December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: The Upcoming DES Challenge
by Liz Taylor 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

There is nothing unglamorous about a known plaintext attack, if the plaintext is choosen carefully. I don't know anything about bank ATMs and the protocols they use, but I presume the PIN is stored on the card single DES encrypted. If this is so, anyone can take an ATM card, attack it to recover the key and then use that key to recover the PIN for any stolen ATM card of that bank (or that branch). Hopefully, the ciphertext/plaintext pair that RSA announces will be a real target like this, with the actual key disabled. Once the key is recovered, the press can then claim that ATM cards are not safe any longer. On a related note, do you think the key will first be recovered by a hardware device or by the Great Internet DES Key Search? Hardware is much faster, but no such device exists in the private/amateur sector now. Estimates are that it will take 10 months to actually build such a device. Opinions?

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Re: Thoughts on moderation
by Douglas Barnes 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Goodness knows most people who are fully engaged in a mailing list get involved in an unproductive discussion or argument from time to time. My main assertion about Sandy is that although he has his likes and dislikes (and is not shy about sharing them) I can't see him bouncing messages just because someone was disagreeing with him. There might be someone who is less opinionated, but I think that you need to find someone who cares enough about a subject to be interested in moderating it (one antonym of "opinionated" is "dispassionate" -- think about it.) The only way to tell if Sandy will be fair _as a moderator_ is to give him a chance. Years of knowing him as a friend, and four months of sharing an office indicate that while he's stubborn and opinionated, he's also extremely fairminded, and will not bounce for content he disagrees with. He also has a broad concept (some might argue too broad) of acceptable list topics, but since we're looking primarily to screen out the worst dreck & outright spam, he seems like a logical choice as moderator. I don't see this move as censorship of any sort -- cleaning the Augean stables is more like it. I am profoundly tired of wading through completely worthless and vapid trash accusing Tim and John of various sexual perversions. (Note that if the writers actually knew these folks, they'd at least be able to write better or more interesting libel.) At 10:35 PM 1/6/97 -0800, you wrote: >Douglas Barnes wrote: >> 1) I've known Sandy for a couple of years, and I trust him to >> use good judgement as a moderator. It will be important to >> develop guidelines so that the job can be rotated, but it's also >> important that the moderator be someone who doesn't have any >> major axe to grind. Sandy has his personal likes and dislikes, >> but I don't think he'll ever stoop to tossing out opinions that >> he disagrees with. > >Wishful thinking, Doug. Sandy will take an emotional (non-objective) >position on an issue, and argue it beyond any reasonable limit. I wish >I had all his replies to things I've said - you'd see what I mean. > >Not to promote anyone who I might not be a friend of, but, there are >people on this list who are "well respected" who are light-years ahead >of Sandy in areas that are important for a list moderator. > >Maybe Gilmore should have publicly announced for a moderator, and then >let the subscribers pick.... > >

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$2500 for a class c.
by faried nawaz 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

