December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: digicash
by hfinney＠shell.portal.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The point is not that B. Dolan's proposed cash is bad, it is that better systems exist. Chaum's blinded c{sh is simiXoar to Dolan's proposal, but with the added feature that the "passwords" that~r authorize access to the bank account can be altered by the users so that the bank does not recognize them later, while still allowing the bank to verify that the "passwords" are valid. This eliminates the trackability allowed by Dolan's proposal. (Sorry about the line noise!{ Hal

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Re: Anarchy Gone Awry (fwd)
by Black Unicorn 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

This post is a perfect example why the two lists should be kept seperate and not merged. This sounds to me like it belongs on alt.politics.data- highway. -uni- (dark)

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ANNOUNCEMENT: Markey Bill (HR3636) Available Online from EFF
by Stanton McCandlish 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

HR3636, The Markey Bill, is now available online at the Electronic Frontier Foundation's ftp archive. FTP to ftp.eff.org, and get the text file ~pub/eff/legislation/hr3636 (aka ~pub/eff/legislation/markey.bil). ****** Info on the bill ****** On Monday, November 22, 1993, EFF applauded House Telecommunications and Finance Subcommittee Chairman Edward Markey (D-Mass.), Minority Chairman Jack Fields (R-Tex.), and other cosponsors for introducing the "National Communications Competition and Information Infrastructure Act of 1993." The Markey/Fields legislation, which incorporates EFF's Open Platform philosophy, is built on three concepts: open platform services, the entry of telephone companies into video cable service, and universal service. Reacting to the open platform provisions, Mitchell Kapor, EFF Board Chairman, stated: "The sponsors of this bill are to be commended for proposing legislation that incorporates a truly democratic vision of the emerging data highway. Open platform service can end channel scarcity once and for all and make it possible for any information provider to offer voice, data, and video services on the data highway. Every citizen will be able to access a true diversity of information and programming." EFF Executive Director Jerry Berman added that "we believe public interest and nonprofit groups, as well as computer and communications industry leaders will work very hard for the open platform provisions. Our goal is to keep them in the bill and make them even stronger before its enactment." AN EFF ANALYSIS OF THE IMPACT OF THE BILL ON PUBLIC INTEREST GOALS OF UNIVERSAL SERVICE, COMMON CARRIAGE, AND CONSUMER EQUITY WILL BE RELEASED AS SOON AS IT IS COMPLETED. For an initial brief analysis (previously posted to comp.org.eff.talk and elsewhere) see ftp.eff.org, ~pub/eff/legislation/announce.mky See also ftp.eff.org or gopher.eff.org, ~pub/eff/papers/op2.0 and ~pub/eff/papers/open-platform* for more information on EFF's Open Platform initiative. See ~pub/eff/legislation/markey.bil for the full text of the Markey Bill.

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on initial rejection of claims of RSA patent
by henry strickland 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Diffie, via "L.": # No. But after all, the RSA patent was filed from MIT by people # (R, S, and A) that I didn't know well till much later. There may have # been some hankey pankey I didn't know about, but I certainly don't # recall the New York Times article you refer to. The statement that # ``They just got the application back rejected.'' Doesn't sound right # to me. I presume that the Patent Office has to state why an # application is returned. It's decisions, after all, are a constant All four of the PKP patents mentioned in RFC1423, Cryptographic Apparatus and Method ("Diffie-Hellman")............................... No. 4,200,770 Public Key Cryptographic Apparatus and Method ("Hellman-Merkle").................... No. 4,218,582 Cryptographic Communications System and Method ("RSA")................................... No. 4,405,829 Exponential Cryptographic Apparatus and Method ("Hellman-Pohlig").................... No. 4,424,414 had all of their claims either "rejected" or "objected to" on the first pass by the patent examiner. I have been told this is not unusual. The patent examiner gave reasonable technical reasons whe he rejected them. Nothing looks fishy to me, that is part of the record. I have a copy of [almost all of] the "full wrappers" on these four patents, and am making them available to the CA cypherpunks (CA, because I live here). (They're not online, there's a lot of handwritten pages & annotations & forms that would not OCR, and it's a 6" stack of legal paper, so it's not easy for me to provide them online, sorry.) strick

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NIST Meeting Dec 8-9
by Dave Banisar 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

