December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Anonymity in Donating
by L. McCarthy 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- - -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Some nice examples of the preservation of anonymity in charitable donations, both for the donor and for the recipient, caught my attention today. An article by Clare Ulrich in the December 1994 Communique (Vol.18 No.3), published by The Cornell Campaign, pays tribute to an anonymous donor to Cornell U.: "While some acts of generosity are marked by a name on a building or a plaque on a wall, others, so to speak, can be counted among the philanthropic `whodunits.' These are the anonymous gifts, and Communique would like to profile several innovative projects that one anonymous donor helped launch this year. According to the donor, anonymity provides greater freedom to `pick and choose' projects that are personally interesting. This donor is particularly attracted to programs that involve computer technology or promise to generate benefits beyond the scope of the immediate project. [...] The same donor who declined recognition for these high-tech projects also provided support for 24 high school juniors from Boys Harbor in Harlem to attend the six-week Cornell Summer College Program in 1994, as well as the two previous summers. [...] Although this anonymous donor may not be interested in getting a name on something, he certainly leaves an indelible mark on the quality of education at Cornell." Closer to home, our dept. chair Dave Stemple broadcast a request for donations to an anonymous recipient: "One of our undergrad majors lived in Amherst Crossings, which burned down last week. As a result this student, a senior who had planned to graduate this spring, is destitute and needs help or he will be unable to complete his degree. If you would like, you can contribute clothes or money (cash only please in order to maintain the student's anonymity) to him. [...]" Incidentally, I received my B&W C'punks shirt from Kevin Prigge a few weeks ago, and consider myself a very satisfied customer. I made a point of wearing it on the flights both ways for a recent vacation I took in California. On the return trip, I was delayed at O'Hare for over an hour due to a leaky window on the airplane. A man in his 50s or 60s approached me and asked, with a smirk, what a Cypherpunk was. I explained a bit, mentioning the passage of the DT bill. Noting the mention of the NSA on the shirt, the man mentioned that his son is working at Apple "with the NSA".... -L. Futplex McCarthy; PGP key by finger or server "The objective is for us to get those conversations whether they're by an alligator clip or ones and zeroes. Wherever they are, whatever they are, I need them." -FBI Dir. Freeh - -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.1 iQCVAwUBLwyA6mf7YYibNzjpAQFENAQA09JTWr501ZJliFWK4efY8py2OhgBq8gy rqYvrGX+EZ49Uq+IDU2DjiiPBHuYPOE23wb/QfouhmKaSSUMqifYTd+uau247Cot CC+CYceBvH3oK35oTr7CahSqb4JLUNs4atOkoYtpbYPG5qrR8yJkAGBKbVzQZHKt ioUFB5xhYKA= =QD4b - -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- - --- [This message has been signed by an auto-signing service. A valid signature means only that it has been received at the address corresponding to the signature and forwarded.] -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 Comment: Gratis auto-signing service iQBFAwUBLwyB+CoZzwIn1bdtAQEgkAF+OBkRShMO+Et/Kr8AkPXPz564xgNnhzfP WPSO0W0UCpkg/e7bQIliMCXiyzp7nHQr =1IBd -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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RSADSI Conference - Extra Passes?
by chen＠intuit.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

A cohort of mine is in need of a pass to next week's RSADSI conference, which, unfortunately, is sold out. So if anyone has a pass that they're not planning to use for a half-day or so, please drop me an e-mail and I will be in your debt. Thanks! -- Mark Chen chen(a)intuit.com 415/329-6913 finger for PGP public key D4 99 54 2A 98 B1 48 0C CF 95 A5 B0 6E E0 1E 1D

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C-LIT: Vernor Vinge's "A Fire Upon the Deep" (was: Re: True Names)
by ddt＠lsd.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 1:48 pm 1/5/95, Angus Patterson wrote: >I've been trying to get True Names by Vernor Vinge, and have been told it's >out of print (like most good cypunk ), does anybody have it scanned? >I realize this is without permission, so does anybody have Vinge's address? >(e-mail or otherwise) or could anybody ask him? Btw, does he have any other >crypto/anonymity related stories? Thanks in advance. Amazing that you should mention this, Angus: I *just* finished reading "A Fire Upon the Deep" and it is not only exeedingly gnarly, but also features a universal net, galactic-wide relays and Netscum-like service providers and associated user kvetching, a sinister-billions-of-years-old-AI-virus, newsgroups, lists populated by aliens - and even _crypto_ as the key to the whole shebang. There's also a great futuristic "dig" on pub key encryption buried in it. Neural net stuff. A possible explanation for the existence of both God and Newt Gingrich...and I could go on. Great read, true anus-clenching adventure... and this from one who does NOT normally read anything more sci-fi than certain software manuals. :) Strongly recommended for c-punks who can last 600 pages (after the first ten, you're hopelessly hooked if you have half a brain left afdter reading this list for a year or two). I _WISH_ I had VV's email address! I'd like to send the guy a big thank-you and ask if he's writing a sequel (yet). If anyone does know it, puh-LEEze mail me. First book of his I've read, first of it's kind I've enjoyed in a very long time. I'll scan my favorite crypto-related (legal-length) excerpt and post it next week, howzat? dave _________________________ Big books small Books high books tall Just give me a good Little book, That's all. -Truman Capote (age 11) C-LIT = Cypherpunk LITerature. Gitcher mind outta the gutter there, Lancelot.

