December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

[NOISE] FIG_newt/on CIA
by Dave Del Torto 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

[ This came to me from someone at Apple, through our pal Stephan Somogyi ] [ ...another "your tax dollars hard at work" story... heh. --dave ] ................................. cut here ................................. There's an easter egg in the 2.0 Newton (MessagePad 120) which was "censored" by, yes, the CIA. Back in '94, one of the Newton software types make a trek to the (very) small town of Rachel, Nevada, which is located at the edge of a secret government airbase. The base, called "Area 51," is thought by UFO-enthusiasts to be filled with alien technology which the government is in the process of reverse engineering. Meanwhile, the government denies the very existence of the base, in spite of widespread media coverage ("Larry King Live from Area 51", etc.). We figured it'd be funny to put a reference to Area 51 in the Newton -- especially given the substantial overlap between conspiracy buffs and computer nerds. So, in the "Time Zones" application, contains a world map, we put an entry for Area 51 in its correct location. Later, we added a twist -- if the user picks Area 51 from the map, the icons in the datebook application take on an alien theme. Normally, meetings are represented by an icon of two people face-to-face, events are represented by a flag, etc., etc. But when Area 51 has been chosen, the icon for a meeting is a person facing an alien, the icon for an event is a flying saucer, a to-do task is represented by a robot, an so on. Okay, cute enough. Now cut to August 1995, when the 2.0 ROM has been declared final, seed units have been in customers' hands for a little while, and the release is just about ready to go. One of the seed units, it turns out, was sent to a cryptographer working for the CIA. When he found that Area 51 was listed at the correct latitude/longitude, he complained to Apple, demanding the removal of the easter egg and threatening to have his superiors take the issue to Spindler if necessary. In the end, Newton management caved in to the demand, and decided to pull the joke out of the system. But the ROM was already done -- so the feature was hidden by a software patch ("System Update") -- but this part of the patch can itself be removed, and "Area 51" returned to its rightful glory. Here's how to get the easter egg back: 1) Open the Extras drawer. 2) Switch the folder of the Extras drawer to "Storage". 3) Tap on the icon "Time Zones" and press the "Delete" button. Warning -- any cities you've added to your Newton will be lost. 4) Switch the folder of the extras drawer back to "Unfiled icons." 5) Tap on "Time Zones." You'll find that Area 51 is on the map -- just tap near Las Vegas and choose Area 51 from the popup. Now look at the icons in Dates. (To purge the aliens from your PDA, open the back and press reset).

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Re: Microsoft's CryptoAPI - thoughts?
by James A. Donald 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>James A. Donald writes: > > A notable misfeature of the API is that it assumes that in general > > you will have two key pairs. One for signing and one for encrypting. > > > > Since in the most common case you are encrypting something related to a > > signed message by the person you are encrypting to, this is a > > bad idea, At 07:59 AM 1/27/96 -0500, Futplex wrote: > Could you elaborate ? I haven't heard of any known interaction > effects between a strong encryption algorithm and a distinct strong digital > signature algorithm (with or without distinct keys), I was concerned about a different issue: Suppose you have some signed information: You wish to send some encrypted information to the person who wrote that signed information. If the signing key and the encrypting key are the same, your software can locally ensure that you encrypt with the right key, (The correct key is the same public key that you used to check the signature on the message.) If the signing key and the encrypting key are different, then in order to ensure that you are not spoofed into using the wrong public key, the whole protocol must work correctly, exposing many more points of attack, since key management is the most complex and most vulnerable area. --------------------------------------------------------------------- | 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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Re: [NOISE] Re: NWLibs> Re: Anonymous trashing of Assassination Politics
by Alan Olsen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 09:38 AM 1/28/96 -0800, jim bell wrote: >I guess I should offer a partial apology, even though I'm not really >responsible for this. Jack Hammer is the on-air name for John Benneth, who >is a local (to me, Portland, Oregon) "moderator" for a "advertised as >controversial" radio talk call-in show. He saw my Assassination Politics >essay a few months ago, and for a few weeks just before the November sweeps >Neilsen ratings period he was trying to bait me into calling in, thinking >I'd be a sucker for a local audience. (He _needs_ controversy to be >sucessful.) Since then he gave up for a while, although he occasionally >snipes at me. I assume his interest will wax and wane as various ratings >periods come and go. Actually ratings do not apply in this case. KKEY does not subscribe to the ratings service. (Never has, to my knowledge.) KKEY is a part time station. It has never had much of a broadcast range. (And never will, as their equiptment causes interfearence with neigboring phone equiptment and the like.) It is supported by advertising which is pitched by the talk show host themselves. It has never had much of an audience. The talk show hosts run the gamut from conservitive to very conservitive. (The former owner had a habit of firing hosts on the air if he did not like their views. But Ralph is dead now...) It has a very bad reputation in Portland as being a station for neo-nazis, whackos and cranks. (Back in my conservitive days i had friends who worked there. It was an "interesting" experience.) >>I have saved Jim Bell's "Assassination Politics" essay, with his PGP >>signature, and soon to be a lot of other things, at >> >> http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~llurch/Not_By_Me_Not_My_Views/ > >Thank you. I guess... > >BTW, I sent the file to you as A16.??? That isn't a really descriptive >name. Please change it to something more mnemonic, like ASPOL.TXT or something. The site does need an index. >>I plan to collect as many off-the-wall conspiracy theories in this >>directory as will fit in my disk quota. And when I run out of quota, I'll >>raise it for myself. > >Now, now, Rich, "Assassination Politics" is not a "conspiracy theory". Or, >at least, it's not your classic "conspiracy theory." I think he is collecting stuff he thinks of as whacky theories. >>I think it's time the wacky right and wacky left started looking at each >>other's Web pages and lurking on each others' lists. > >What about the wacky libertarians? Why did you leave us out?!? >Waaaaaaahhhh!!! I think he is collecting stuff that is just "whacky". >> It's really funny >>putting two "Anarchist" pages, one featuring Che Guevara, the other >>featuring David Duke, side by side. Both say the guvment is out to get >>them; > >I, on the other hand, am out to "get" the government. But you'll be hearing >more about that later. Unless they get you first... Alan Olsen -- alano(a)teleport.com -- Contract Web Design & Instruction `finger -l alano(a)teleport.com` for PGP 2.6.2 key http://www.teleport.com/~alano/ Is the operating system half NT or half full?