NIST Meeting Dec 8-9 NIST Computer System Security and Privacy Advisory Board Meeting December 8-9, 1993 Hyatt Regency Reston 1800 President's Street Reston, VA >From 495, take Dulles Access Road (toll road) to Reston Parkway, Turn right on parkway, Hotel is on left by new town center. Draft Agenda December 8, 1993 I Welcome 9:00 Opening Remarks - Lynn McNulty 9:10 Chairman's Remarks - Dr. Willis Ware II. Unclassified Government Cryptography Activities 9:15 National Research Council Cryptographic Study Marjorie Blumenthal, NRC 9:45 GAO Report on Cryptography Policy, Harold Podell 10:15 Break 10:30 Status of NIST Cryptographic Standards Activities, Miles Smid 11:00 DSS Infrastructure Briefing, McNulty & Mitre Rep. 11:30 Key Escrow Update 12:00 Lunch III. Emerging NII Technologies 1:30 Jim Flyzik, Director, Telecommunications Management, Treasury Dept. 2:30 Organizing for the NII and GII - Bruce McConnell, OMB 3:00 NIST's Role - Jim Burrows, NIST IV Electronic Commerce 4:00 Electronic Commerce Initiative - Steve Trus 5:00 Recess December 9 V. MOSIAC 9:00 MOSIAC Briefing - DoD Program for Protection of Unclassified Data in the DMS - John Nagangast, NSA VI Common Criteria 9:45 Common Criteria Update - Dr. Stu Katzka 10:15 Break VII NIST Security Program Plan 10:30 NIST Security Plan for FY-94 - Dr. Stu Katzke 11:00 Disussion VIII Telecommunications Security 11:30 Telecommunucations Switch Vulnerability Analysis, Rick Kuhn 12:00 Lunch IX Workplace Privacy Bill 1:30 S-984 - Privacy for Consumers and Workers Act, Kristina Zahorik Legislative Assistant, Senate Employment and Productivity Subcommittee 2:00 Discussion X CSSPAB Workplan 2:30 Draft CY-1994 Workplan - Presentation and Discussion CSSPAB Working Group XI Public Participation 3:00 Public Participation XII Close 3:30 March Meeting - Agenda Ideas 3:45 Adjourn

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Re: W.Diffie on RSA patent
by smb＠research.att.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I thought this was all documented in the NYT. Does anyone have the article? Anyway, Mr.Diffie says (see below) that nothing sinister happened at the patent office regarding the RSA patent. I would like to hear of any other patents that were suppressed by the NSA hiding behind the patent office. I mean, this professor was definitely not making up a story! She gave me the NYT reference but I think I accidentally threw out the paper I wrote it on. Does anyone have the reference? I think it happened in '78. It sounds like you're talking about the Davida patent, or maybe the zero-knowledge proof patent. Here's the basic story. U.S. patent law contains a provision for ``secrecy orders''. That is, when you apply for a patent in certain sensitive areas -- and cryptography is one of them -- the application is routed to the appropriate government agencies, including NSA. If they think the invention is too good, you'll receive a notice saying that you not only can't get a patent, you're not even allowed to discuss it anymore. George Davida -- a professor -- was hit with just such an order. Eventually, it was lifted, after a lot of public protest. NSA tried claiming that the patent application proved that the issue was commercial, rather than pure free speech, but they didn't try to fight it. More recently, Shamir received a secrecy order on his zero-knowledge proof patent. This was even more insane than usual, since (a) Shamir is not a U.S. citizen, and (b) he'd already been discussing the idea at conferences world-wide. According to rumor, this order was imposed by the Army, and was lifted through NSA's intervention. I know that the Shamir story was in the NY Times, though I don't have the citation. A pointer in my files is: journal name: Notices of the American Mathematical Society journal date: Jan 88 volume/number: 35, 1 article title: Zero Knowledge and the Department of Defense author(s) name: Susan Landau page number: 5-12 but I don't have the article handy. The Davida story was probably in the Times as well; my summary of it is taken from ``Cryptology Goes Public'', by David Kahn, in ``Kahn on Codes'', 1983. The article originally appeared in the Fall 1979 issue of ``Foreign Affairs''.

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Information
by STERLING D. TATE 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Information on mailing list. Cypherpunk-info(a)toad.com

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ANNOUNCEMENT: DPSWG Crypto-Policy Statement to White House
by Stanton McCandlish 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

