December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Arthur C. Clarke Supports Strong Crypto
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- At 08:05 PM 2/4/96 -0800, Timothy C. May wrote: > >(Pardon me for mentioning crypto...) > >Arthur C. Clarke, known to most of you (author of many SF works, coiner of >the phrase: "all sufficiently advanced technlogies are indistinguishable >from magic," mention by Alan Olsen yesterday), has a role in a "Discovery >Channel" program called "Mysterious Universe." Actually, it was _I_ who mentioned this quote, but didn't specifically recall whom to ascribe it to. Perhaps Tim May didn't see it; a week or so ago May engaged in a shotgun-type killfile addition, including me when I was merely ( I still believe...) the victim in a local flamewar. If there is somebody out there who: 1. Is on speaking terms with Tim May. and 2. Has a little respect for my commentary, I would very much appreciate it if you would forward this comment to him to ensure that he sees it. The truly ironic thing is that Tim wrongly ascribes the comment to Alan Olsen, who is apparently the (recently admitted) perpetrator of at least one flamewar against me. Jim Bell jimbell(a)pacifier.com Klaatu Burada Nikto -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCUAwUBMRWQLvqHVDBboB2dAQF8zwP3SjAAIP46pqwsygL4Hm8YOChJ6xfIs4Vq vp+8rjMvPmZwxNtGN+7kcRTbXmau5P3MePSp94iK6k8qwisNqsoqCYkMBxs198fg 2YRZvfLAMQ0xsVznUSRA4bBTI3mLAv868xleSkIwhSjJ271qKUaI2K5exY1FgVK/ JnaVHWZTeQ== =tjA2 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Fair Credit Reporting Act and Privacy
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

[I urge people to put thread names in the subject lines, and not just leave the subjects as "Re:" or "Your mail." I have added a subject line.] At 5:58 AM 2/5/96, Karl Ike wrote: >It is impossible to get changes in the Fair Credit Reporting Act in the >traditional way. Credit reporting agencies have far too much personal >information that is passed out with incrediable ease at the consumers expense. > >I have a suggestion! > >Today, with TRW, Equifax and TransUnion's vast network, it is easy to obtain >anyone's credit report from various sources. Do you think if someone, >outside of the USA, obtained the credit reports on half, maybe all, of the >US Senators, congressmen, judges, etc, and published them in their entirity, >on the internet, from outside the US, would get their attention? Then there >would be changes, overnight, protecting the right of privacy! Let them >become the victim of credit reporting agencies once and shit will happen >overnight. "Protecting the right of privacy"? If I tell Joe Bob that you welshed on a debt made in the past, something that the person you welshed on has informed me of, how is this a violation of your right of privacy? Better yet, abolish the laws about so-called "Fair Credit Reporting." If Tim's Pretty Good Credit Reporting knows that Joe Blow filed for bankruptcy in 1975, by what right should men with guns come to his file cabinets and announce that he may not reveal true information that is older than, say, 8 years? Facts are facts. Not just for 8 years, or even 20 years. Debts incurred 30 years ago and not paid may still be useful bits of information in deciding whether to extend credit to a person. And even possibly untrue things are not the main justification for the FCRA. The FCRA is _not_ primarily designed to correct wrong information, but to place time limits on correct information. It limits speech. And it interferes with rational economic decisions. Fortunately, strong crypto and cyberspatial data havens will make enforcement of the FCRA increasingly difficult. --Tim 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 JEWS (ALL of them!) Try to kick Ernst Zundel off Usenet!!
by ErnstZundl＠aol.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Ich habe kleine Hoden

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RC2 source code post to sci.crypt
by koontz＠MasPar.COM 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

So, who cancelled the post anyway?

