December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

IDEA vs DES
by Phil Karn 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Now that I've got DES running about as fast as it can go on the 486, I did a little analysis on IDEA. The algorithm is definitely more straightforward to implement than DES, but not necessarily that much faster. It uses three primitive operations, all on 16-bit quantities: XOR, ADD and multiplication modulo 65537. Each encryption involves 48 XORs, 34 adds and 34 multiplies, plus a few exchanges. The multiplies are a problem. On the 486, a 16x16 integer multiply takes from 13-26 clocks, depending on how many significant bits there are in the multiplicand. Random data usually has 15-16 significant bits, so this distribution is probably weighted more toward the 26 clock figure. So I count an optimistic total of 990 clocks per 64-bit encryption, assuming plenty of registers (which I don't have), not counting the modular reduction steps for each multiply, and ignoring the memory references for the subkeys. I figure my DES code is currently taking about 1300 clocks per encryption. So IDEA won't be much faster, though it may be more secure. Anybody know the speed of the integer multiply instruction on the various PowerPC chips? Along with modular exponentiation and vocoders, which also do a lot of multiplies, it looks like fast multiplication is becoming rather important in secure communications. Phil

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RE: Keepers of the keys
by jay holovacs 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Aside from the privacy principle arguments, there is the very same logistics problem, securely keeping hundreds of millions of keys, fully up to date (many people and operations change keys every day or week) sufficiently secure as to be tamper-ptoof yet sufficently accessible to retrieve in 2-3 hrs as required by LEAs. They can't even keep much smaller amounts of INS info without major screw-ups. Interestingly, there is a special federal court which authorizes wire taps on foreign 'national security' targets. No request has ever been turned down. The only way to keep keys secure in the long run is to let the owners be responsible for their own security. ****************************************************** Jay Holovacs holovacs(a)idt.net PGP Annoy Big Brother -- use PGP ". . . one of the most difficult problems confronting law enforcement as the next century approaches" FBI Director Freeh ****************** ========================== >From: Declan McCullagh <declan(a)well.com> >From: Joe Shea <joeshea(a)netcom.com> >To: Declan McCullagh <declan(a)well.com> >Cc: fight-censorship-announce(a)vorlon.mit.edu >Subject: Re: FC: Brookings Inst. on crypto: "There are reasonable compromises" > > Declan, what would you think if the actual keepers of the keys, >so to speak, were the courts, such as the Administratoive Office of the >US Courts? That would at least seem to reduce a lot of the possible >privacy concerns. One has the sense that once they get into the hands of >the varius agencies, they'll get back out. >

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Re: e$
by Perry E. Metzger 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Jim Dixon says: > In message <9408091402.AA23089(a)snark.imsi.com> perry(a)imsi.com writes: > > > point. The US government does not object to the use of financial > > > instruments so long as they are backed by the US $ (or another > > > accepted currency). > > > > Yes it does. Bearer bonds are illegal in the US. > > Perhaps my use of terms was insufficiently precise. Bearer bonds do not > actually represent money in the same sense that a check does. Perhaps you don't actually know what it is that you are trying to say? > If A writes a check to 'cash', pays B with it, and B passes it on to > C, and so forth, are you saying that this is or will one day be illegal? If the check is written to "cash" and is used to avoid federal transfer reporting requirements, it is CURRENTLY illegal. I suspect that checks made out to "cash" would be illegal in all cases if they were widely used to avoid reporting requirements. Perry

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Offline reading
by Adam Shostack 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I just finished (last night) Guns of the South, by Harry Turtledove. Before that I read Out of Control by Kevin Kelly. Both were recommended by folks on this list, and both were very good. Does anyone else care to share thoughts on books they're read recently? I'm looking for anything interesting. Also, could anyone recommend a good intro to F.A. Hayek's work? (in or out of print; Boston has many good used bookstores.) Adam -- Adam Shostack adam(a)bwh.harvard.edu Politics. From the greek "poly," meaning many, and ticks, a small, annoying bloodsucker.