------- Blind-Carbon-Copy To: hungry(a)hungry.com Cc: chris(a)uidaho.edu, people(a)kuoi.sub.uidaho.edu Subject: $2500 for a class c. Date: Tue, 07 Jan 1997 15:19:25 PST Message-ID: <7130.852679165(a)bear.cs.uidaho.edu> From: faried nawaz <nawaz921(a)bear.cs.uidaho.edu> (two messages follow) From: gjohnson(a)dream.season.com (Reality is a point of view) Subject: IP allocation goes fee based soon?! Newsgroups: ba.internet Date: 6 Jan 1997 16:08:04 GMT Organization: season.com [205.179.33.0] Path: news.uidaho.edu!newsfeed.orst.edu!newshub.tc.umn.edu!spool.mu.edu!newspump.sol.net!howland.erols.net!agate!news.ucsc.edu!news.scruz.net!gjohnson Lines: 18 Message-ID: <slrn5d28r9.34.gjohnson(a)dream.season.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 205.179.33.42 Xref: news.uidaho.edu ba.internet:12066 Take a look at http://rs.internic.net/arin for a quiet bombshell, especially Section 2.3. A Class C block for $2,500? If you think that isn't funny there are a few people that agree with you in threads elsewhere. Try a dejanews search on $2500 Class C. You might also want to take a peek at http://www.iahc.org for news about a commentary period that ends in the next few days. - -- Gary Johnson "Wahoo." gjohnson(a)season.com Remember why... later in the thread -- From: davidm(a)them.com (David Mandala) Subject: Re: IP allocation goes fee based soon?! Newsgroups: ba.internet Date: Tue, 07 Jan 97 19:10:07 GMT Organization: Them Productions Path: news.uidaho.edu!newsfeed.orst.edu!news.uoregon.edu!marlin.ucsf.edu!overload.lbl.gov!agate!spool.mu.edu!newspump.sol.net!howland.erols.net!news.bbnplanet.com!cam-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news-xfer.netaxs.com!news.texas.net!news1.best.com!nntp1.best.com!davidm Lines: 32 Message-ID: <5au72j$rnn(a)nntp1.best.com> References: <slrn5d28r9.34.gjohnson(a)dream.season.com> <e3mca8.3mx(a)oriole.sbay.org> <southernE3MJxJ.FKq(a)netcom.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: davidm.vip.best.com X-Newsreader: News Xpress 2.0 Beta #2 Xref: news.uidaho.edu ba.internet:12120 I've since heard that their contract run out in 1998, now since they have gone from a small nothing company to a widly known disaster, if follows that they are making money hand over fist. So before the contract opens we need to make enough noise with the goverment that the contract is NOT relet to them but rather to open bid, or to a true non profit alliance of Internet professionals to provide the service at cost (which in reality is quite small). Only we can make the difference. In article <southernE3MJxJ.FKq(a)netcom.com>, southern(a)netcom.com (Shawn) wrote: >In article <e3mca8.3mx(a)oriole.sbay.org>, George Bonser wrote: >: Billions and Billions of IP addresses are right around the corner >: and they are going to use the current shortage to set a precedent >: (sp?) of charging $2500 per block of 256? That would put them in a >: position to make an absolute KILLING when IPv6 comes out. > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > >Give that man a ceegar. > >That is, I believe, the point. > >All, of course, at $50/year per domain name. > >With that kind of income, they might give Microsoft a run for their >money as being one of the most profitable computer companies in the >world. <tounge FIRMLY in cheek> :-) > >Shawn /************************************************************* David Mandala Them Productions San Francisco, CA Internet: davidm(a)them.com CIS: 74156,221 AOL: dism *************************************************************/ faried - -- i don't hate people. | my other car is a cdr why, some of my closest | linux, the ms-dos of the nineties friends are people. | <zorgo> cable and internet.. who needs a life? -- stevi(a)aa.net | http://www.hungry.com/~fn/ ------- End of Blind-Carbon-Copy

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Re: The Upcoming DES Challenge
by sameer 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> There is nothing unglamorous about a known plaintext attack, if the > plaintext is choosen carefully. I don't know anything about bank ATMs > and the protocols they use, but I presume the PIN is stored on the card > single DES encrypted. If this is so, anyone can take an ATM card, attack it > to recover the key and then use that key to recover the PIN for any stolen > ATM card of that bank (or that branch). Hopefully, the ciphertext/plaintext > pair that RSA announces will be a real target like this, with the actual key > disabled. Once the key is recovered, the press can then claim that ATM > cards are not safe any longer. Stolen ATM cards are actually not that valuable. They have fixed limits and require physical presence to exploit. Try swift/forex/etc. secret des keys.. those are valuable. -- Sameer Parekh Voice: 510-986-8770 President FAX: 510-986-8777 C2Net C2Net is having a party: http://www.c2.net/party/ http://www.c2.net/ sameer(a)c2.net

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Re: [CRYPTO] Quadratic residues
by miner 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 02:37 PM 1/7/97 -0500, Anonymous wrote: >Timothy May's family tree goes straight up. All of his >ancestors were siblings, to dumb to recognize each other in the >dark. > > /\ o-/\ Timothy May > ///\|/\\\ > / /|\ \ Counting the days till I don't have to see anymore of these, certainly a product of one of the 3 people already in my killfile. Thank you John and Sandy in advance

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RE: Thoughts on moderation
by Blanc Weber 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: Douglas Barnes I don't see this move as censorship of any sort -- cleaning the Augean stables is more like it. I am profoundly tired of wading through completely worthless and vapid trash accusing Tim and John of various sexual perversions. .................................................. So what about determining the lowest parameter of tolerance for style & content - how low you can go before your messages are transferred to the "flames" division? Then, for instance, Uni could say to Dale: "you will find my detailed retort to your deluded accusations on the other list" (which Dale would, of course, go over there and read <g>). In any case, everyone would know what that sensitive, low point of intolerance is such that if they descend to it they will be sifted out and recategorized. .. Blanc

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About ICF(International Cryptography Framework)
by Starr 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Has anyone heard anything or been paying attention to the development of the ICF(International Cryptography Framework) standard. This seems to be an attempt of the US Gov and a FEW of our favorite corps to completely control cryptography standards as well as to have the keys to all cryptographical content. The only information I've found so far is on HP's website http://www.dmo.hp.com/gsy/security/icf/main.html I've also managed to get a hold of Ray Bamford (ray_bamford(a)hp.com)at HP who seems to have some PR role in this wool over the eyes attempt. It seems to be just another (souped-up, in disguise attempt at the clipper chip except on an International basis). When I spoke to him he told me that the only information that has been issued is what you seen in the technical paper, and that the info they have is extremely exclusive, even if you are a legitimate company working on cryptography issues, etc. Check it out...I would definitely like to hear your opinions as well as if any of you have more information on this subject(newsgroups, mail lists, etc). -spanky

