December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

PRZ Interview in Infobahn Magazine
by K. M. Ellis 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I generally try to avoid buying anything with the word "Infobahn" on it, but in the premiere issue of this new magazine there's a 5-page article about Phil Zimmerman written by Jeff Elliot (of the National Review...but it's a good article anyway ;). It's pretty good--if anyone is new to the ongoing Zimmerman drama it's a good sum-up. -=Kathleen M. Ellis=- (This message also serves as a test for the new DC-Cypherpunks list server.) kelli(a)zeus.towson.edu http://zeus.towson.edu/~kelli/ GAT d? H+ s+++:-- !g p? !au a- w++@ !v@ c++++ UL++ P+ L+ 3 E---- N+ K W--- M-- V-- po- Y++ t+ 5-- jx R G'''' tv- b+++ D-- B e+ u** h* f++ r--- n+ z** Diverse Sexual Orientation Coll.Towson State University DSOC(a)zeus.towson.edu BigBrotherSystemsBBS........BigBrotherIsWatchingYou.......(410)494-3253#11

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U.S. Banks are not all that bad
by tcmay＠sensemedia.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Hate to disagree with Lucky, but.... At 11:05 PM 7/30/95, Lucky Green wrote: >Six years ago, you could walk into a Bank, show them your driver license, >and open an account. >Today, you need several pieces of ID. I've cashed checks at Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Comerica (whatever _that_ is), etc., without having an account at these banks, and without having to pay any fee, and without any more ID than a driver's license. (I have no accounts at California banks, so all checks sent to me are, perforce, not checks drawn at "my" bank...and yet I've never had to pay a dime to cash a check. The times I've gotten out of state checks, I've of course not expected third parties to cash them for free for me...usually I just deposit them by mail.) >Three years ago, you could withdraw money from your own account without >having your checkbook on you. >Today, they make you pay for a "counter check". Hasn't happened to me. >One year ago, you could walk into a bank an cash a check drawn onto an >account at the very same bank. >Today (Coast Federal), they make you pay a $10 check cashing fee. Hasn't happened to me. I walk into banks, present the checks drawn on their own bank, ask to have it cashed, and all they want is to make sure I'm the person to whom the check is drawn. No fees, no refusals to cash. >The US banking industry has gone to the dogs. The day a non-US bank offers >an account that can be accessed over the net will be the day I close my US >accounts. Maybe I have the magic touch. I find U.S. banks to be marvels of efficiency. (But then I can remember running out of cash on a Saturday and having no way to get any more cash except by borrowing from friends...the ATM revolutionized things around 1980.) I'm not speaking of "interesting" banking applications, which, I fear, are not permitted by current U.S. banking laws. --Tim May .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)sensemedia.net | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-728-0152 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Corralitos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. "National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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C'punks at DefCon
by QLDM75A＠prodigy.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> Are any of us cpunks having a gathering at Defcon? (besides the > one Well, a couple other c'punks have mailed me to determine a time and a place. It looks like everyone wants to meet in the lobby of the Tropicana sometime Friday before Hacker Jeopardy. Nobody has stated a concrete time yet so I guess we'll all just wander through the lobby every now and then. Any suggestions on a time? Eldon Jenkins