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Re: No more NSA supra-computer?
by pcw＠access.digex.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>Yesterday I was talking with a friend, and the subject of supercomputers >came up. Naturally, I mentioned the NSA 7000 Y-MP equivalent and Gunter >Ahrendt's list of supercomputers worldwide (finger >gunter(a)yarrow.wt.uwa.edu.au) My friend sent me a note this morning saying >that he couldn't find that machine on Gunter's list; sure enough, it's been >removed. > My guess, and this is only a guess, is that it disappeared for "security" reasons. They have a habit of keeping the smallest bit of light from emerging. For instance, no one knows the "Black" part of the budget. It's classified. But you can take the total budget amount and subtract the non-Black section and get the result. They make you do the math.

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No Subject
by nobody＠REPLAY.COM 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

TruthMonger <tm(a)dev.null> wrote: >Joe Shea wrote: >> On the other hand, >> if someone's going to blow up San Francisco this week, it sure would help >> to have a key to any encrypted communications he was generating. > > Yeah, sure. I use an escrowed key to communicate about all of my >criminal activities, and I send the FBI a cc: on all of them. > It sure would help if LEA's all had access to the American Reporter's >files so that they could censor any writing that might encite someone to >blow up San Franciso. > Why don't you send them all of your writing for approval, Joe? If all >the people in favor of key escrow would allow the government total >access >to all of their communications, then the drop in crime would more than >make up for that commited by those who use encryption. > > If you can't afford to buy a clue, Joe, then try renting. It seems that Mr. Shea is still a bit wet behind the ears when it comes to understanding how the world really works. Listen up, Joe. You might learn something here: As TruthMonger correctly points out, no terrorist is going to use an escrowed key to encrypt info about his activities. At least not as his only source of encryption. He may first encrypt the message with one or more non-GAK keys and then use the GAK key for the final layer, to make the message look legit (i.e., "government approved") to anyone who may be analyzing the contents of email traffic, looking for "unapproved crypto." Therefore, if someone is plotting to blow up San Francisco, GAK will be of no help in preventing it. Now the LEAs are not stupid. They realize this fact. Then why are they so adamant about implementing GAK when it will do absolutely nothing to prevent the very things (i.e., terrorism, child porn, [crime du jour]) it is supposedly meant to counter? Because terrorism, etc. are not the reasons they are pushing for GAK. The real reason is control: control over the citizenry. You see, Joe, the LEAs have seen the future, and it has scared them shitless. They see a world filled with ubiquitous privacy via strong encryption, privately-issued digital cash which transcends national borders and the taxman, and a digital world completely beyond their control. The powermonger's worst nightmare is to lose his power. He will do anything he can to maintain it. If GAK is slowly, but surely implemented over the next few years, maybe, just maybe, the powermongers will be able to maintain control. Or at least that's what they hope. If not, then the self-righteous moralist will lie awake at night in frustration knowing that somewhere in the world, someone is getting off to a .jpg image of child porn, even though that image was generated digitally without actually causing harm to any children. The DC politicos will be outraged that Americans are systematically moving their money offshore (via digital cash), out of the clutches of the IRS. The media thought police will not be able to control the flow of information around the world, thus exposing the lies that they attempt to propogate as "truth." Now, Joe, perhaps you are the kind of person that thinks dodging the taxman is wrong? Perhaps you think the government has the right to force its citizenry to pay for things like nuclear warheads, abortion clinics, or bribes to line the pockets of Third World banana republic dictators? I hope you are more intelligent than that, Joe. You see, it's all very simple, but we humans tend to complicate things needlessly. The fundamental question is whether or not we have the right to tell others what to do. If I was to stick my hand in your pocket, pull out your wallet, and give all your money to a beggar on the street, you'd probably have me arrested. And you would be completely right in doing so, because I unjustly took what didn't belong to me. But this is exactly what the government does to us every day. They force us ("voluntary compliance") to cough up a chunk of earnings to pay for their ridiculousness. If we don't pay, they levy our bank accounts or seize our assets, all under the guise of "law." The point is this: nobody has the right to tell me what to do. No single person, nor a group of politicians claiming to represent "my best interests" has the right to force me to do anything. I have the inherent (some call it God-given) right to live my life free from oppression. If you choose to submit yourself to the slavery of another man, that's your business. But you do not have the right to submit me to the same. Anyone who believes that government has certain "rights" that an individual does not have is severely flawed in their logic. In fact, that person is simply an oppressor at heart. If you think the government has the "right" to stick its hand in my pocket to fulfill what you perceive to be "good", then you knowingly support oppression. If you think government has the "right" to punish others who do not agree with your subjective moral code, then you are an oppressor. So what are you, Joe? Are you an oppressor or not? It's a yes or no answer. There is no middle ground. If you think there is middle ground, it only shows that you sympathize with the oppressors, and therefore are one of them deep down inside. Yours Truly, Freddy Bastiat

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That NYT article...
by L. Todd Masco 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

We're talking to the author -- FWIW, he'll be printing a retraction. Off to HOPE. -- L. Todd Masco | Bibliobytes books on computer, on any UNIX host with e-mail cactus(a)bb.com | "Information wants to be free, but authors want to be paid."

