December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Jamming and privacy problem
by Phil Agre 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The emissions tracking proposal might have another sort of relevance to cryptography. Assuming (it's a big assumption, but entertain it for a moment) that we agree that some type of automatic enforcement mechanism for emissions-based repairs were a good thing, how could it be built without identifying any individuals to the authorities? What I find so utterly over-the-top about the ARB proposal is that it is capable of maintaining records on everybody everywhere, whether they are violating any laws or not. Of course they'll promise to protect privacy, and they may even promise not to capture any records for people whose emissions fault codes come up clean (though they say nothing about this in the RFP). But such assurances would be nonsense, since once the system is in place a simple software change would cause the system to revert back to the total-surveillance functionality described in the RFP. The key, then, is designing systems so that simple software changes under the control of the authorities can turn them into instruments of oppression. This design consideration is hard to even formulate accurately in the context of traditional system design methodologies, which assume that everything in sight comes with identifiers and that *the* way for a system to relate to something is to represent it in terms of those identifiers. Digital cash and other such schemes are so profound precisely because they break with this underlying assumption, forcing systems to think thoughts like "this person (whoever s/he may be) has paid $1 to travel on this road", "this person (whoever s/he may be) is eligible for an upgrade to first class", "this person (whoever s/he may be) is obeying emissions laws", and so on. Philosophers and linguists call these "indexical" (or, more precisely, "deictic") because they identify an individual contextually without appealing to a name or other universal identifier. Phil

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Re: Imminent Death of Usenet Predicted
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

One thing that I'm worried about is InterNIC. As I understand it, it is a central company that is in the business of receiving domain name registrations, including the info on what that domain is connected to, and sending it out to various nameservers. The nameservers then use this to route some (not all, I do believe) traffic. This situation is a weak point. The government in whatever country InterNIC's physical presence is in (the US, I believe) can put pressure on it for "faciliating breakage of laws" or some such nonsense (for some material, such as the sites that have crypto material, the espionage argument that it is cooperating in limiting their ability to work might be what was used). It is then forced to stop issuing domain names except to people the US govt wants to get such. Nameservers in the US that use any other service to determine domain names get arrested themselves, under likewise treatment. Now, this can all be fought in the courts and will likely be defeated.. but it would still cause some problems. Am I completely incorrect, or do the programmers on here and elsewhere need to start coming up with a better way to do things? -Allen

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[NOISE] Is this email getting through?
by shamrock＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I have not received any CP traffic for several days. Repeated (re-)subscription requests didn't generate a reply from majordomo. If this message shows up on the list, please let me know. Puzzled, -- Lucky Green <mailto:shamrock@netcom.com> PGP encrypted mail preferred.

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Encryption Programs
by avatar＠mindspring.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

OBVIOUSLY the spokesman of the group. I ask for help and this is what I get? One more time, I'm well aware of the capabilities of PGP. What I'm looking for is a program that does a better job of binary encryption than just Radix 64 ASCII armoring. >Return-Path: remailer(a)utopia.hacktic.nl >Date: Sun, 4 Feb 1996 10:40:07 +0100 >To: avatar(a)mindspring.com >From: anon-remailer(a)utopia.hacktic.nl (Name Withheld by Request) >Organization: Hack-Tic International, Inc. >XComm: This message was automaticly Remailed by an Anonymous Remailer. >XComm: Report inappropriate use to <postmaster(a)utopia.hacktic.nl> >Subject: Encryption Programs >From: House.of.the.Rising.Sun(a)utopia.hacktic.nl > > > wow, a fresh newbie with his first toy! your lights work, too? > cypherpunks is not for you if you need to ask for encryption.... > > there's only one encryption program which is both simple and > effective: PGP. if you don't know where to find it, use DEC's Alta > Vista web search engine in advanced mode for "mit NEAR pgp" > > you can get a DOS image. there are some windows interfaces I > have been told, but fuck Bill Gates and horse he rode in on. > > maybe some day, you'll find enlightenment on choice of operating > systems... instead of following the herd to Gate's bank of mindless. > > >>From avatar(a)mindspring.comSun Feb 4 09:06:32 1996 >Date: Sat, 03 Feb 1996 23:17:09 -0600 >From: avatar(a)mindspring.com >To: cypherpunks(a)toad.com >Subject: Searching for the best > >Hi, Folks > > I am looking for the best file encryption program and the best file >wiping program. >PC compatible, perferably Win 95 compatible. > Thanx >Charles Donald Smith Jr. >582 Clifton Rd. N.E. >Atlanta, Ga. 30307-1787 >(404)-378-7282 > >REPUBLICAN; smaller government, less taxes, richer people, and proud children!! > > Charles Donald Smith Jr. 582 Clifton Rd. N.E. Atlanta, Ga. 30307-1787 (404)-378-7282 REPUBLICAN; smaller government, less taxes, richer people, and proud children!!

