December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Welcome to cypherpunks
by Majordomo＠toad.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-- Welcome to the cypherpunks mailing list! If you ever want to remove yourself from this mailing list, you can send mail to "Majordomo(a)toad.com" with the following command in the body of your email message: unsubscribe cypherpunks Cypherpunks Mailing List <cypher(a)infinity.nus.sg> Here's the general information for the list you've subscribed to, in case you don't already have it: About cypherpunks ----------------- I. Administrivia (please read, boring though it may be) The cypherpunks list is a forum for discussing personal defenses for privacy in the digital domain. It is a high volume mailing list. If you don't know how to do something, like unsubscribe, send mail to majordomo(a)toad.com and the software robot which answers that address will send you back instructions on how to do what you want. If you don't know the majordomo syntax, an empty message to this address will get you a help file, as will a command 'help' in the body. Even with all this automated help, you may still encounter problems. If you get really stuck, please feel free to contact me directly at the address I use for mailing list management: cypherpunks-owner(a)toad.com Please use this address for all mailing list management issues. Hint: if you try to unsubscribe yourself from a different account than you signed up for, it likely won't work. Log back into your old account and try again. If you no longer have access to that account, mail me at the list management address above. Also, please realize that there will be some cypherpunks messages "in transit" to you at the time you unsubscribe. If you get a response that says you are unsubscribed, but the messages keep coming, wait a day and they should stop. For other questions, my list management address is not the best place, since I don't read it every day. To reach me otherwise, send mail to eric(a)remailer.net This address is appropriate for emergencies (and wanting to get off the list is never an emergency), such as the list continuously spewing articles. Please don't send me mail to my regular mailbox asking to be removed; I'll just send you back a form letter. Do not mail to the whole list asking to be removed. It's rude. The -request address is made exactly for this purpose. To post to the whole list, send mail to cypherpunks(a)toad.com If your mail bounces repeatedly, you will be removed from the list. Nothing personal, but I have to look at all the bounce messages. There is no digest version available. There is an announcements list which is moderated and has low volume. Announcements for physical cypherpunks meetings, new software and important developments will be posted there. Mail to cypherpunks-announce-request(a)toad.com if you want to be added or removed to the announce list. All announcements also go out to the full cypherpunks list, so there is no need to subscribe to both. II. About cypherpunks The cypherpunks list is not designed for beginners, although they are welcome. If you are totally new to crypto, please get and read the crypto FAQ referenced below. This document is a good introduction, although not short. Crypto is a subtle field and a good understanding will not come without some study. Please, as a courtesy to all, do some reading to make sure that your question is not already frequently asked. There are other forums to use on the subject of cryptography. The Usenet group sci.crypt deals with technical cryptography; cypherpunks deals with technical details but slants the discussion toward their social implications. The Usenet group talk.politics.crypto, as is says, is for political theorizing, and cypherpunks gets its share of that, but cypherpunks is all pro-crypto; the debates on this list are about how to best get crypto out there. The Usenet group alt.security.pgp is a pgp-specific group, and questions about pgp as such are likely better asked there than here. Ditto for alt.security.ripem. The cypherpunks list has its very own net.loon, a fellow named L. Detweiler. The history is too long for here, but he thinks that cypherpunks are evil incarnate. If you see a densely worded rant featuring characteristic words such as "medusa", "pseudospoofing", "treachery", "poison", or "black lies", it's probably him, no matter what the From: line says. The policy is to ignore these postings. Replies have never, ever, not even once resulted in anything constructive and usually create huge flamewars on the list. Please, please, don't feed the animals. III. Resources. A. The sci.crypt FAQ anonymous ftp to rtfm.mit.edu:pub/usenet-by-group/sci.crypt The cryptography FAQ is good online intro to crypto. Very much worth reading. Last I looked, it was in ten parts. B. cypherpunks ftp site anonymous ftp to ftp.csua.berkeley.edu:pub/cypherpunks This site contains code, information, rants, and other miscellany. There is a glossary there that all new members should download and read. Also recommended for all users are Hal Finney's instructions on how to use the anonymous remailer system; the remailer sources are there for the perl-literate. C. Bruce Schneier's _Applied Cryptography_, published by Wiley This is required reading for any serious technical cypherpunk. An excellent overview of the field, it describes many of the basic algorithms and protocols with their mathematical descriptions. Some of the stuff at the edges of the scope of the book is a little incomplete, so short descriptions in here should lead to library research for the latest papers, or to the list for the current thinking. All in all, a solid and valuable book. It's even got the cypherpunks-request address. IV. Famous last words My preferred email address for list maintenance topics only is hughes(a)toad.com. All other mail, including emergency mail, should go to hughes(a)ah.com, where I read mail much more regularly. Enjoy and deploy. Eric ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Cypherpunks assume privacy is a good thing and wish there were more of it. Cypherpunks acknowledge that those who want privacy must create it for themselves and not expect governments, corporations, or other large, faceless organizations to grant them privacy out of beneficence. Cypherpunks know that people have been creating their own privacy for centuries with whispers, envelopes, closed doors, and couriers. Cypherpunks do not seek to prevent other people from speaking about their experiences or their opinions. The most important means to the defense of privacy is encryption. To encrypt is to indicate the desire for privacy. But to encrypt with weak cryptography is to indicate not too much desire for privacy. Cypherpunks hope that all people desiring privacy will learn how best to defend it. Cypherpunks are therefore devoted to cryptography. Cypherpunks wish to learn about it, to teach it, to implement it, and to make more of it. Cypherpunks know that cryptographic protocols make social structures. Cypherpunks know how to attack a system and how to defend it. Cypherpunks know just how hard it is to make good cryptosystems. Cypherpunks love to practice. They love to play with public key cryptography. They love to play with anonymous and pseudonymous mail forwarding and delivery. They love to play with DC-nets. They love to play with secure communications of all kinds. Cypherpunks write code. They know that someone has to write code to defend privacy, and since it's their privacy, they're going to write it. Cypherpunks publish their code so that their fellow cypherpunks may practice and play with it. Cypherpunks realize that security is not built in a day and are patient with incremental progress. Cypherpunks don't care if you don't like the software they write. Cypherpunks know that software can't be destroyed. Cypherpunks know that a widely dispersed system can't be shut down. Cypherpunks will make the networks safe for privacy. [Last updated Mon Feb 21 13:18:25 1994]