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Re: ecash trial issues explained
by wcs＠anchor.ho.att.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> From: Wolfgang Roeckelein <wolfgang(a)wi.WHU-Koblenz.de> > > >-> Digital cash should not be "anonymous" -- paper currency isn't. Serial > > There seems to be a misconception here what is meant with anonymous. Paper cash > is anonymous: I can't derive the person I got the note from from the note > itself. So if I meet a guy in the street, he gives me a pack of cigarettes and > I give him cash, this transaction is anonymous. It isn't difficult to make paper cash less anonymous, though, by tracking serial numbers. This is occasionally done in "law enforcement" situations - recording the notes used to pay ransom or bribes. It wouldn't be difficult to add serial-number recording equipment/mechanisms to automatic bank-teller machines, to record what serial numbers would be given out to whom. (This can be done either by adding scanners to the ATMs themselves, or by scanning the money before putting it into the ATM, and having the ATM record that transaction #43 dispensed the 105th-110th bills in the stack. Scanning can either be done by OCRs, or by replacing the human-readable numbers with bar-codes, as some of the paranoids periodically suggest the US Treasury is about to do as part of some heinous plan. However, the original posters' assertion that digital cash should not be anonymous is not a technical statement, it's a value judgement, and in my opinion it's a bad one. There are a lot of genuine social needs that anonymity can support, and a lot of bad things that can be done with traceable money. Aside from that, traceability costs money. Original gold and silver money didn't need to be traceable, though coiner's and assayer's marks were useful, and it is easier to keep track of your pile of gold bars if they're numbered. But paper money has serial numbers largely to prevent easy copying; gold is a lot harder to counterfeit, unless you've got a king who insists that coins with his face on them should be worth N times as much as anonymous coins. Bill

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Re: GIF_nip
by rah＠shipwright.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> Watch your Cc: headers, s'vous plait? AAK! Eudora's "reply-to-all" strikes again! Grovelling in your general direction, Bob Hettinga ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah(a)shipwright.com) "There is no difference between someone Shipwright Development Corporation who eats too little and sees Heaven and 44 Farquhar Street someone who drinks too much and sees Boston, MA 02331 USA snakes." -- Bertrand Russell (617) 323-7923

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Re: True Names
by Blanc Weber 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: Timothy C. May I see copies in used bookstores often. It's in the collection "True Names and Something-or-other" and was in print until recenly. I also have the Bluejay edition, with an afterward by Marvin Minsky. .............................................................. I bought one at Half-Price Books. I don't know what edition it is, it's a dingy little paperback with a signature in it of some stranger that I wouldn't know. I keep it with my "previously owned" collection. Blanc

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DES for HP48
by SINCLAIR DOUGLAS N 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

There used to be some code on soda to do DES on an HP48 palmtop/calculator. I looked this afternoon, on ftp.csua.berkeley.edu, and I couldn't find it. Anyone know where it got to?

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Re: True Names
by Blanc Weber 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: Jim Gillogly > Blanc Weber <blancw(a)microsoft.com> writes: > I see copies in used bookstores often. It's in the collection "True > Names and Something-or-other" and was in print until recenly. I also ............................................................. No, No, Jim, that wasn't me saying that - that statement was made by a cpunkgod. Mine was beneath it. Blanc

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floating point crypto?
by rah＠shipwright.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I'm incensed. I casually mentioned somewhere else that I saw something on this list about floating-point math being used in crypto, contrary to popular belief, and somebody had the *timerity* to call me on it. ;-). I think it had to do with factoring, but maybe even in key-generation, though that doesn't sound right at all... So, are there c-punk archives I could look in? I remember hearing something about that, too. However, if someone remembers off the top of their head, or if they have an actual copy of the posting, that would be great, too. Please send me whatever it is by e-mail. No point cluttering the list more than I already have... Of all the nerve.... Cheers, Bob Hettinga ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah(a)shipwright.com) "There is no difference between someone Shipwright Development Corporation who eats too little and sees Heaven and 44 Farquhar Street someone who drinks too much and sees Boston, MA 02331 USA snakes." -- Bertrand Russell (617) 323-7923

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No Subject
by Carol Anne Braddock 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

[icicle.winternet.com] Login name: carolann In real life: CarolAnne Braddock Directory: /usr2/carolann Shell: /etc/scripts/tcsh-susp Last login Thu Jan 5 21:38 on ttyq5 from annex3-1.wintern New mail received Thu Jan 5 21:16:23 1995; unread since Mon Jan 2 13:18:25 1995 Plan: This account has been disabled permanently. Mike Horwath - Admin - Winternet - drechsau(a)winternet.com

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