December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Telstra Australia admits it lied about net
by nobody＠REPLAY.COM 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

http://www.australian.aust.com/computer/fulltext/c1014b.htm Telstra: We were wrong about Net By GEOFF LONG October 14: A Telstra official has admitted that the carrier overestimated the congestion problems associated with the Internet, one of the prime reasons given when it wanted to introduce timed local calls. Speaking at the launch of Telstra's Big Pond Business services, Big Pond general manager John Rolland said congestion caused by Internet users connecting for long periods was not as big an issue as they first thought. He added that the about-face was in line with similar findings from North American carriers and switch manufacturers Alcatel and Ericsson. Mr Rolland said that the main problem areas are where ISPs are situated, but that these were manageable: "What is clear is that in the medium term we will have hot spots, especially around ISPs." However, these could be addressed by working with the ISPs and managing connectivity better. The remarks came in response to Telstra promoting permanent modem connections as part of its Big Pond Business offering.

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Re: Stronghold
by dlv＠bwalk.dm.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Adam Back <aba(a)dcs.ex.ac.uk> writes: >> > Unfortunately I wasn't on cypherpunks-unedited at the time, but I >> > thought that it was immediate send out from toad.com without going via >> > Sandy. >> >> Going over my notes I see that at least one of my submissions - the >> one quoting the C2Net lawyer letter in its entirety - didn't appear >> even on cypherpunks-unedited. > >I think I saw this claim made before around the time of the "moderation >experiment". > >The only ways I can see that this could have happened are either that: > > i) John Gilmore started editing cypherpunks-unedited at Sandy/C2net's > request > > ii) cypherpunks-unedited was edited all along by someone (John or Sandy) > >i) is sort of feasible, perhaps there are others who were on unedited >and were counting who could confirm this. Toto I think was. Apparently a 'bot was installed on toad.com to discard my submissions from the "unedited" list _after my article which prompted the C2net threatening lawyer letter did make it through the "unedited" list (but was censored from the "flames" list by C2Net). >ii) is hard to believe because the fact that something is edited shows >-- when the editor is sleeping you get lag. > >I'm fairly sure I didn't see the C2 legal letter you posted yesterday >before. I'm sorry to have to return to this topic that's been beaten to death and causes me intense nausea. I figured I'll comment on two more attempts to revise history by lying C2Net shills from Hewlett Packard and Oracle. Please recall that C2Net created 3 lists on toad.com: unedited flames C2Net-approved At one point, all my submissions to cypherpunks appeared on "unedited" and then on "flames" with about a 3-second delay, indicating a 'bot at work. The 'bot was scrubbed when C2net decided that my writings were not suitable for auto- forwarding to the "flames" list either. For about a week, numerous articles by myself, Tim May, et al appeared on "unedited" but not on "flames". Howver toward the end of the "moderation experiment" apparently a 'bot on toad.com was filtering my submissions from the 'unedited' list as well. My Jan 30th announcement that C2Net filtered out of the flames list _did show up on the unedited list. However my following articles, like the one quoting C2Net's threatening lawyer letter (which I cc'd to numerous people, including JYA, who, not surprisingly, declined to put it on his archive) did _not appear on the "unedited" list. Nevertheless at least one lying C2Net shill from Hewlett Packard claims that my articles appearing on the unedited list on January 30th prove that I wasn't being filtered from "unedited" one week later. Another lying C2net shill, Jason E. Durbin, a technical writer for Oracle, just wrote in news.admin.net-abuse.policy: }For those unfamiliar with the tactics Vulis uses when attempting to }destroy moderated fora, take a look at the current, ongoing thread }called "Stronghold" (and other variations on same) on the Cypherpunks }mailing list archived at: } }http://infinity.nus.sg/cypherpunks/current/date.html#start } }It summarizes (including Vulis' take on the situation) Vulis' attack }on the mailing list itself via a feigned attack on the Stronghold }security server. } }In summary, make such an annoyance of yourself by whatever means }necessary (posting binaries, running an insultbot, making false }accusations, etc.) to get yourself threatened with banishment, then }rally the free speech advocates by painting yourself as the innocent }harmed party even though no banishment occurred. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ } }Interesting insights into how Vulis attempts to manipulate his victims }into damning themselves while making him look like a victim. }Interesting reading. "No banishment occured" - more bizarre lies from C2Net and their supporters. Oh, and I don't recall sending binaries to this list either. This reminds me of the claim by Rich Graves, another C2Net/Cygnus shill, that I'm sending "hundreds" of articles a day to this mailing list. You may recall that the same C2net/Oracle shill Jason Durbin has been following up on my Usenet articles in sci.crypt, comp.unix.questions, etc with lies and libel: claiming, e.g., that I "lie about my credentials", that I don't even have a master's degree, etc. Is C2Net paying Jason Durbin to badmouth my academic credentials? >From Jason Durbin's Net.Scum page: Jason E. Durbin, jdurbin(a)nl.oracle.com, jed(a)poisson.com, slothrop(a)poisson.com, jed(a)best.com, jed(a)netcom.com. Jason claims to work for Poisson Corporation, 8 Avocet Drive, #211, Redwood Shores, CA 94065, tel +1 415 637 0435, JD503. In real life, Jason is a lowly technical writer for Oracle Corporation, 500 Oracle Parkway, Redwood City, CA 94065, tel: +1 800 345 3267, +1 415 506 7000, (+1 605 506 7000), fax: +1 415 506 7200. Jason's manager in the technical writing department is: Sanford Dreskin Mail Stop: MS-40P12 Office tel: +1 415 506 2181 Office fax: +1 415 506 7228 Home tel: +1 510 376 9526 Home addr: 859 Augusta Drive, Moraga, CA 94556-1051 In what ways are Durbin and the Hewlett-Packard liar affiliated with C2Net? --- Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps

