December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: PGP
by Karl Lui Barrus 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- >About how many calculations does it take to crack a 1024 bit key? If >someone has limitless time, money, etc., they can break it...but how >many calculations does it take? I did some calculations on this a few months ago, and it works out to be on the order of 4.42 10^29 steps. So then you can figure out how much real time it takes given machine speed. I also made some calculations for other sizes - to get the rest of the article gopher to chaos.bsu.edu and look at Misc/"Bits and Factoring Difficulty" where I have been archiving various cypherpunks posts, apparently flying the face of copyright laws blah blah blah blah. Since I wrote that I give permission for it to be at the gopher site ;) >Also, there is a password used to protect the keyrings. Assuming a >strong password how many calculations does that take to break? Well, if it's an 128 bit IDEA password, and brute force is the fastest way to "break" it, then 2^128 = 3.4 10^38. Karl Barrus klbarrus(a)owlnet.rice.edu -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQCVAgUBLU7jtYOA7OpLWtYzAQFV8wQAjugItETGxmxMkXyGN798/9DwUnhpHU7g A7NskB3jBRSFvFJYwp1B/0c80v2I14LjZg1FHU2zlUD2NPza91mSRc0hW4WcY3Sq 2RQjZIUBxz9Fu+4XPEQWT7iFOh+MhGbx60h5QktXDaJaS46QrrsPz2SXaMbdG7iu BiyraoH3mu8= =aMtI -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

1 0

SASE Suggestion
by loki＠nately.UCSD.EDU 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- I have been meditating on this problem of return addresses, and have a proposal. The remailers can not be allowed to choose the return path, as any corrupted remailer will corrupt the rest of the path. I suggest the following SASE packet format. Notation: A(foo) = foo encrypted to remailer A P = some sort of one use postage token. end is a flag indicating the final destination. x,y,z,b are large random integers. n is a large prime. Packet: This will rout reply from A -> B -> C -> Bob A(P,x,B,B(P,y,C,C(P,z,Bob,end))),A(b,n,message) Upon receiving the packet, A does the following: A decrypts the packet (both parts separately). A calculates a new b' = b^x mod n and encrypts B(b',n,message) So B receives B(P,y,C,C(P,z,Bob,end)),B(b',n,message) C receives C(P,z,Bob,end),C(b'',n,message) Analysis: The message, which would normally be encrypted to Bob, is never transmitted in the clear. Bob can easily compute b'' to confirm that the message was correctly routed, but this reveals no information about the path the message has taken. The first remailer will refuse to deliver the message twice, because of the expired postage token, so the same path will not be reused. So, what do you think? It does require some work from the remailers, but not too much more than now. - ---------------------------------------------------------- Lance Cottrell who does not speak for CASS/UCSD loki(a)nately.ucsd.edu PGP 2.3 key available by finger or server. "Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra. Suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night the ice weasels come." --Nietzsche - ---------------------------------------------------------- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQCVAgUBLU7fRFVkk3dax7hlAQH4MgP9HIQPR3esnHbJuELXtCmTGXvQoLHgoA+L OeW1WOM6WczcOEwzFRsto8k2vrTsSMDPAqhTm+Ylgy83x8ez+yquoKmfFqiNQzWY Vcoy7ng/Jgu9i9snIGlsVdq6cpKTS8YKiR3EmnQrbpXetL7cFBZRN4yJ+dadS77q cT2rY82uzw4= =YTIz -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

1 0

Capt'n Kirk and Major Tom... Both lost in space...
by Chris Knight 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I did not consider that a flame war, it was just a bit of banter. You seem to lack both a sense of humor, and the intelligence to discern it in others. As for re-posting personal mail, there is nothing unethical about it. Your vehemence on this point just goes to prove how much you wanted to hide your true personality from those on the net. Since you don't seem to want to end this, I will. Post all you want, personal and private. You have proven beyond a doubt that you have no points of view worth discussing, nothing to be learned, and nothing worth replying to. -ck On Tue, 1 Feb 1994, Kirk Sheppard wrote: > Dear Master Knight, > > You have quickly forgotten the crap about sending valium etc. You started > the flame war then by reading my small post literally and started it > today by making personal insults. This is your habit. My habit is to > respond in kind. Also, the trick of reposting private mail to a list > shows the level of your personal ethics. Quite low from this vantage point. > > Kirk Sheppard > > kshep(a)netcom.com > > P. O. Box 30911 "It is Better to Die on Your Feet Than to > Bethesda, MD 20824-0911 Live On Your Knees." > U.S.A. > - Emiliano Zapata > > > On Tue, 1 Feb 1994, Chris Knight wrote: > > > > > > > On Tue, 1 Feb 1994, Kirk Sheppard wrote: > > > > > This is the second idiotic flame war you have started with me in the last > > > two weeks. > > > > Perhaps you have your mail lists confused. Until only a week ago, I > > was not posting in this echo. Secondly, you started this "war". > > > > > I would never again apologize to you. > > > > There was a first? > > > > > I do take some small pleasure in the fact that you are so lazy that you > > > don't change the subject line when you reply, so on each reply you republish > > > the condition of your being. It gives me a small chuckle each time I read the > > > "truth" of your intellect. > > > > It is truely sad that these are the pleasures in your life. > > > > > > > > > >