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by native＠media.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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Re: Sandy and I will run a cypherpunks "moderation" experiment in Jan
by Greg Broiles 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 09:37 AM 1/7/97 -0800, Pierre Uszynski wrote: >Rich Graves <rcgraves(a)disposable.com> very correctly mentions: > >> 1) Moderator liability and anonymous posting. > >I agree that this is actually a critical problem with a filtering >moderation scheme. Such a scheme appears to provide the capability to >filter out possible "copyright violations" posts. From what I remember >of the Netcom/CoS case (without going back to the sources), that may >mean more liability for the reviewers (and the operator of the >machine). That's a major point against simple filtering moderation. I agree that this raises the spectre of liability for messages passed on, but I'm not sure it's a big problem. I see three broad categories of information which the moderation liability scheme may suppress: 1. Copyrighted items such as newspaper/magazine articles 2. Secrets which are being revealed (e.g., the alleged RC4 source, the Mykotronix trash stuff) 3. Defamation As to the loss of (1), I'm not heartbroken - much of this information is already placed online by its owners, and can be referred to with a hypertext link or a reference instead of being posted in its entirety. Also, some people (who I don't feel like singling out) currently provide access to third-party copyrighted information, but in a discreet manner. The "copyright violations" poster(s) could provide access in this way, unless they're committed to making John Gilmore and the remailer operators take the heat for someone else's actions. The loss of (2) is regrettable; but Usenet (and other unmoderated forums) are still available for hit-and-run disclosure of secrets. Also, it's unclear to what extent (2) will be lost. Given the recent California and Federal statutory changes strengthening trade secret protection, I think it's useful to be careful - but it's arguable that neither the alleged RC4 code nor the Mykotronix trash stuff would have been a trade secret violation. Also, let's weigh the value of what'd be lost (how many of these messages do we really get?) against the negative value of the crap we're currently subjected to, and the (speculative) value of posts we don't get because their authors have left the list because of disgust and annoyance. I'm not going to lose much sleep over (3). I can't call to mind a single instance of interesting or useful defamation that I've seen on the Net. >ichudov(a)algebra.com (Igor Chudov @ home) responded: > >> [in another forum] >> After long thinking, moderator board has come with the following >> solution: >> >> 1) We do not know for sure if a certain post violates >> some copyrights or not >> [and more in the same line 2,3,4,5] > >Would any of this have mattered in Netcom/CoS? My hunch is that liability for infringement will focus on defendants' actions after they knew or had reason to know that a particular act of copying or distribution was a violation of the copyright owners' rights. Copying data from one place to another is the essence of the net; holding owners of machines (or moderators) responsible for violations they couldn't have stopped is nonsensical. I predict (but cannot cite cases so holding) that moderators/listowners will be held liable for copyright violations they could have detected and stopped with the exercise of some level of care; but that they will not be held liable where no reasonable amount of effort on their part could have prevented the copyright violation. And I think "reasonable" will depend on the facts at hand. (All of the contributory infringement cases I'm familiar with have involved a defendant who was aware of, if not actively assisting with, the underlying infringement.) >Instead, a system that would forward reviewers' opinions *after the >fact* does not have any of this problem. And we have already mentioned, >it is also more powerful (real time initial feed, easy multiple >feedback feeds, fully compatible with anything else...) although it >does not reduce bandwidth requirements. Can you name a software package which runs under Windows or the Mac OS which automatically processes reviewers' opinions against a mailbox of incoming mail? Better yet, can you name a Eudora plug-in which does so? Abandoning an imperfect but workable solution because it's possible to imagine that someone will create something better someday strikes me as silly. Comparing theoretical software/strategies with currently implemented software/strategies is comparing apples and oranges. -- Greg Broiles | US crypto export control policy in a nutshell: gbroiles(a)netbox.com | http://www.io.com/~gbroiles | Export jobs, not crypto.

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Moderation and the Polymorphic Virus
by Toto 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Perhaps with proper moderation, having access to a cloistered environment without all of the 'noise', cypherpunks will be able to come up with a true polymorphic virus that will make the Atom Bomb look like a child's toy. The rabble who rant on endlessly about 'social issues' can surely not be trusted to contribute anything of value on what are, in fact, merely a question of 'numbers'. It is up the the elite, the code writers, to lead the cypher- punks into a New World Order, in which the results of cryptography are only used for proper, approved purposes. Toto

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