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Re: Security flaw in PGPverify of INN (fwd)
by Ray Arachelian 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

=====================================Kaos=Keraunos=Kybernetos============== .+.^.+.| Ray Arachelian |Prying open my 3rd eye. So good to see |./|\. ..\|/..|sunder(a)sundernet.com|you once again. I thought you were |/\|/\ <--*-->| ------------------ |hiding, and you thought that I had run |\/|\/ ../|\..| "A toast to Odin, |away chasing the tail of dogma. I opened|.\|/. .+.v.+.|God of screwdrivers"|my eye and there we were.... |..... ======================= http://www.sundernet.com ========================== ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 14 Oct 1997 17:34:11 +0200 From: Peter Simons <simons(a)RHEIN.DE> To: BUGTRAQ(a)NETSPACE.ORG Subject: Re: Security flaw in PGPverify of INN -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- I am replying to the "security problem" report in pgpverify written by Lutz Donnerhacke, which has been delivered via several mailing lists, including BUGTRAQ and Best-Of-Security. Normally I'd simply ignore this article, but this is so breath-takingly ridiculous that I have to set a few facts straight. Lutz Donnerhacke <lutz(a)IKS-JENA.DE> wrote: > I was urged to send you the following information. I noticed CERT and tale > itself. But tale claims that the problem is not a problem of pgpverify, it's > a problem of some krauts trying to send checkgroups monthly using a bot. > > The checkgroups mentioned were send since a year. They do not include Date: > and Message-ID: because these values were not predictable by the human > signer and the bot does not know the passphrase to work with. > > In consequence there are checkgroups out there which can be resend at any > time causing a lot of trouble, because the signature is still valid even if > a new Message-ID: and Date: line are used. > > The obvious fix is to modify pgpverify to block such control messages. > ftp://ftp.iks-jena.de/pub/mitarb/lutz/ contains the necessary fixes. This is plain bullshit. pgpverify is working just fine and there's no security leak or malfunction in the script. The real story behind this 'report' is as follows: Lutz is the moderator for the german language de.* USENET hierarchy. One of his duties is to send out regular checkgroups and other control messages. What he did is that he didn't include the Message-Id and Date header into the signature of the control messages that he posted. He only signed headers like From and Subject. So he posted control messages with incomplete signatures for maybe a year, until this was first noticed and publicly addressed by Ralph Babel. The problem with these control messages is that anybody is able to re-post them with a new Message-Id and Date. Due to the correct PGP signature, most INNs will simply execute them, thus deleting all changes in the hierarchy since the checkgroups was posted originally. While this is not a major problem, it certainly is a problem, as all groups that have been created past a certain date can easily be removed, etc... When his mistake became public, he didn't stand up for it and created a new key to start posting correct control messages, rendering the old ones useless, he put the blame on Tale and his script instead. So please don't believe this "security flaw". pgpverify is working just fine and if the responsible person will use PGP correctly, there is no problem at all. -peter -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3i Charset: latin1 iQCVAwUBNEORSw9HL1s0103BAQEgugP9FWJMNivNBqmJElzoQ6pXnwvS6QsbLjQG YrwHzvcYY3CAR7R446gr/WeuxW1JI1t9+yql8TNSvHeEXAX+qgz/ZMCjcjgjg0Pe j0BuVLBBfKuBoxGZDQybRybu3d5Xflqk07W9HjPP0tDtdkUcjndHr2J1Ea/J4zTd QgGNNUoZDFM= =brmw -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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commercial data recovery
by Zooko Journeyman 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