1 0

Re: PGP
by Karl Lui Barrus 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- >Brute-forcing IDEA takes about as much computation as factoring >something between a 1200 and 3000 bit RSA key (I've heard both >numbers, but I don't know the numbers). So, in the current >implementation, RSA is the weak link! Yes, I think that the turnaround point is right around 1600 bits, at which IDEA is "easier" than RSA. Assuming of course brute force is the fastest way to break IDEA; the fastest (known|published) factoring method runs in time proportional to the formula I typed out, etc. Karl Barrus klbarrus(a)owlnet.rice.edu -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQCVAgUBLU7l2IOA7OpLWtYzAQE7fwP6A6ENOTE7dUl0gbqEk17NRLPnExCHa2za HEt3LTfbn/0gpTfrwnKUTCKP3TAvnVJJ/cDFxRR1RkaTyHxA0RvQR/b8SosFK2Uc HEY5I5AqNVUKE9TceDXcBnYmmMbZAIMpdMMTknrn3Eyo1kcfLGTfOInH0wM35Rdl /o/sPMmc23s= =S2+w -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

1 0

"bio-radar"?
by HO JUNYA 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

In the current issue of Defense Electronics, the editor talks about some "bio-radar" technology, in the hands of both the US and the Soviet bloc.. Does anyone know more about this, or know where to get more information?

1 0

Re: archiving on inet
by loki＠nately.UCSD.EDU 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

This thread seems way off topic. Lance

1 0

Re: Why is Chris Knight a Twerp?
by jim＠bilbo.suite.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Please take the "archiving mail-list" thread to e-mail. Thank you, Jim_Miller(a)suite.com

1 0

Archiving on inet
by Matthew J Ghio 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Wow, this usenet copyright issue has touched off a pretty heated debate. Let me just make a few points: In most usenet areas, there are no limitations on who may receive the group. By posting to such an area, you imply that you intend your post to be received by an unrestricted audience. This, of course, includes the possibility that some readers of the newsfeed will be reading it in a time-delayed manner, such as a dialup newsfeed over slip, uucp, or other protocol. A CD-ROM is just another form of delayed newsfeed. There are many areas availiable where restrictions are placed upon who may receive the feed. Many mailing lists, such as extropians, have this policy. Anyone receiving that list agrees that they will not redistribute the messages, and that includes selling CD-ROMs. If you have something which you would like to limit the distribution of, there are many forums availiable where the readers consent that they will abide by such a policy. The general readers of usenet have not consented to any such agreement. What offends me is that some hypocritical people would send a message to an area that they know is public domain, and then complain that they didn't want their message distributed. When you post, you should decide weather or not you want it public domain. But don't complain if you change your mind after the fact. I reccomend that everyone who is concerned about the distribution of some document that you wrote, (ie research paper, commentary, etc) post a message in a public forum giving a brief overview, and then state that it is copyrighted, and that anyone who agrees to respect your terms of non-distribution should send you email and that you will send them a copy. This also allows you to place an expiration time limit on it, so that someone won't find it reading outdated usenet news. To continue Lefty's cable TV analogy: A cable TV company can charge you a fee for assisting you in receiving a publicly availiable signal. However, they do not have copyright on that signal - they can't stop you from buying your own antenna, nor can they stop a competing cable company (if the municipality allows it). The cable company is selling you their assistance in receiving a publicly availiable signal. They do not own that signal or the copyright to it. They are merely a common carrier of the communication. In the same way, internet service companies like netcom are merely providing a service which aids you in receiving a publicly availiable signal. Selling the netnews feed either on a CD-ROM is no different. They are not selling the posts - they are selling their communications services which allow you to receive it. They have no copyright on the posts. They are NOT SELLING COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL - they are SELLING A COMMUNICATIONS SERVICE. If a TV station was to take the broadcast of a competing station, add their own commercials etc, and rebroadcasts it, then we have copyright infringement. They are taking someone else's material and using it for their own benefit - here we have copyright infringement. The cable company does not do this - they are simply distributing the signal unaltered, commercial advertisements and all. In the same way, if someone is selling complete, unaltered archives of usenet, it is a communication service. If they're taking posts, modifying for their own purposes, and selling at a profit, we have the possibility of copyright infringement. I hope you all understand the difference.