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Re: Sometimes ya just gotta nuke em
by James M. Cobb 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Rich, Neither dropping nuclear weapons on Japanese cities nor an invasion of Japan was necessary to secure surrender of the Japanese government. David Kahn explains: Communications intelligence contributed...in major ways to the Allies' Pacific victory. It stepped up American submarine sinkings of the Japanese merchant fleet by one third. This cutting of Japan's lifelines was, Premier Hideki Tojo said after the war, one of the major factors that defeated Japan. David Kahn. "Codebreaking in World Wars I and II: The Major Successes and Failures, Their Causes and Their Effects" (1980). In: Kahn on Codes: Secrets of the New Cryptology. Macmillan Publishing Co. 1983. Page 108. The water transport intercepts should provide case after case of how American submarines won one of the most important victories in the Pacific: the sinking of the Japanese merchant fleet.... Kahn. "Opportunities in Cryptology for Historians." Op cit. P 289. Some information came out shortly after World War II, when we all heard about how we broke some Japanese codes before Pearl Harbor, which...did help very much...in the successful American submarine blockade of Japan, which very largely brought the Jap- anese empire to its knees. Kahn. "Signals Intelligence in the 1980s" (1981). Op cit. P 292. In other words, it was Starvation City. --------------------------------------- As an aside. these three quotations from Kahn on Codes, a collection of articles, show that David's views in this regard are consistent over the years. Continuing-- Dropping nuclear weapons on Japanese cities or an invasion of Japan was not necessary to secure surrender of the Japanese government. William Langer explains: In the greatest air offensive in history [during May, June, and July 1945] United States land-based and carrier-based aircraft des- troyed or immobilized the remnants of the Japanese navy, shattered Japanese industry, and curtailed Japanese sea communications by sub- marine and air attack and extensive minefields. United States bat- tleships moved in to shell densely populated cities with impunity and the Twentieth Air Force dropped 40,000 tons of bombs on Japanese industrial centers in one month. William Langer. An Encyclopedia of World History. Houghton Mifflin Co. 1948. Page 1169. It was Devastation City. ------------------------ Then why Hiroshima and Nagasaki? There were two main reasons nuclear weapons were dropped on Japanese cities: (1) generally, to proclaim Pax Americana...with a bang (2) specifically, to declare war on the Soviet Union. For the sake of completeness, let's ask: If it really had been necessary to drop nuclear weapons on Japan in order to compel the Japanese government to surrender, should they have been dropped? Without hesitation. Cordially, Jim NOTE. The first part of the "Opportunities" article was published in 1972. The second part, dealing with World War II, was written perhaps a decade later for publication in the collection.

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No Subject
by Rishab Aiyer Ghosh 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

India's Department of Telecommunications (DoT) charges a licence fee of $50,000 per _annum_ for BBS operators, and nearly twice as much for e-mail providers. It is preparing to finalise a policy for Internet service providers; as it doesn't understand the distintion between Internet _networks_ (MCI, Sprintnet etc) and "retail" providers (the geek in the garage), it is planning to charge well over $100,000 in annual licence fees. This is totally against the opinions of Telecom Secretary R K Takkar, as expressed to my newsletter, The Indian Techonomist, some months ago. I spoke to Mr Takkar for some time, providing him the "education" that he asked for in my newsletter and that large datacom companies here have been curiously averse to give him. He appreciated my point of view, and invited me to send a proposal for an alternative datacom policy, which I have done (and which is summarised below). I hope to meet him next week to follow this up. As a major part of my call for removing restraints is based on the Internet's treatment by other world governments, I would like letters of support to show this. My proposal may appear tame, but it isn't really. It will allow small ISPs to pay as little as $150 a year in licence fees; reduce the (high) likelihood of cartels between large companies; and entrench electronic free-speech at (some) parity with other media. (Note that the DoT has said that it is "not considering" blocking access to parts of the Net for reasons of morals or security. This despite the local media's loudly proclaimed discovery that the Net is 97.34% paedophile, or whatever.) Highlights 1. Definitions - The category for E-mail providers becomes redundant, leaving international gateway, national network, and "retail" service providers - Content providers have constitutional protection as electronic publishers - BBSes do not require licensing, being content providers 2. Goals - Licence fees not for revenue generation, but to ensure responsibility (unavoidable. Mr Takkar's words) - Licence fees based on telecom infrastructure costs, not revenues (at the moment, a licence is almost like income tax) - Regulation required for free and fair competition (see below) - TRAI should also handle datacom regulation, and datacom consumer complaints (the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India is likely to be very independent of the government, headed by a former Supreme Court judge) 3. Regulation - Equal access to gateway, network and service providers (to prevent denial of service and cartels, very likely here without explicit rules preventing them) - Rationalisation of DoT leased line tariff structure (now, a network costs more than the sum of its parts! too complicated to explain briefly) 4. Licensing - Uniform fee structure for gateway, network and service providers (say 2.5% of leased line costs, which are known as they are provided by the DoT) - Barriers to entry greatly reduced (minimal ISP pays $150 p.a) - However, total licence fee revenue for DoT not significantly reduced (important for success of this proposal; large nationwide network may still pay $100,000+ thanks to its huge leased line requirements) The full text of the proposal will be made publicly available on the Net sometime next week. Those who would like to see it, and a template for a letter of support, should send me mail at dcom-appeal(a)dxm.org. I would like letters from non-commercial organisations, lobby groups, policy bodies, and so on, but NOT datacom companies (I wouldn't mind _personal_ letters of support from them, but they wouldn't do for the DoT). I would particularly like to see something from Hong Kong, which I have used as a good example of how to do things in Asia. Thanks, Rishab ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The Indian Techonomist - newsletter on India's information industry http://dxm.org/techonomist/ rishab(a)dxm.org Editor and publisher: Rishab Aiyer Ghosh rishab(a)arbornet.org Vox +91 11 6853410; 3760335; H 34 C Saket, New Delhi 110017, INDIA