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About your online business.
by 05551984＠turboma.dyn.ml.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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Re: PRZ Interview in Infobahn Magazine
by tcmay＠sensemedia.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Lord, I'm going to get in trouble for writing this message... (And Phil, if you happen to read Cypherpunks now and read this, understand the context of my comments...) At 12:57 AM 7/31/95, K. M. Ellis wrote: >I generally try to avoid buying anything with the word "Infobahn" on it, >but in the premiere issue of this new magazine there's a 5-page article >about Phil Zimmerman written by Jeff Elliot (of the National Review...but >it's a good article anyway ;). It's pretty good--if anyone is new to the >ongoing Zimmerman drama it's a good sum-up. It may be a good article, but as soon as I saw yet another "personality" interview with PRZ in the new trendzine "Infobahhn," I put the issue back on the shelf. (Not just because of the PRZ personality piece, but because I'm ODd (that's "overdosed" to you younger folks) on "Wired," "Mondo 2000," "Access," "Ray Gun," "The Net", and all the slightly more technical magazines like "MIME World," "Java Times," and "Diffie-Hellman Newsletter" (yes, these last three items are fictitious). Just my opinion, but I think the Information Superhypeway is indeed being over-hyped. In case you're wondering, I did indeed agree to be photographed for the cover of "Wired" #2, a few years ago. All I can say is, "I'm sorry." Bay Aryans can attest to the fact that in the last several months I've refused to have anything to do with the various hypings and personality profiles the info rags are so focussed on. I enjoyed talking to Timothy Leary for a few minutes at a party, but refused to appear on camera with him in a "Cypherpunks on parade" segment for a Japanese television program. I'm not condemning those who do interviews--I did a few myself--but I think there' something to be said for avoiding the "personality profiles" which so superficially cover the issues. (At least it's not (yet?) as bad at the media's fascination with Mitnick and Shimomura....I about barfed to read the tale of "The Hooker and the Hacker" in the latest "Esquire," the one with Cindy Crawford on the cover. Then, just today, my younger brother told me he'd been reading about Mitnick and Shimomura in "Rolling Stone.") Anyway, flame away with your claims that publicity is good, that the dozens of PRZ interviews are doing some good. I'm becoming more of a Zen Buddhist monastic skeptic on these issues every day. --Tim May, happy to be far from the madding crowd .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)sensemedia.net | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-728-0152 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Corralitos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. "National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Re: U.S. Banks are not all that bad
by cman＠communities.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

As near as I can tell, there are spotty instances of the behavior Lucky describes, but it is becoming more common, especially wrt required ID. I must say that I've had some absolutely amazingly bad experiences with banks in Asia, Mexico and Central America, so I'm a skeptic when it comes to assuming that non-US banks are light years better. Although I have no direct experience of European banking, I do know that the European banking industry, taken as a whole, is substantially behind the US banking industry in automation and efficiency. Most of the irritation that I hear reported about US banks is the result of pushing customers too hard to change expensive banking habits or erecting policies that eliminate money-losing practices without regard to their impact on customer goodwill. At First Interstate recently, I had to make a withdrawal from the teller, as the ATM was broken. Their policy _does_ reqiure a "counter check", and normally they charge, but when I explained that the ATM was kaput they did it for free. It is _much_ cheaper for them if you use the ATM, and this kind of policy is designed to encourage you to do this. It's the kind of thing that the market will sort out nicely -- if it irritates people and loses them money more than it saves them money, they will stop doing it. Remember, the US has an absolutely fantastic amount of competition wrt banking services, especially when compared to other countries.

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Re: Sat phone permit "wire"taps
by stewarts＠ix.netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>> "Iridium, Globalstar, Inmarsat-P and Odyssey all plan to include >> features to permit authorized eavesdropping, officials said. Sigh... >> Hmm. Anyone here ever heard of the Walkers, or the Rosenbergs? Different cases - the Walkers gave away information on how the Yankees were stealing Russian secrets, which the Russians patched up by encrypting. The most current information on the Rosenbergs, gotten from decrypted Soviet communications and declassified US and ex-Soviet files, indicates that Ethel Rosenberg was probably innocent of spying, and Julius was spying but didn't give away any useful atomic secrets, and that the FBI probably knew at the time they had Ethel killed that she was innocent. Sometimes even having your secrets cracked isn't enough to protect you.... #--- # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, Freelance Information Architect, stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com # Phone +1-510-247-0664 Pager/Voicemail 1-408-787-1281 #--- # Export PGP three lines a time --> http://dcs.ex.ac.uk/~aba/export/ M0V]N9W)E<W,@<VAA;&P@;6%K92!N;R!L87<@+BXN(&%B<FED9VEN9R!T:&4@ M9G)E961O;2!O9B!S<&5E8V@L(&]R(&]F('1H92!P<F5S<SL-"F]R('1H92!R M:6=H="!O9B!T:&4@<&5O<&QE('!E86-E86)L>2!T;R!A<W-E;6)L92P@( T*