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yo subscribe!!
by Garry Bentlin 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

how do I? and can you ? thanks heeeps! reg, garryb

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NY State to restrinct netporn?!
by Deranged Mutant 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

This in today's LI Newsday, p. A6: Crime Time in Albany Bills Reflect now popular get-tough stance by Liam Pleven, Albany Bureau Albany - A bill that would restrict sexually explicit material on the Internet - which the Assembly took little notice of last year - is suddenly headed tothe governor's desk after winning legislative approval yesterday. ... --- "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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Re: Hassles taking App. Crypt. to Taiwan?
by pclow＠pc.jaring.my 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>If this were Singapore, they might consider it subversive literature, >because it is :-) ...............and the next thing you'll probably say is that Asians live in tree houses and have pet gorillas or whatever :)......

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Re: Crippled Notes export encryption
by droelke＠rdxsunhost.aud.alcatel.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Herb Sutter wrote: > At 20:32 01.17.1996 -0500, Perry E. Metzger wrote: > > > >Alan Pugh writes: > >> infoMCI (sm) > >> Lotus-Security - Lotus Announces Compromise for Export of Strong > >> Encryption > > > >So, Lotus thinks they can fool people by back-dooring in key escrow, eh? > > > >Time to break out the artillery. > > > >Perry > > Careful... what would YOU have done, with your customers demanding stronger > crypto today and you unable to legally give it to them? > > Again, folks, try to remember that this is NOT key escrow... international > Notes customers are no worse off than before, and a darn sight better off > against everyone besides Uncle Sam. > > Herb Not key escrow - WHAT?!?!? Then, what do you call giving government access to 24 out of 64 bits of the key. This reduces the keyspace to a measly 40 bits. As we have seen - 40 bits is trivial to crack without a multi-billion dollar budget. I think that Lotus did what all corporations do - it thought was best for it's bottom line, and so chose the limited keyspace with key-escrow approach. It is our job (as cypherpunks and US citizens) to show Lotus and the world that this is NOT a good approach. Dan ------------------------------------------------------------------ Dan Oelke Alcatel Network Systems droelke(a)aud.alcatel.com Richardson, TX