[Note-- I am not subscribed to ietf-open-pgp at this time. My apologies if this submission from a non-subscriber is unwanted. I will be brief. --Zooko] Adam, I applaud your effort to steer discourse toward productive work re: GAK, CMR, CDR. I haven't thought about your idea enough to have a definite opinion, but at first blush it seems a promising strategy to design high-security and forward-secrecy for communication but recovery/sharing features for stored data. I wonder if it is too much early-days to start talking about advanced protocols e.g. secret-splitting in IETF-Open-PGP? Probably so. Better just punch out a standard with current tech... Hm. What about the idea of storing your data remotely (for cost-efficiency, safety, etc.) using encryption to maintain your privacy? In that case, the distinction between comms and storage keys is blurred. A company may choose to e.g. store all long-term data at Zooko's Backup Server, encrypted in such a way that some combination of corporate keys (controlled by individual employees and/or departments) is necessary to decrypt each package of data. This would open the door, as you fear, for a government to mandate that _its_ key be added to each set, with authority to open any package even without the cooperation of any corporate keys. I'm not sure how to weigh the relative risks and benefits. I (ever so humbly) think that Zooko's Backup Server would be a great value for businesses, and that part of that value would be the ability to make data unlockable by various keys, both for administrative/internal security purposes and for robustness against accidents and saboteurs. Zooko's Backup Server can be physically located in a country free of such intrusive organizations, but of course it is the intrusive organizations of the _client's_ country that become important with that kind of protocol... Regards, Zooko P.S. There is already a company whose name I have forgotten that offers hard-drive backups over TCP/IP. They use some encryption but I don't know how strong.

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Request for expert opinion and Feedback
by Joubin 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Hello all, I am involved in a project which aims at the creation of a free and portable Java(tm) based object operating system. A basic functional requirement for this new OS is to provide /fast and effective/ strong cryptographic support at the OS level. The basic structure of the system is a layered architecture, with the lowest layer consisting of a platform specific (non-portable) kernel supporting an embedded JVM (again in C/ASM) and a set of Java(tm) interfaces to this 'virtual platform'. The OS proper will sit on top of this and will be 100% Java (tm). The issue: As you may know, SMI has and will deliver a set of 'security' packages as a standard component of JDK. This uses RSA technology. Basic and general 'interfaces' to encapsulate constructs such as Key, Provider, Cypher, etc. are also defined. A few people in the project group feel that many different groups and entities out there will provide (portable) Public Key encryption packages (implemented in Java(tm)) that can be used by the users of the OS. They argue against embedding computational support at the Kernel (non-portable) layer as wasted effort. Others (& myself included) feel that 'effective' also means efficiency of execution. Specially so if such functionality is to be used to encypher 'streams' and such (if that is possible). Your expert advice: a) How do you feel about 'where' the computational support should be implemented ? b) Assuming answer to (a) to be "At the kernel level and in C/ASM", is it possible to achieve a fine-grain modularity in terms of fairly generic algorithms and computations which can then be combined in conjunction to support a variety of encryption strategies ? c) Is there any benefit to implementing the random number generation system in the Kernel? Your input is greatly appreciated. If you feel there are other considerations to be made, please let me know. Thank you. Joubin p.s. Java(tm) and related items are the tightly guarded property of Sun Microsystems Inc. __________________________________ member, alpha zero LLC joubin(a)inch.com NoVA __________________________________

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Re: Spoofing
by nobody＠REPLAY.COM 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

semprini(a)theschool.com wrote: > > I don't think I'm out of line here in saying that all this spoofing of > other users is a bit childish. I'm sure there are better > things one could find to do with one's time. (Possibly work on > cracking RSA's 128- bit key?) > > --Dylan I already cracked it. The message is: "Sorry, but we ran out of cash."

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Have some fun
by suzy1＠aol.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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spoofing as performance art
by Zooko Journeyman 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Tim C. May allegedly typed something like: > > There's something about the Cypherpunks list that causes some people to > decide it would be a kewl act of performance art to disrupt it, distract > it, stalk it, and mailbomb it. > > And complaining never helps...it only stimulates their performance art juices. Hey, the jokes from Anonymous(ses) and Dmitri M. Vulis are the only reason I _read_ cpunks anymore! Oh yeah-- and that hilarious spoof about PGP, Inc. putting GAK-friendly features into their product. It's so funny that people fall for that old "PGP is in with the government" gag every time it comes around. Also, I'm looking for a job, I think. Or else a good university to go to. But mostly I'm just reading the hilarious Anonymous posts and spoofs. Regards, Zooko