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"PGP-Scape"? (was Re: Our "New Order")
by Deranged Mutant 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

jimbell(a)pacifier.com wrote: [..] > >Methinks the time is right for a "PGPScape" web browser. [..] > Let me see if I understand this concept correctly. The remote site would > pre-encrypt the transmitted data, so that when received it could be > decrypted by the requestor according to his (or a temporarily chosen, to > avoid disclosing the actual recipient.) public key, so as to disguise both > the material and perhaps also the actual requestor? Something like that, yes. Anything to where someone watching cannot tell what a person is reading from a web site... even better if one cannot tell who is reading it. Anonymizing proxies would also be nice. There's also less worry about secure transactions, since if everything's encrypted it's harder to tell if a transaction is taking place, viewing porno or subversive or religious, literature, or if you're just reading something mundane. So much for vaporware, though. > Excellent idea! So is fast-than-light travel, but only if it's implemented. Rob. --- "Mutant" Rob <wlkngowl(a)unix.asb.com> Send a blank message with the subject "send pgp-key" (not in quotes) for a copy of my PGP key.

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"Nations see Internet.." continued
by Mike Ang 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Sorry about that -- here's the whole thing again "Nations see Internet as threat to security" made the front page of the Saturday _Globe and Mail_. There are some really nice lines in the article, which basically states that electronic freedoms through the Internet are a direct challenge to the power of nation states. They mention all of the more recent examples in China, Germany, France, and the States. The author obviously wasn't afraid of making large claims. Most of them were acceptable, but some seemed completely unsubstantiated (see below). Here are some of the more interesting paragraphs: But as China, Germany, the United States and now France have discovered recently, data sent electronically over the Internet can be every bit as threatening to a country's laws or its culture as armies of yesteryear. But its elusive nature makes it difficult to track down and impossible to eradicate. And there is growing concern that the very existence of the Internet is a threat to the nation-state. [..] "We think of states as unitary bodies, but what they really are is a bundle of sovereignties -- economic sovereignty, military sovereignty, cultural and social sovereignty." That bundle is now coming undone, or as Mr. Saffo put it, "Digital technology is the solvent leaching the glue out of the state as we know it." .. It's not just cultural or social sovereignty that governments worry about. The power to tax is also being eroded by the increase in economic transactions that take place over the Internet, some encrypted so that prying eyes at the tax department could not read them even if a tax inspector was fortunate enough to stumble upon them. Drug dealers and terrorists are resorting increasingly to this means of moving funds. .. However, advocates of unregulated cyberspace says [sic] this just means that the only people using encryption programs at the moment are those doing it illegally. It's a similar argument to the one often made in Canada against gun control -- the bad guys already have weapons. .. Yay, more FUD. The article does a good job of raising some of the important issues. But I _highly_ doubt that "drug dealers and terrorists" are using digital cash to transfer funds. They also characterize strong encryption as something evil. The author implies that main reason for encrypting financial transactions is to evade the tax department - if I'm sending my credit card # across the net, _of course_ I'm going to encrypt it, and when using digital cash, encryption is generally part of authentication. Comparing crypto to guns works in the sense that the "bad guys" will always be able to have access to them. However, I for one support gun control but do not support mandatory limits on crypto. Where I live, there are no theats that justify allowing everyone to carry guns - the threat to privacy and freedom of speech justifies allowing everyone to use strong crypto. You can use a gun to deprive another person of their life - what harm can you do another with PGP? Perhaps you can harm them by being able to spread hate propaganda, but I don't think that that is a strong enough argument. - Mike. If you've got to flame me, do it by email.