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SS Obergruppenfuhrer Zimmermann (NOT!)
by mpd＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Anonymous User <nobody(a)c2.org> writes: > "Private communications between neo-Nazis on the network are > effected under a program called "Pretty Good Privacy", > devised by an American neo-Nazi sympathiser." > Robin Gedye (in Bonn) p.23 of "The Sunday Telegraph" > January 21, 1996 Before anyone takes this nonsense too seriously, one should realize that the exhibition of such microscopic views of technology by journalists and politicians is fairly common. Who can forget Caspar Weinburger's stirring speech in front of an illegally exported low-end VAX, explaining that the machine was a sophisticated electronic device for the tracking of missiles and troop movements, now in the hands of America's enemies. Then there was the newspaper article which explained in perfect seriousness that "GIF" was a secret computer code used by child molesters to encode images of their victims. Characterizing PGP as a neo-Nazi tool for private communications written by a sympathizer, while absurd in a larger sense, is hardly sillier than the prior examples. And all such scenarios contain a microscopic grain of truth as seen by someone somewhere with a severe case of tunnel vision. The reporter no doubt reports correctly that some neo-Nazis use PGP to communicate privately. Doubtless PKZ supports the right of all people, including those with diverse political views, to conduct legal private conversations which cannot be overheard by their governments, as do most of the people on this list. I suppose in some obtuse sense this is sympathy. It is highly unlikely that anyone who uses Cypherpunk technology is as ignorant as this reporter. So let's just mail the poor guy a clue and move on. Things like this happen often, and it's not really worth a prolongued debate. -- Mike Duvos $ PGP 2.6 Public Key available $ mpd(a)netcom.com $ via Finger. $

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January 22 Infoworld
by Dwight Brown 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Nicholas Petreley's "Down To the Wire" column is a short take on the insecurity of encryption schemes used by most commercial software. There shouldn't be much new here to cypherpunks (he discusses the vulnerabilities of WordPerfect, Word for Windows, Excel, and Compuserve's CIS.INI, and uses some out of date examples "to protect the integrity of current software": bad move, Nicholas), but it'd make a good introduction for people who aren't familiar with the issues. Petreley also announces that InfoWorld is planning a "network-cracking event", in which they plan to set up various network OS'es, make them as secure as they can, invite "a small number of accomplished hackers" to attack them, and publish the results. He says they're looking for participants... InfoWorld's web site is http://www.infoworld.com. Petreley can be reached at nicholas_petreley(a)infoworld.com. ==Dwight

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Re: your mail
by jf_avon＠citenet.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>On Mon, 22 Jan 1996, Jean-Francois Avon wrote (quote may be only partial):: > >> >> I suppose, from the adress, that it is some type of mailing list. >> >> If yes, could anybody send me the "how to subscribe" file? >> My mail quoted above was sent out to all subscribers to the list. I supposed it was only the administrative address.... I got *a lot* of replies. Thank to all cypherpunk! JFA