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InfoWar Epilogue 6 / The Geigerburg Text
by Bubba Rom Dos 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The True Story of the InterNet Part III InfoWar Final Frontier of the Digital Revolution Behind the ElectroMagnetic Curtain by TruthMonger <tm(a)dev.null> Copyright 1997 Pearl Publishing ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- InfoWar Table of Contents * Epilogue * Bubba Rom Dos ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Epilogue ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- WORK AND NOT WORK Looking back over the events of my life since I wrote Witness and the experience of the Institute Summer School of 1962; it becomes more than ever clear to me that our understanding of man turns upon the problem of Reality. If the aim of existence is Self-Realization and if this is identical with God-Realization, then the connecting link that makes them one and the same is to be found in the meaning of the word 'Reality'. If all were equally real, then realization means the process of transformation that leads from the unreality or imperfect reality towards Reality in the fullest sense. The theme of this book is that there are both degrees and distinctive modes of Reality, and that there is a process that leads from the Unreal to the Real. This, in its turn, requires that there should be a means of effecting the transformation. This 'means' is what we call by the name of WORK. In the book there are few references to Work, either in the absolute sense as the process of universal realization, or in the relative sense of personal transformation. This is because those who participated in the discussions started from the premise that Work is a reality in both senses: absolute and relative. We were not concerned to discuss the authenticity of the process of transformation, but to understand it better. The obligation to work for Reality is the Categorical Imperative from which life derives its meaning. It is, as Kant showed in the Grundlage, the ultimate, irreducible, moral certainty from which are derived our notions of God, Immortality and Ethic. I have never been satisfied, nor I believe was Kant himself, with the Critique of Practical Reason. It does not convey the sense of urgency which we experience in contemplating life based on Work and life without Work. I was impelled to write this Epilogue by the impact of a vision or vivid dream that woke me from sleep a few nights ago. I found myself in some remote, antipodean place where people were living ordinary lives. I recognized not a few of them as people I knew or had read about and noticed with a sense of wonder rather than surprise that some were still living and others were dead. They did not notice this difference because in any case they were all ghosts. But they were all aware of being ghosts and wanted to turn into real people. From time to time, an aeroplane arrived with others who joined them and among the new arrivals were both living ghosts and dead ghosts. I was made aware that all was well with these people because eventually they would cease to be ghosts. Then I found myself back again nearer home; but this time I was taken to some kind of underground place. Here also were people more or less happily occupied with their daily lives and some of them were now living and others were dead. These also were ghosts but these ghosts were neither able to distinguish between life and death, nor did they understand that they were no more than ghosts. I knew that I must tell them about their condition and about the other place where ghosts were being transformed into real beings. When I spoke to them of aeroplanes that could take them over, they said that they would go only if an aeroplane would come back and assure them that there was a place for them over there. I remember very clearly explaining that once an aeroplane had gone over, it would never return. This seemed to them illogical and unreasonable and they took no more notice of what I said. Then I found myself in a kind of lift being taken back to the surface. I looked at the lift-man and said to myself, "If I were not colour blind I should see that his face is grey". Somehow, this observation brought home to me the terror of being a ghost and immense pity filled me for these people who had lost the possibility of becoming real. As I began to wake up, I said to myself: "What does it really matter that they are only ghosts? They are good, decent people, living good, decent lives and if they are satisfied with unreality why should they be disturbed? Their ghostly existence is also necessary." At that moment I awakened completely and saw, in a flash, the infinite significance of Work. It is the imperative of all imperatives, the source from which all life takes its meaning, the way to Reality and even Reality itself. Work takes many forms: but all forms have one common character: the Will to Reality. Whether active or passive, whether in solitude or in society, work is always one and the same: it is the dedication of the will to the realization of Reality. This dedication carries with it the obligation to share understanding with others and to serve the Work in its universal significance. That is why those who have seen the difference between ghost-life and real-life are compelled to speak of what they have seen-even to those who do not wish to hear. I am more than ever aware of the imperfections and even the errors in what I have written. I am ashamed to offer it as a "Spiritual Psychology" to those who are seeking for the Reality that is Work. Let it be taken as an essay and an attempt to share an understanding that is still in the process of being born. J.G. Bennett. January, 1964. {Excerpt from "A Spiritual Psychology" by J.G. Bennett} ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bubba Rom Dos "He who shits on the road, will meet flies upon his return." What is InfoWar? InfoWar is the voice that tells you that you can shit on the road, and not meet flies upon your return, if you spray the area with Agent Orange. InfoWar is the voice that tells you that you can spray the area with Agent Orange and not suffer any