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RC2 question [No Nuke Content]
by Kevin L Prigge 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Could someone throw a little light my way with regards to the permute[] array being derived from pi? I'm just not seeing it, I guess. Sorry for the interruption, I owe the list several off-topic flames and a discussion of some random non-crypto stuff at a later date. -- Kevin L. Prigge | "You can always spot a well informed man - UofM Central Computing | his views are the same as yours." email: klp(a)tc.umn.edu | - Ilka Chase PGP Key Fingerprint = FC E5 EE E7 8B 2E E9 D5 DA 1C 5D 6B 98 52 F6 24

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Re: FV's blatant double standards
by John Pettitt 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:39 PM 2/5/96 -0500, Simson L. Garfinkel wrote: >Yes, clearly if you are not concerned about missing 50-75% of First Virtual's >users, this attack will work just fine. >-simson > > Who cares - if 25 to 50% of a systems users are vulnderable doesn't that make it weak ? John Pettitt, jpp(a)software.net VP Engineering, CyberSource Corporation, 415 473 3065 "Technology is a way of organizing the universe so that man doesn't have to experience it." - Max Frisch

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[NOISE] just a few bits shy of a soul...
by Dave Del Torto 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

While chatting with a friend recently over brown rice in Boulder CO, he said something that I found raw-ther amusin'. Thought I'd share it. We'd been discussing bit-sizes of keys vs fifth-generation NSA cryptanalytical systems, etc and he said: "Wow, it's amazing how much [NSA] computing power is placed in service of [such a] '1-bit' consciousness." Heh... dave

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Re: CONTEST: Name That Program!
by Dave Del Torto 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:10 AM 1/31/96, Bill Stewart wrote: >At 11:45 AM 1/30/96 -0500, Nathaniel Borenstein <nsb(a)nsb.fv.com> wrote: >> In fact, I'd settle for getting onto 10% of the machines, although I >> suspect I could get onto more like 80% without raising a sweat. If I were you, Nathaniel, I'd drop that petard of yours on the ground, grab a very absorbent hankie and run like hell. ;) >You've alleged that Macs and Unixen should be about as easy as Windows >machines to crack with your CardShark. I disagree - most Mac users I >know have been using virus protectors more consistently and reliably >than DOS/Windows users. However, if their virus software only stops >known viruses, rather than anything modifying critical resources, >you might get away with it for long enough to surf some numbers. [elided] Actually, for those who don't know, one of the most ubiquitous anti-viral utilities for Macs (Symantec Antivirus for Macintosh, aka "SAM") also offers a mode that constantly watches for any generic attempt to modify crucial file/app/system resources -- and offers the opportunity to deny such attempts. Thus, it doesn't _only_ offer protection against "known" attacks. It even specifies which application/virus is trying to modify which file, allows the user to teach it that certain mods are verboten and halts activity until the user decides how to proceed. This makes it all but impossible (if a Mac is so-protected) to even introduce a trojan-keystroke-sniffing-credit-card-transmitter, much less use it to take over the TCP stack (MacTCP) without the user's knowledge. As for FV's recent "discovery:" [a] I'm glad if FV _really_ wants to educate the public, but I hope they find a better way next time than a "hey, we found this really simple way to hack the universe, but we're not telling all you 13-year-old juvenile delinquent hacker-wannabes" broadcast (talk about yer invitations!), [b] confused why NB didn't anticipate the fuss and prepend a short disclaimer onto his posting of it to cpunx (how about _thrice_ burnt, Nathaniel?), [c] unimpressed by all the vitriol it stirred up and the glee exhibited by everyone in slamming Nathaniel and Co. (lighten up, even if it was deserved) and [d] bummed that no-one remembered my keycapture utility survey of nearly a year and a half ago...as in "gee, I wish _I'd_ thoughta that." ;) Frankly, I wonder if, in the long run, FV's stunt hasn't wrought more harm than good: I got a late-night call from a worried but clueless friend asking me to clarify this "credit card sniffer thing" he'd heard about from someone else: he was all worried that there was an invisible virus on his machine. >sigh< It's seems the brush has been set afire: now which way will the winds blow? Cheers, dave ____________________________________________________________________________ "With annual interest, compounded every nanosecond, that'll be $0.02000018."

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