December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Bidzos on C-Span 2
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

If you care, Jim is smoothly hawking a beautiful world of easy-going crypto on C-Span 2, at least in NYC at 5:35 PM. At a session in San Francisco, probably a recording. Jingle jangle.

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Only accepting e-mail from known parties
by dlv＠bwalk.dm.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

owner-cypherpunks(a)toad.com writes: > Eric Murray wrote: > > | Where we're headed is mail filters with PGP imbedded (PGP 3 will > | make this much easier) that check incoming mail for a valid signature > | for certain PGP keyid/fingerprints and pass that mail along. > | Other mail that doesn't match gets tossed into a 'junk' folder > | or thrown away if you really don't want to talk to anyone that you > | don't already know. > > I agree with the assesment of where we may be going, but the > technology is available now. (Marshall Rose uses it; if you want to > get mail into his private mailbox, offer him some $ via imbedded FV > authorizations in the mail, and it goes into his inbox. If he thinks > it was worth his time, he doesn't charge you.) > > Anyway, the code is defeintely available now. The back end is a > little kludgy, but it was needed for an auto ley retreival script. > This could easily be hacked to include a +pubring=$people line. The > script gives you a keyid, which you can then use to filter on, ie: <shell script> This is much better than nothing. This would stop the e-mail being sent to everyone who's ever posted to Usenet. I see a couple of attacks: 1. Alice only accepts signed e-mail from Bob. Carol receives a signed e-mail from Bob to Carol, sends 10,000 e-mails to Alice (via sendmail) with From: bob, same body+signature, possibly varying message-ids and subjects. 2. Alice only accepts signed e-mail from Bob. Carol, a rogue sysadmin, intercepts an e-mail from Bob to Alice, sends 10,000 more copies of it to Alice (via sendmail) with From: bob, possibly varying message-ids and subjects. As I keep pointing out, pgp-signing the body is not enough. --- Dr. Dimitri Vulis Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps

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Bidzos Coda
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The Bidzos show was recorded 12/8/95 at the Commonwealth Club in SF. It finished here at about 5:45 PM. Only caught a piece. Jim was answering written questions about a range of crypto and Internet security issues from the audience. Among other things, he says they're working on an encryption program "closely tied to the OS of portables, to protect the data if the machine is lost or stolen." He also said, "don't throw tomatoes," but they're doing something with "private key escrow" for those who want to provide access to their encrypted material in case of death or other emergency. Maybe some other idle sinner saw more, or was at the realtime tomato-chucker.

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(cpx) Re: Bidzos on C-Span 2
by rah＠shipwright.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 5:41 PM 12/25/95, John Young wrote: >If you care, Jim is smoothly hawking a beautiful world of >easy-going crypto on C-Span 2, at least in NYC at 5:35 PM. Actually, he did a pretty good job of towing the er, party line. Lots of good opportunities for analogical heavy lifting in arguments with statists. "Suppose you had a very strong door which protected your whole house and made it inviolate. Suppose then the government then wanted to have copy of your door keys on the off-chance you turn into a crack dealer someday...", etc. Except for the fact that he wants Uncle to protect his patents, that is... ;-). This was done on December 8 at the Commonwealth Club in SFO. Were there c'punks there? The questions sounded like it... He also said something about some kind of magic badge with biometric/PK software which would allow you to work anywhere there was a network connection. Reminiscent of our discussions about Xerox PARC's ubiquitous computing stuff, Gerry O'Neil's 2081, etc. I feel a rant coming on about this "information toaster" stuff, Metcalfe's fight with Alsop in Infoworld, etc. Guess I'll start it tomorrow. Take cover everybody... Merry Christmas! Cheers, Bob -------------------------------------------------- The e$ lists are brought to you by: Making Commerce Convenient (tm) - Oki Advanced Products - Marlboro, MA Value-Checker(tm) smart card reader= http://www.oki.com/products/vc.html Where people, networks and money come together: Consult Hyperion http://www.hyperion.co.uk info(a)hyperion.co.uk See your name here! Be a charter sponsor for e$pam, e$, and Ne$ws! e-mail rah(a)shipwright.com for details... -------------------------------------------------