consequences to your own health, because you don't live here. InfoWar is the voice that tells you the people who do live here are Communists who need to be killed, with the help of Agent Orange, and people who need to be saved from both the Communists and the flies, with the help of Agent Orange. InfoWar is when the evening movie at the PX is 'Clockwork Orange' and your head starts pounding, as a ferocious battle begins between your awakened prenascence and the thundering voice which is screaming, "It is not synchronicityit is only a coincidence." InfoWar is when you can look at a picture of a napalm-burned child and tell by the color of their skin whether or not they are the enemy. I am not arguing for or against this or that battle, this or that war. I am only pointing out that anyone who returns from war the same as when they left for war, or with their sanity completely intact, in need of no healing Well, let me just say that they already live in a Virtual Reality within which the inhabitants of that reality do not realize that they are ghosts. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- InfoWar is when you don't turn on the gasyou only put them in the ovens. InfoWar is when you don't put them in the ovensyou only turn on the gas. InfoWar is when you don't drop the atomic bomb, you only design it. InfoWar is when you have two types of nuclear bombs and you convince yourself that they both need to be dropped, not for testing purposes, but to end the war earlier, and to save lives. InfoWar is going to sleep praying that your Generals and Nuclear Physicists don't wake you in the morning to tell you that they have developed a third type of nuclear bomb, which must be dropped in order to shorten the war and save livesor a fourth, or a fifth. InfoWar is convincing you to develop nuclear software without a backdoor that you can use to prevent it from raining destruction on the innocent, because you are just a programmer, an engineer, a designer, a grunt, and these types of decisions are to be made by those who are trained to know when it is right for millions upon millions of people to die, and for the earth to be scorched beyond repair. InfoWar is convincing you to design surveillance software without a mechanism available to defeat it if it falls into the hands of the Destroyer. InfoWar is thinking that you are an island, and that your island only produces the tools and weapons that can be used for great Good or great Evil-thinking that those on other islands bear the responsibility for how those tools and weapons are used. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- "If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquillity of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains set lightly upon you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." -- Samuel Adams ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Y2K not a 'bug'-it is not a 'design flaw.' It is a collaboration, in preparation for Apple has not collapsed 'in spite of' being Y2K compliant, but 'because' of it. The Congressional IRS investigation is taking place despite the fact that the agency is not doing anything that it hasn't been doing for years and years. When heads roll (out), new heads roll in. The Secret Lab Players are being given leading stage roles, in positions such as at the FBI Crime Lab, in preparation for What was CAMP (Campaign Against Marihuana Production) all about? It was a male bonding ritual between the Federal, State, regional and local law enforcement agencies. It was laying the groundwork to shipping tens of thousands of federal assault rifles to local and regional LEA's in preparation for Full featured scaleable Telemetry systems for power reticulation control and a host of other applications. Exciting innovations in Telemetry Systems. Designed and manufactured to your exact needs. http://www.tora.net/telemetry/telemetry.html, 1873 bytes, 11Aug97 "The average person's views of love are no longer based upon their relationship with each other, but upon what they see on TV." - President of Video Valentine "That site contains no graphics, no photos, no video clips, no audio. Just text. Deal with it." -News of the Weird "The '[ANY]' program cannot be 'fixed,' because it's working precisely as the politicians want it to." -Vin Suprynowicz <vin(a)lvrj.com> Assistant Editorial Page Editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Check the Archives From: Ayn Rand <ar(a)dev.null> To: Tim May <tcmay(a)got.net> Tim May wrote: >There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of laws. Atlas Shrugged wrote: >"You'd better get it straight that it's not a bunch of boy scouts you're >up against -- then you'll know that this is not the age for beautiful >gestures. We're after power and we mean it. Your fellows were pikers, >but we know the real trick, and you'd better get wise to it. There's no >way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power >to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, >one makes them. Once declares so many things to be a crime that it >becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a >nation of law-abiding citizens? What's there in that for anyone? But >just pass the kind of laws that can neither be observed nor enforced nor >objectively interpreted -- and you create a nation of law-breakers---and >then you cash in on guilt. Now that's the system...that's the game, and >once you understand it, you'll be easier to deal with." ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything since the Big Bang has been plagiarism. Will the future plagiarize Hitler or Ghandi? One Free Will, one vote ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- "The Xenix Chainsaw Massacre" "WebWorld & the Mythical Circle of Eunuchs" "InfoWar (Part III of 'The True Story of the InterNet') Soviet Union Sickle of Eunuchs Secret WebSite ----------------------------------------------------------------------------

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InfoWar Epilogue 6 (Part III of 'The True Story of the InterNet')
by Bubba Rom Dos 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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