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Nuke em if ya got em "TCMay"
by paralax＠alpha.c2.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Date: Sat, 03 Feb 1996 22:20:52 -0800 James A. Donald Wrote: At 03:39 PM 2/3/96 -0800, paralax(a)alpha.c2.org wrote: P> Mr. Hayes MAY have used a condescending tone but you have exposed your P> racist roots again. First you embarrass yourself with you lack of knowledge, JAD> Paralax does not know shit from beans. He presumably imagines that Tim is JAD> "embarrassed" because Tim's knowledge of the historical facts differs from JAD> those facts dreamed up by the usual crew of apologists for totalitarian terror. JAD> James A. Donald Historical facts and or personal interpretations thereof were never called in to question by me. I took umbrage with Mr. May's insulting, insensitive and racist comments about Jews and the Japanese. Whether Mr. May's is personally embarrassed by his public display of ignorance and bigotry matters not. He did indeed embarrass himself on an 'International Stage'. I may not know shit from beans (actually I do) but I do know cultural insensitivity, racism, bigotry and ignorance when I see it displayed so blatantly. I encouraged Mr. May to return to topics 'cipher' before further embarrassment ensues. I urge you to do likewise. A. Paralax View

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RC2 protected by copyright?
by thad＠hammerhead.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

RSA issued a statement claiming that anyone using RC2(TM) would be in violation of various laws. I think that they might have a point. You can't protect an idea with trade secrets, certainly not a software idea, if you intend to sell the software. It is easy to reverse engineer it; this is probably what happened with RC2. But, what about copyright? Now, copyrights cannot protect ideas, only the expression of those ideas. An algorithm is clearly an idea, you could write a program that would implement it in a completely different way, not just by translating it (translations are still protected by copyright). RC2, though, as 256 bytes of seemingly random data at the head of it, in a permutation table. This is clearly not any idea, but a bit of text. This text would have to be copied to any interoperable RC2. (You could surely use some different permutation, and probably most of the 256! permutations would be equally secure, but would not interoperate with RC2). I would expect that this copying of text be held to be a violation of copyright. Some might argue that 256 bytes is so small that perhaps it couldn't be copyrighted. Copyright clearly can't protect use of a word, or a short phrase (1000 points of light, say). If the permutation table at the beginning was 65536 16-bit numbers, instead of 256 bytes, then the copyright protection be that much stronger and less open to debate. Do any of the real lawyers on the list want to take a crack at this? Has anybody heard any noise from RSA describing exactly how they intend to go after people? thad -- Thaddeus Beier thad(a)hammerhead.com Technology Development 408) 286-3376 Hammerhead Productions http://www.got.net/~thad

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Re: Need a "warning" graphic of some kind for CDA
by Bill Stewart 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

[This email rated FZ] >Now that we all have web pages that are naughty and might be seen by >little children, I'd like to hve some kind of a graphic that can >universally be seen as a "Warning: The following material is unsuitable >for children and close-minded twits". (or words to that effect). A Frank Zappa icon would be highly appropriate for that - I don't know how his record publishers would feel about someone scanning it off an album cover and retouching for the web, but you could probably work out something. A Zappa IMG button with HREF to a copy of his album language rating label would seem very fitting. Before Bill Clinton signed the Exon Internet Censorship Bill, Tipper Gore brought you Music Censorship. Uncle Frank says "<quote here>" I suppose it's a bit beyond Fair Use? #-- # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com / billstewart(a)attmail.com +1-415-442-2215 # http://www.idiom.com/~wcs

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Re: Reasons in support of crypto-anarchy WAS Re: Why am I (fwd)
by lunaslide＠loop.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>jim bell writes: >[More Junk] > >Look folks, I'm really sick about the debate about Jim's ideas about >"assassination politics". (My opinion about the idea isn't >transmittable under the Exon law so I couldn't say anything anyway). > >This has gone off into political theory. Could we take it to private >mail or some such? I think that it poses serious questions about anonymity and cryptography and their uses, therefore it is a viable topic. Just rm it if you don't want to read about it. lunaslide On the meridian of time there is no injustice, only the poetry of motion creating the illusion of truth and drama. Henry Miller -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: 2.6.2 mQBvAzD3EHEAAAEDAMVwZzXozPjX18mCenA5fJsdWZXcrhJCxPR+SoVCmR7d4ZVU mwITzPTHo/GyLvJrWyk5YdhheczyY2VSawaMrCN/nWA7K9lwAylbKyPxqBhRYJ3C 2wi2uD5LY2wypNOQyQARAQABtB5KZWZmIENvbm4gPGx1bmFzbGlkZUBsb29wLmNv bT6JAHUDBRAw+1bqS2NsMqTTkMkBAQkTAwCersFbCyk8O0MbGlNcZDAe24CLEWQ0 0C5EHni33W76UsG1bybcLsuMH6HVwLF7IqZivnzc7wkujYPQvCqn8HEYYTld8V9V Cou4dOvA8kV7rHvAn/LuLx7DRruLFrRoPSk= =OIT9 -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----

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