NOTICE: This is the letter from the Digital Privacy and Security Working Group sent to the White House 12/06/93, urging the Administration to lift export controls on DES, RSA and other mass market encryption without requring legislation. Some erroneous press reports have said the DPSWG (see letter signatories) were making a Clipper/Skipjack "deal". This is not true. The letter makes it clear that Clipper as originally proposed is not viable, and that in any form it is to be implemented only if it's use is completely voluntary and ONLY if current restrictions on mass market encryption software are removed, so that the right to choose one's own methods of privacy and security is retained, and American businesses can effectively and openly compete in the expanding international market for encryption products. For more details please see the third paragraph of the letter, below. - ----------------------------------------------------------------------- DIGITAL PRIVACY AND SECURITY WORKING GROUP 1001 G Street, NW Suite 950 East Washington, DC 20001 Jerry Berman 202/347-5400 Leah Gurowitz 202/393-1010 December 6, 1993 The President The White House Washington, DC 20500 Dear Mr. President: On April 16, 1993, you initiated a broad industry/government review of privacy and cryptography policies at the same time that the Administration unveiled its Clipper Chip proposal. The Digital Privacy and Security Working Group -- a coalition of over 50 communications and computer companies and associations, and consumer and privacy advocates -- has been working with members of your Administration to develop policies which will reflect the realities of the digital information age, the need to provide individuals at work and home with information security and privacy, and the importance of preserving American competitiveness. The Digital Privacy and Security Working Group is committed to the proposition that computer users worldwide should be able to choose their encryption programs and products, and that American programs and products should be allowed to compete in the world marketplace. In our discussions with Administration officials, we have expressed the Coalition's tentative acceptance of the Clipper Chip's encryption scheme (as announced on April 16, 1993), but only if it is available as a voluntary alternative to widely-available, commercially-accepted, encryption programs and products. Thus, we applaud repeated statements by Administration officials that there is no intent to make the Clipper Chip mandatory. One key indication of whether the choice of encryption regimes will be truly voluntary, however, is the ability of American companies to export computer programs and products employing other strong encryption algorithms (e.g. DES and RC2/RC4 at comparable strengths) demanded by customers worldwide. In this regard, we commend to your attention legislation introduced by Rep. Maria Cantwell (H.R. 3627) that would liberalize existing export controls on software with encryption capabilities. Of course, such legislation would not be necessary if the Administration acts to accomplish such export control liberalization on its own. As part of your on-going encryption review and decision-making, we strongly urge you to do so. As your Administration concludes its review of this issue, representatives of the Digital Privacy and Security Working Group remain available to meet with Administration officials at any time. Sincerely, American Civil Liberties Union IBM Apple Computer, Inc. Information Industry Association Business Software Alliance Information Technology Association of America Committee on Communications and Information Policy, IEEE-USA Iris Associates, Inc. Computer and Business Equipment Lotus Development Corporation Manufacturers Association Microsoft Corporation Crest Industries, Inc. Oracle Corporation Digital Equipment Corporation Prodigy Services Company EDUCOM Software Publishers Association Electronic Frontier Foundation Sun Microsystems, Inc. Electronic Messaging Association Telecommunications Industry Association GKI Cryptek Division Trusted Information Systems Hewlett-Packard Company cc: John Podesta, Office of the President George Tenet, National Security Council Mike Nelson, Office of Science and Technology Policy Ray Kammer, National Institute of Standards and Technology Steve Aoki, National Security Council Geoff Greiveldinger, Department of Justice - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This document and others on related topics are archived at ftp.eff.org, ~ftp/pub/eff/crypto-policy.

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Re: ANNOUNCEMENT: DPSWG Crypto-Policy Statement to White House
by jim＠bilbo.suite.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Stanton McCandlish writes: > NOTICE: This is the letter from the Digital Privacy and > Security Working Group sent to the White House 12/06/93, > urging the Administration to lift export controls on > DES, RSA and other mass market encryption without ^^^^^^^^^^ ?? > requring legislation. > Why only "mass market" encryption? The company I work for is developing a collection of runtime libraries and utilities which software developers can use to create and manage portable object-oriented distributed applications. Think of it as a object-oriented DCE-like tool set with a run-time environment and system administration utilites. Our customers are primarily large corporations, although it would be useful to small shops, too. We have communication software that can perform encryption of user data, but the current export laws prevent us from placing this capability in versions for our foreign customers. <sigh> We have to maintain two distinct versions of our product: a domestic version and and foreign version. Since we target other software developers, I don't believe our product qualifies as "mass market" software. At least, this is my interpretation of the definition of "as is" in the Cantwell bill: > For example, generally available software is offered > for sale or licensed to the public without restriction > and available through standard commercial channels of > distribution; sold as is without further > customization; and designed to be installed by the > purchaser without additional assistance from the > publisher. Computer hardware and computing devices are > also defined. > . > . > . > 15 ``(4) DEFINITIONS.---As used in this > 16 subsection--- > > 1 ``(B) the term `as is' means, in the case of > 2 software (including software with encryption ca- > 3 pabilities), a software program that is not de- > 4 signed, developed, or tailored by the software > 5 company for specific purchasers, except that > 6 such purchasers may supply certain installation > 7 parameters needed by the software program to > 8 function properly with the purchaser's system > 9 and may customize the software program by > 10 choosing among options contained in the soft- > 11 ware program; > > Although we don't make custom versions of our software for specific customers, our software, due to its nature, is highly customizable by the purchaser. Neither the Cantwell bill, nor the DPSWG letter mentions this type of software product. As I see it, the main distinction between "mass market" software and our software is that our software is used to create other software, whereas "mass market" software implies final product "end-user" software. My question to the DPSWG (and US Rep. Maria Cantwell, if I could e-mail her) is: Why only "mass market" software? Or put another way: Does the DPSWG want the government to keep export controls in place for the type of product our company is developing? Thanks, Jim_Miller(a)suite.com

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what was that fast integer math board?
by peb＠PROCASE.COM 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I lost the mail about the fast integer math board for a PC (the ~$1100 DSP chip based one). I'd like to forward that to another list and haven't found it by searching for DSP, etc.). Please email me a copy. Paul E. Baclace peb(a)procase.com

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