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WWW> ANNOUNCE: PGP Encrypted Mosaic Sessions for Purchases (fwd)
by Robert A. Hayden 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Forwarded from Net-Happenings... ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 12 Aug 1994 10:23:58 -0400 SENDER: Guy H. T. Haskin <guy(a)netmarket.com> Subject: WWW> ANNOUNCE: PGP Encrypted Mosaic Sessions for Purchases -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- The NetMarket Company is now offering PGP-encrypted Mosaic sessions for securely transmitting credit card information over the Internet. Peter Lewis wrote an article on NetMarket on page D1 of today's New York Times (8/12/94). For more information on NetMarket, connect to http://www.netmarket.com/ or, telnet netmarket.com There is no charge to browse around the service and no charge to set up an account. The NetMarket Company is currently offering CDs from Noteworthy Music and flowers from 800-THE-ROSE. If you do not have access to a PGP-capable version of X Mosaic, NetMarket also allows accounts to be set-up toll-free by calling 800-867-3777 or by sending PGP encrypted e-mail to pgp(a)netmarket.com. NetMarket was able to offer this service because Phil Zimmerman's PGP is now free and available for personal use and because support for encryption functions had been added to the recent versions of X Mosaic software from the NCSA. NetMarket has secured a commercial license for PGP, configured our server to allow encrypted transactions and provided directions for configuring X Mosaic and exchanging public keys. For more information on NetMarket, please e-mail or finger info(a)netmarket.com or use the automated comments page after connecting to our server. NetMarket's public key is available by fingering pgp(a)netmarket.com and on our WWW server. - -- guy(a)netmarket.com (Guy H. T. Haskin)| Noteworthy Music on the Internet The NetMarket Company | Multimedia interface to 17,000+ CDs www: http://www.netmarket.com/ | finger/email: info(a)netmarket.com ftp/telnet/gopher: netmarket.com | voice:603-881-3777 fax:603-881-3776 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.7 iQCVAgUBLkuCw8ov4aYyIJbZAQFcuAP+O4LTod9047nKuubRtVeH/kwcp/0At4To 3C5cee6jUb/2ETzavoDyRz3X4edsMzOgCtvBtmMB1tuqqBSMs0xh0eXnUiQ6oRTI JSu9Z/UmIBofUPC5lGd9gyoMjVJaVv41R8SMI1R9XD9WBFwlyrAifimiLo6zs4ML tqnXeAJ4F54= =jBCt -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: Bug in PgP2.6???
by Jeff Gostin 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Ben.Goren(a)asu.edu writes: > The EFF has sold us out, and this is making MIT look rather unprofessional. Wild conspiracy theories aside for the moment, I back MIT on this one. People are only beginning to get clued in as to what version the current version is. Releasing a new version at this point, IMHO, would be a MAJOR headache. If you've ever worked for a software company, and tried to deal with the maintenance-version-of-the-day, you'll understand where I'm coming from. OTOH, guys [Hey you! MIT!], if it's an easy bug to fix, at least post a SOURCE PATCH. --Jeff -- ====== ====== +----------------jgostin(a)eternal.pha.pa.us----------------+ == == | The new, improved, environmentally safe, bigger, better,| == == -= | faster, hypo-allergenic, AND politically correct .sig. | ==== ====== | Now with a new fresh lemon scent! | PGP Key Available +---------------------------------------------------------+

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appropriate laptop
by Loren Fleckenstein 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Advice, please: I plan on purchasing notebook PCs for myself and colleagues to that are capable of running much-awaited Phil Zimmermann's voice encryption program. I'll probably get something based on the 486 DX2 chip. What type of sound card must these computers be capable of accepting in order to run the encryptor?

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