1 0

Cypherpunk article in NY
by Duncan Frissell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Life in Cyberspace - Joshua Quittner New York Newsday - Page 59 Tuesday, 01 February 1994 CODING UP A BIT OF PRIVACY MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. This must be how the Founding Fathers looked when they hacked out the Constitution : A roomful of young men, mostly--frazzled hair, eager eyes, wild beards, arms flailing and fingers jabbing in air, reaching for big ideas. You can't help but feel it; urgency tempers their voices. The earnest men plan and argue in this corporate conference room as the last sun rays of a winter Saturday afternoon fade in through a skylight. Time is running out for the Cypherpunks. There is much work to be done before the information highway arrives. The information highway --- that 500-channel shopping mall/cineplex championed by cable and telephone companies --- is a noxious concept to the people in this room. They are not technophobes or Luddites, these Cypherpunks, Instead, they are a collection of clever computer programmers, engineers and wire heads from some of the nation's best-known Silicon Valley software houses and hardware shops. This is their central question: In a future world where all information is centralized on a network, where all information is tracked by the bit, where every purchase you make and every communication can be monitored by corporate America, how does privacy survive? If you go to the bookstore now and buy a book, you can pay in cash. No one knows your name or what you purchased. "What happens to cash transactions on the information highway?" they ask. The Cypherpunks believe that they can preserve your privacy through good cyphers, or codes. But they must hurry, must get their codes out and their networks up and running. "The whole information highway thing is now part of the public eye," explain Eric Hughes, a founder of the Cypherpunk movement. "If we don't change it now, it'll be impossible later." The Cypherpunks know what technology is capable of. We visit them today because they represent one edge of the national debate on the structure of the information highway. And as we all know, extreme positions help define the middle. Many of the Cypherpunks have been heavy Internet users for years and hope to preserve the communal spirit of that freewheeling world of interconnected computer networks. They dread the coming commercial network of televisions and computers, saying it will displace the Internet and destroy many of the freedoms they now enjoy. So the Cypherpunks, with the kind of zeal they professionally bring to marathon, 72-hour sessions hacking computer code, are plotting to keep free networks alive. That's "free" in the sense of unfettered, unmonitored, uncensored. One way they're going about it is by spreading easy-to-use, cheap cryptography. Cryptography is the science of keeping two-way communication private. Computers, it turns out, are revolutionary cryptographic tools, able to encode and decode files quickly. For the first time, virtually unbreakable codes are now possible, thanks to computers. The Cypherpunks post cryptographic software on the Internet where anyone can access it, and can encode their communications, including electronic mail, pictures and video. The the U.S. government is concerned, as governments always are, about the spread of powerful cryptography (terrorists could use it, kidnappers could use it, drug dealers could use it, all of them on cellular phones that encode conversations). It currently is pushing its own commercial cryptographic standard, through a special chip known as the Clipper. The chip is reviled by Cypherpunks and other civil libertarians because it provides a back door that law-enforcement agencies could enter, with the proper warrants, for surveillance. By getting good, unbreakable cryptography out there now, the Cypherpunks hope, whatever the government finally decides will be moot. Software has a wonderful property, the Cypherpunks are fond of saying: Once it's created, it can never be destroyed. It can be copied infinitely, from computer to computer, spreading like a secret. Come what may, unbreakable Cypherpunk code, and Cypherpunk networks, will be out there forever, they hope. But just to be safe, the Cypherpunks are toying with different network-related plans to create an economy of "digicash" --- network money that, like the dollars in your pocket, isn't tied to a user's credit cards or other personal identification. Digicash will help pay for Cypherpunk networks and will allow people to purchase goods without revealing their identity. "I'm starting a bank, and it's not going to be a U.S. bank," Hughes says. He standing at the whiteboard now. A strawberry-blond ponytail dangles down his back and he grasps a magic marker in his hand. "We have several long-term strategies, one of which is the elimination of central banks." He tells the assembled crowd what they already know. Heads nod. Some people take notes. Hughes is a self-employed programmer in Berkeley. His hand flies across the whiteboard, sketching out a schematic diagram, showing how his bank will operate. The bank will store depositors' money (he's thinking a $200 minimum deposit) and disburse payments to anyone --- all over the Internet. It will be based abroad, maybe in Mexico. A Cypherpunk network bank is one way to pay for a network of truly encrypted, private communications, you see. "Is this going to lead the way to portable laptop ATM machines?" someone else asks. "First Bank of Cyberspace!" yells one person. "First Internet bank!" yells another. "The Nth National Bank!" Laughter. Billy goat beards bob. There is much work to be done. ******************************* Net Tips If you have e-mail access to the Internet, you can subscribe free to the Cypherpunks mailing list, which circulates to about 750 people daily. Send an e-mail message to: cypherpunks-request(a)toad.com with the word " Subscribe" and your name in body of message. More information about cryptography, as well as cryptographic software, can be obtained over the Internet by ftp'ing to: ftp.soda.berkeley.edu ******************************** Thanks to Lois for entering this article. --- WinQwk 2.0b#1165

1 0

Re: SASE Suggestion
by jim＠bilbo.suite.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Lance Cottrell writes: > I have been meditating on this problem of return > addresses, and have a proposal. The remailers > can not be allowed to choose the return path, > as any corrupted remailer will corrupt the rest > of the path. As I understand it, the remailers don't "chose" the return path, Bob (the sender of the original message) choses the return path when he creates the SASE. All the remailers do is interpret the part of the SASE that becomes readable to them after decrypting the SASE portion sent to them from the previous hop. If all is working, what becomes readable is the address of the next hop (closer to Bob) and some misc other stuff (postage, maybe, and perhaps another encryption key). Am I not understanding something correctly? Jim_Miller(a)suite.com

1 0