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Re: [NOISE] Re: NWLibs> Re: Anonymous trashing of Assassination Politics
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- At 02:17 AM 1/28/96 -0800, Rich Graves wrote: >On Sat, 27 Jan 1996, Jack Hammer wrote: > >> Here might be an interesting example of a snippet from a plot to commit >> criminal syndicalism. > >You know, I'm not really sure whether you're kidding, ignorant, cheering, >or warning. Frankly, I don't fucking care. You guys are all nuts. And I >should know -- ask Clark or AlanD. I guess I should offer a partial apology, even though I'm not really responsible for this. Jack Hammer is the on-air name for John Benneth, who is a local (to me, Portland, Oregon) "moderator" for a "advertised as controversial" radio talk call-in show. He saw my Assassination Politics essay a few months ago, and for a few weeks just before the November sweeps Neilsen ratings period he was trying to bait me into calling in, thinking I'd be a sucker for a local audience. (He _needs_ controversy to be sucessful.) Since then he gave up for a while, although he occasionally snipes at me. I assume his interest will wax and wane as various ratings periods come and go. >I have saved Jim Bell's "Assassination Politics" essay, with his PGP >signature, and soon to be a lot of other things, at > > http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~llurch/Not_By_Me_Not_My_Views/ Thank you. I guess... BTW, I sent the file to you as A16.??? That isn't a really descriptive name. Please change it to something more mnemonic, like ASPOL.TXT or something. >I plan to collect as many off-the-wall conspiracy theories in this >directory as will fit in my disk quota. And when I run out of quota, I'll >raise it for myself. Now, now, Rich, "Assassination Politics" is not a "conspiracy theory". Or, at least, it's not your classic "conspiracy theory." >I think it's time the wacky right and wacky left started looking at each >other's Web pages and lurking on each others' lists. What about the wacky libertarians? Why did you leave us out?!? Waaaaaaahhhh!!! > It's really funny >putting two "Anarchist" pages, one featuring Che Guevara, the other >featuring David Duke, side by side. Both say the guvment is out to get >them; I, on the other hand, am out to "get" the government. But you'll be hearing more about that later. Jim Bell Klaatu Burada Nikto "Something is going to happen... Something....Wonderful!" -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMQu0VPqHVDBboB2dAQHfegP/W67SNQnzCL7TYdphdVmQ6wwWUjniUkz5 PJG/vJzQONFlsqLyz0o+jn0dZsMquoAWmB6jkrSzN6oAPoSnpAL5e5GPxk7busP+ Jmn56UCCFc6TUPlA69zqI5EA0uctcTGPunnLhNN/aEFTmngwQVmgC8o/eRB8NEyt s2ImX/n6u0s= =0YOC -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: The Big Lie
by mpd＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Rich Salz <rsalz(a)osf.org> writes: > That's an interesting point, but it does not apply to the > majority of humanity. "The Holocaust" is not an O.D. of > something, it is a shorthand term for things like Final > Solution and the camps. Regardless of what one wishes to call such a term, there are obvious dangers to using shorthand, abbreviations, OD's, acronyms, and other such things as if they possessed predictive power, or some magical ability to explain the things they reference by virtue of their construction. It is of course even sillier to question their existence. If I define "Salz Syndrome" as a tendency by people named "Rich" to post messages suggesting that discussions of Holocaust semantics are off-topic for the Cypherpunks list, then I have to a certain extent stacked the deck when rhetorically asking questions like... Why does Rich post such messages? Or when I answer a question about the legitimacy of Saltz Syndrome as a real disease by feigning surprise and saying indignantly - "Surely you are not suggesting Saltz Syndrome doesn't exist!?" By the same token, I don't feel "Did the Holocaust happen?" is a particularly well-formed or useful question. The answer, by almost any criteria, is most certainly "Yes", and answering the question tells me nothing I didn't know before I asked it. All of this is of course orthogonal to the point I was trying to make, which is that while such flaws of logic and debate go largely unnoticed in the unconnected world, and often result in the winning of debates, they generally get flamed royally on the Net, where a different set of rules apply. -- Mike Duvos $ PGP 2.6 Public Key available $ mpd(a)netcom.com $ via Finger. $

