robertson's "The 700 Club" now has a WWW site and on it he advertises a new video tape http://the700club.org/cbn/telethon.html where he predicts the end of the world. What has that got to do with "www-buyinfo"? Well, one segment is described as: "This story examines the oncoming rush to digital cash [...] and how quickly businesses, financial institutions, and even the government are moving in this direction." For those of you without a copy of Revelations handy, this is a Mark Of The Beast according to him. You'll have to buy the video to find out why. Revelations is on-line (along with the whole bible) at: http://www.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?&passage=Revelation Sorry for the almost completely non-technical post. Have a good weekend, y'all! --tal -- Tom Limoncelli -- tal(a)plts.org (home) -- tal(a)research.att.com (work) http://mars.superlink.net/user/tal "I tried netsex, didn't like it." http://www.qrd.org/QRD/www/usa/nj "Maybe you just haven't met the http://www.qrd.org/QRD/www/usa/nj/BNNJ right keyboard?" --- end forwarded text ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah(a)shipwright.com) Shipwright Development Corporation, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA (617) 323-7923 "Reality is not optional." --Thomas Sowell >>>>Phree Phil: Email: zldf(a)clark.net http://www.netresponse.com/zldf <<<<<

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VIRGINIA CORP RECORDS/OFFICERS/RA
by myattkk＠bellatlantic.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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