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Re: (cpx) Re: Bidzos on C-Span 2
by rah＠shipwright.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Oops. You can shoot me now... Sorry, folks! e$pam first and let god sort 'em out. Fixing that little problem this week, as a matter of fact. Cheers, Bob ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah(a)shipwright.com) e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA (617) 958-3971 "Reality is not optional." --Thomas Sowell The NEW(!) e$ Home Page: http://thumper.vmeng.com/pub/rah/ >>>>Phree Phil: Email: zldf(a)clark.net http://www.netresponse.com/zldf <<<<<

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Re: New Release of CFS
by dxm＠alpha.c2.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Matt Blaze writes: > [Perhaps this isn't the best time for me to post this here; apologies > in advance if this sparks another flame fest. -matt] > > Source code for the latest version (release 1.3.2) of CFS, the Cryptographic > File System, is now available upon request for research and experimental > use in the US and Canada. Dear Mr. Blaze: As you seem to have noticed, a few subscribers to cypherpunks are more interested in exploring their own personal psychopathologies than in the creation and spread of strong cryptography. Please do not feel that you need to apologize for their actions, and especially please do not restrict your actions and/or posts because of them. To correct merely one of the many mis-statements made by these people desperate to draw attention to themselves, the Linux community is NOT interested in 'out-of-the-box'. If we were interested in 'out-of-the- box', we would be running OSs that COME in a box. What we ARE interested in is source (or, if source isn't available, at least 128 bit keys). If you provide source, we'll port it. It's that simple. While support is nice, and appreciated, it is NOT NEEDED. We can take care of ourselves. So, on behalf of the Linux community and those of us running CFS, thank you very much for your contribution. And please don't let a couple of idiots like these lower your opinion of the over 1 million Linux users who appreciate your efforts and support. -- Deus Ex Machina dxm(a)alpha.c2.org

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Re: ex encrypted script
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:57 PM 12/21/95 -0800, you wrote: > >There is encrypt and then there is render useless to the reader. > >A tale I hear is that when HP had to deliver operating system source to >the french government they stripped all comments and changed all variable >and subroutine names to 32 byte strings of I 1 0 (zero) and O (uppercase O). >It still compiled but was 100% useless to human readers. >John Pettitt >email: jpettitt(a)well.sf.ca.us (home) > jpp(a)software.net (work) This is EXACTLY the kind of creative uncooperativeness that I was thinking of, on a different subject, when I proposed that Netscape do anything it could think of (legally) to sabotage, undermine, subvert, escape, and otherwise stifle any attempt by the US government to restrict crypto in general, or its export in particular. The fact is, we are all CREATIVE people, and presumably given any particular set of rules (laws) , it should be possible for us to "comply" with "the law" in such a way as to be as obstructively obnoxious as possible.

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HRB Systems Data Storage Encryptor
by nobody＠flame.alias.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Check out http://www.hrb.com/encryption/ssp.html, your exclusive source of the Ultron Crypto-Engine (tm)

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Encryption Discrimination from Sun
by mpd＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I was just browsing through the rules for the million dollar contest just announced by Sun Microsystems to encourage the writing of killer applets in Java, Sun's new architecture- independent program format. The URL is http://javacontest.sun.com/rules/index.html in case anyone is interested. While reading the contest rules, I found the following one particularly interesting... "No entries may include encryption as a feature or part of an applet." This was made even more curious by the later revelation that one of the criteria for judging entries was... "The applet should be able to transfer information from one point to another, with no possibility of interception or other interference during the process." Doubtless the reason Sun nixed encryption is because this is an international contest, and they did not want to deal with legal hassles involving international borders and different laws in every country. Nonetheless, they seem to have missed an excellent opportunity to encourage the migration of privacy software into the new realm they are creating. -- Mike Duvos $ PGP 2.6 Public Key available $ mpd(a)netcom.com $ via Finger. $

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Assault presses with cop killer computers.
by James A. Donald 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

While channel surfing around 6PM today on Christmas day, I saw President Clinton announce the grave international threat posed by terrorists, drug dealers and money launderers wielding computers (Only three horsemen -- he left out child pornographers.) He was immediately followed by an Expert In Television Expertise, who told us that computers were getting more and more powerful, and doing more and more things, and that Something Must Be Done. The Expert did not actually use the phrase "The first Amendment was never intended to protect modern assault presses using cop killer computers", but that was the message. --------------------------------------------------------------------- | We have the right to defend ourselves | http://www.jim.com/jamesd/ and our property, because of the kind | of animals that we are. True law | James A. Donald derives from this right, not from the | arbitrary power of the state. | jamesd(a)echeque.com

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