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Re: "German service cuts Net access" (to Santa Cruz)
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: IN%"frissell(a)panix.com" "Duncan Frissell" 28-JAN-1996 07:06:37.29 >At 12:07 AM 1/28/96 -0800, Timothy C. May wrote: >* the Germans recently arrested an American who landed in Germany >somewhere, as part of a trip. It seems he had been involved with the >production of Neo-Nazi material, somewhere out west. This was the last I >heard about the story. Sorry, I'm going from carbon-based memory. He was grabbed in Denmark and extradited to Germany so you'd have to avoid most of the EU. ------------------- One wonders if this would happen to an ISP who carried Neo-Nazi material and happened to travel to some part of the EU. Or would other countries than Germany have a bit more sense? -Allen

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Re: The Big Lie
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

tcmay(a)got.net (Timothy C. May) writes: > [Note: I present this as a line of thinking that is > actually often the result of suppression of views. "If They > are suppressing it, maybe there's some truth to it." Note > also that the views of Zundel and other Holocaust Deniers > are not causally related to the deaths of millions of Jews, > gypsies, and others in WW II. The damage, if any, is in the > "hurt feelings" and "insults" felt by survivors and their > relatives. While survivors and their relatives are certainly the most hurt by such, I would like to mention that the insults in question also include those who allegely lied about the camps. My grandfather (Ltc. (Ret.) William H. Smith) was directly behind the front lines in his Army Intelligence work (document gathering and sorting at that point). He and his sergeant were the first Allied discoverers of one of the camps- I believe Dachau. Moreover, he was in charge of the Paris Documents Center at one point. I don't like his being called a liar. Despite that, I still regard Holocaust Revisionists as having free speech rights. It's just if they try to recreate Krystallnacht (sp?) that I want them dead. -Allen

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The boss is watching...
by dfickes＠advice.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I've just been contacted by the producer of a cable news/analysis program who is putting together a show focusing on employees fooling around on the Web and what employers can do about it. (Trust their employees?). She is very interested in stories and tales of employers who have taken action against employee "abuse" but also is looking for companies that have policies that satisfy the "auditors" without becoming "onerous." She has convinced me that she is interested in presenting a balanced report and I've offered to gather whatever information I can lay my hands on before Feb 2. Incidentally, I was contacted because of my work on the announcement of "Internet WatchDog", a computer monitoring tool, which was previously mentioned on the list. Thanks for your help in advance... regards, -d David Fickes dfickes(a)advice.com ADVICE Marketing phone: 415/321-2198 366 Cambridge Avenue fax: 415/321-2199 Palo Alto, CA 94306

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The Dangers of Cross-Pollinating Other Mailing Lists
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Folks, When people decide to copy other mailing lists on messages they send to Cypherpunks (or vice versa), we often get flooded with insults and spams from people who don't share our views. (While I have nothing against trying to recruit others to our views, in my opinion this is best done by judicious writing of essays for _them_, tuned to their interests, and not in mindless spamming of every list that might have a passing interest in some of the topics.) We already have enough traffic here, and don't need replies from a bunch of other lists, be they libertarian lists, digital commerce lists, human rights lists, or java lists. The latest example of this is the rantfest invvolving these players: ------ From: Jack Hammer <jh(a)teleport.com> To: jim bell <jimbell(a)pacifier.com> Cc: Rich Graves <llurch(a)networking.stanford.edu>, cypherpunks(a)toad.com, nwlibertarians(a)teleport.com, hammernet-l(a)teleport.com, libernet-d(a)dartmouth.EDU, liberty-and-justice(a)pobox.com ------ I recognized Bell and Graves, but not the others. And I see no reason why our list should be dragged into flames about "fart sacks" by people on all of these other lists. This was the final straw, and I have no choice except to add Bell, Graves, Hammer, etc. to my filter list, which I will now proceed to do before sending this message off. [Done] Words have consequences. So do flames. --Tim May Boycott espionage-enabled software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^756839 - 1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Re: The Big Lie
by Daniel Miskell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Hey Tim- Just a thought. When you stated that other countries might be trying to (basically) pretend the holocaust had never happened, because it might NOT have happened and may very well be a big lie, you forgot to consider somthing. Had the holocaut happened, which i believe it did, it was of such horific magnitude that, since (for a time) we sat back and let it happen, let 6 million innocent people die, we might be trying to forget about it so as to not have to take responsibility for it having happened. It is much easier to say that it never existed and have no responsibility, than to acknoledge that it happened, and to look at what kind of people it makes us to let it happen. Just a thought. :) Dan --- _________________________________ *!Cheese Doctrine:!* Though cultured over time, and aged to perfection, one must not yield to produce mold. One must also not belittle themselves by conforming to the "whiz", but melt over the unprocessed ideas of Ghuda. _________________________________

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