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Re: building libraries
by stewarts＠ix.netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:40 PM 7/28/95 -0400, Alex Tang wrote: >> The answer is to have some non-USA entity build shareable full fledged >> full powered crypto libraries and provide them for free for the rest of >> the world and for all machines. >Wouldn't there still be licensing issues to deal with (in the states at >least)?? I'm sure RSA would claim that the package would be in violation >of the licensing... If you did everything in an RSAREF-compatible manner, that would help; I think somebody outside the US has written an RSAREF-clone. Some problems include building programs that have generic-callout hooks instead of crypto-specific hooks (so that they don't get bitten by ITAR), while still maintaining reasonable efficiency and convenience. #--- # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, Freelance Information Architect, stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com # Phone +1-510-247-0664 Pager/Voicemail 1-408-787-1281 #--- # Export PGP three lines a time --> http://dcs.ex.ac.uk/~aba/export/ M0V]N9W)E<W,@<VAA;&P@;6%K92!N;R!L87<@+BXN(&%B<FED9VEN9R!T:&4@ M9G)E961O;2!O9B!S<&5E8V@L(&]R(&]F('1H92!P<F5S<SL-"F]R('1H92!R M:6=H="!O9B!T:&4@<&5O<&QE('!E86-E86)L>2!T;R!A<W-E;6)L92P@( T*

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Re: Zimmermann legal fund
by stewarts＠ix.netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 02:23 PM 7/30/95 EDT, nsb(a)nsb.fv.com wrote: >To pay into non-US accounts, we need to establish banking relationships in >other venues. For the most part, we need to do it one country at a time, >which is awesomely time-consuming ..... >Remember, the requirement is not that you be in the US, but rather than you >have an account in a US bank. This is not all that hard for a non-US >citizen to do **IF** you can show up physically at a US bank. Thus, if >there's a US bank that has an office near you, you can walk in and open an >account to which deposits can be made through the US direct-deposit system, >and you're in business with FV. Aren't there some banks or similar companies that are world-wide, but have US branches? I think SwissBankCorp or somebody like that has an office in San Francisco; would it be possible for you to transfer money to someone with an account there who's really in, say, Switzerland or the UK or Hong Kong? #--- # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, Freelance Information Architect, stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com # Phone +1-510-247-0664 Pager/Voicemail 1-408-787-1281 #--- # Export PGP three lines a time --> http://dcs.ex.ac.uk/~aba/export/ M0V]N9W)E<W,@<VAA;&P@;6%K92!N;R!L87<@+BXN(&%B<FED9VEN9R!T:&4@ M9G)E961O;2!O9B!S<&5E8V@L(&]R(&]F('1H92!P<F5S<SL-"F]R('1H92!R M:6=H="!O9B!T:&4@<&5O<&QE('!E86-E86)L>2!T;R!A<W-E;6)L92P@( T*

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Re: PRZ Interview in Infobahn Magazine
by stewarts＠ix.netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 09:32 PM 7/30/95 -0700, Timothy C. May wrote: > > I'm going to get in trouble for writing this message... Heh, heh. Infobahn also has an article by Sandy Sandfort in it; Sandy had it at the SF Cpunks meeting, so I assumed I'd be able to find it at the store (haven't yet; the first issue was 40K copies for nationwide distribution.) Michael Berch, the publisher, is a reasonable guy, if you like his type. mcb(a)postmodern.com (infobahn.com was taken). He's got some lawyer background and hacked computers at LLNL for a while. >Bay Aryans Gack. You will get in trouble :-) #--- # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, Freelance Information Architect, stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com # Phone +1-510-247-0664 Pager/Voicemail 1-408-787-1281 #--- # Export PGP three lines a time --> http://dcs.ex.ac.uk/~aba/export/ M0V]N9W)E<W,@<VAA;&P@;6%K92!N;R!L87<@+BXN(&%B<FED9VEN9R!T:&4@ M9G)E961O;2!O9B!S<&5E8V@L(&]R(&]F('1H92!P<F5S<SL-"F]R('1H92!R M:6=H="!O9B!T:&4@<&5O<&QE('!E86-E86)L>2!T;R!A<W-E;6)L92P@( T*

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