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[local] Report onPortland Cpunks meeting
by Alan Olsen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The physical Cypherpunks meeting in Portland occured on the 20th of January. No big name Cypherpunks we involved in the manufacture of this meeting. (Well, maybe next time...) It pretty much went like a first meeting... We had about 11 people or so attend. (Hard to tell in a coffee shop if people are attending or just wondering what the heck is going on.) The participation from the group was very positive. Those who did attend were quite willing to participate. Those of you who did not show up missed a good meeting... and free coffee drinks from the Habit. (The Habit Internet Cafe was having their one year aniversary and was giving away free coffe as part of the event.) Some of the happenings (in no particular order): Bruce Baugh handed out the information he has been collecting on remailer timings and mail to new gateways. The information was pretty useful. He had sent out a group of ten messages to each remailer through a nym server. The results were at odds with the published times. Certain sites either dropped large percentages of messages or delivered them about 8-9 days late. Others which were rated at the bottom of the list on the regular timing list were the most reliable in Bruce's tests. Neal McBurnett talked about his Java program that generates statistics on the PGP "web of trust". The information he gave was pretty surprising. (Fewer keys exist in the keyservers than I believed.) I encoraged Neal to post his findings to the list. (Hint! Hint!) I will not try to explain the stats from memory... I gave a report on the status of the PGP 3.0 API. (Of which Derek Atkins was kind enough to send me for the meeting. Thanks Derek!) There was a key signing. It was a bit rough as for many of us it was our first key signing. (I think Neal was the only person who had been to an organized key signing.) Still, it went fairly well. Only a couple of people brought their key fingerprints on disk instead of paper. As of today, I have only recieved signed keys back from a couple of people though... The next key signing will be done a bit differently. (Live and learn.) There was also a suggestion for a nym signing at some point. There was a discussion of entropy which devolved into entropy. The definitions of entropy varied widely depending on the background of the individuals involved. (Or just general smartassedness... My definition of entropy was "A urilogical condition".) There was alot of just general discussion of crypto and current events. A good time was had by all. (At least I have not had any complaints.) One of the other topics discussed was a Portland-Cypherpunks mailing list for keeping people informed on local activities. This will probibly be put into place sometime soon... There will also be upcoming meetings as I have had a number of people inquiring about the posibility. Well, that is about all I can remember at this point... (At least with not enough caffiene in me.) Others who were there can probibly comment. 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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Mykotronx sells 68,000 Fortezza cards to Spyrus
by baldwin 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Here is a press release from Mykotronix about a big order of Fortezza cards for the Defense Messaging System. Another part of the government has selected Fisher International to supply SmartDisk cryptographic cards for the use of citizens interacting with the IRS and other agencies electronically. Although Fisher has not received a big order yet, they are looking at 100 thousand and 10 million card production runs. The Fisher card is based on RSA's crypto toolkit and DOES NOT include skipjack or escrow. --Bob ______________________________ Forward Header __________________________________ Subject: Mykotronx sells 68,000 Fortezza cards for Defense Msg System IRVINE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 22, 1996--Rainbow Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:RNBO), Monday announced its Mykotronx division has received a purchase order from Spyrus for over 68,000 of Mykotronx's new Capstone encryption processor (MYK-82). The devices will be used to build part of the Government's order of Fortezza Cryptographic Cards for the Defense Message System (DMS) awarded Sept. 1995. Initial delivery of the new cryptographic processor will begin April 1996. "The significance of the MYK-82 is that it allows us to provide a high grade, low cost encryption technology to customers, such as Spyrus," said John Droge, vice president of program development for Mykotronx. "The MYK-82 is an advanced encryption processor specifically aimed at PCMCIA cryptographic applications and has a built-in PCMCIA interface. The newer design is smaller, faster and has a lower cost than its predecessor." In addition, Mykotronx will be programming all the cryptographic processors to fill the Government's Sept. 1995 order of 300,000 Fortezza Cryptographic Cards. The MYK-82, developed by Mykotronx and fabricated by VLSI Technology Inc., is the first of a series of security products to be developed as part of an alliance with VLSI, targeting both Government and commercial markets. Rainbow Technologies, founded in 1984, is the world's leading developer, manufacturer and supplier of software protection products and encryption technology. Mykotronx, a subsidiary of Rainbow, is a leader in secure communication and cryptographic products for U.S. government agencies and the commercial marketplace. Rainbow was recently recognized by Forbes magazine as one of The Best Small Companies in America and in SmartMoney Magazine as one of the Seven Stocks for the Next Decade. Rainbow is ISO 9002 certified. CONTACT: Rainbow Technologies Inc., Irvine, Calif. Ann Jones, 714/450-7350 email: ajones(a)rnbo.com WWW Home Page: http://www.rnbo.com KEYWORD: CALIFORNIA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: COMPUTERS/ELECTRONICS COMED

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