December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Netscape to copyright URLs?
by Lindsay Haisley 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 02:39 AM 8/20/95 -0400, you wrote: >Today's surf of Netscape's home page yielded an interesting question. Is >Netscape trying to licence links to their products? To me >http://home.netscape.com/comprod/mirror/netscape_now_program.html seems to >suggest tha you can only display certain logos and info if you are >licensed by Netscape. You could for example not put up a link to their >"Download Netscape NOW" page without prior approval by Netscape. > >This seems to be a new development on the web. Since when does one need a >license to include certain URLs in one's home page? The Netscape general info document specifically states .... >Aside from the ftp mirrors we list on our home page, we do not allow >redistribution of our software. This means that it is not legal to put >our software on your ftp server, nor to include it on disks you are >distributing, although you're more than welcome to include a pointer to >our home pages so that people can download the latest version for >themselves. They have specifically given permission here for links, at least to their home pages, possibly even to other items such as a downloadable netscape. (______) Lindsay Haisley (oo) "The bull FMP Computer Services /------\/ stops here!" fmouse(a)fmp.com / | || Austin, Texas, USA * ||---|| (512) 259-1190 ~~ ~~

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Re: A glance at the future of missing child identification
by danisch＠ira.uka.de 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

These transponders are already used for many year. They inject them in pigs and cows to identify them. And some car manufacturers put the into the ignition keys as theft protections. Technology is not new. Perhaps it is already used for criminals? Somewhere I heard that in America criminals are sentenced to stay at home because the jails are overfilled. A sender is attached to their leg and the police is informed if he leaves his home. Perhaps a drug dealer may be more usefull if he moves free and has a transponder inside which he doesn't know about, that having him in jail. Here in Germany most department stores have big antennas at the doors which are normally used to detect thefts. Perhaps these antennas also recognize certain people. You can be sure even criminals go to department stores, undergrounds, or bus stations. Some hidden antennas and it's easy to be on their track. But it might be difficult to hide them on x-ray images... Brrr, disgusting idea... :-{ Hadmut

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Legality of suverting computational cycles via Microsoft
by solman＠MIT.EDU 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Does anybody here know if it is illegal to get unwiting users to download benign viruses via MSN? Doesn't this sort of hole, by its very nature, make it trivial for people to violate Europes future electronic privacy laws? (despite Microsoft's guarantee that MSN would follow those rules.) JWS

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Re: Netscape to copyright URLs?
by monty.harder＠famend.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

RJ> Essentially, they want us to help them create the perception RJ> that if you don't show the "Netscape Now!" flag (didn't Nixon have RJ> a similar slogan?) on your page, that you're just not a high- RJ> quality operation. Or maybe they're trying to change the subject Let's just create our own flag, and use it instead, then. * If we had ham, * We could have ham and eggs, * If we had eggs. --- * Monster(a)FAmend.Com *

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Re: Basically F-C-ed
by Alex de Joode 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Anonymous sez: : FBI Probing Planted Explosive : Orlando, Fla., August 20 (AP) -- Two explosives were : planted in a professor's suitcase to test airport : security measures in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, and were : discovered when he arrived in Orlando, officials said : Saturday. [..] : Kensel said such security measures were normal for : Europe. : "Particularly in Europe, there are grave concerns about : security issues," he said. "As a result, they do conduct : various security programs regularly. This was part of a : routine check of their own security systems. : "The bag got away from them basically," he said. Airport police was very quick to point out that such practices were legal, now when they do that ...... -- Alex de Joode Fear Uncertainty Confusion and Kaos, Inc.

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Re: NSA into antigravity?
by Andrew.Spring＠ping.be 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

: >> >>On July 19, Gerald Ollman and Robert Wayne, two researchers from the >>University of Maryland geophysics department were detained in Fort Meade, >>Maryland, apparently by agents of the National Security Agency, whilst >>taking measurements of the Earth's gravitational field. After 18 hours of >>questioning, they were released after being instructed not to discuss the >>incident. Their equipment and results were not returned. >> >>Neither the University nor the NSA has commented on the incident. However, >>it is believed that Ollman and Wayne were investigating a slight anomaly >>in the Earth's gravitational field centered around Fort Meade. No reason has >>been given for their detention. Missile targeting software depends on good models of the earth's gravity for accuracy, both for design and for simulation purposes. Since Ft. Meade was doubtless the target of many nukes during the cold war (and probably still is), that may account for them having a bug up their asses on the subject. 'Course you know the NSA; the world's largest employer of mathematicians, the largest purchaser of computer hardware, and the largest consumer of Thorazine. -- Thank you VERY much! You'll be getting a Handsome Simulfax Copy of your OWN words in the mail soon (and My Reply). <Andrew.Spring(a)ping.be> PGP Print: 0529 C9AF 613E 9E49 378E 54CD E232 DF96 Thank you for question, exit left to Funway.

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Re: Certificates/Anonymity/Policy/True Names
by monty.harder＠famend.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

TC> This happens all the time, though "I am not a lawyer," in disputes about TC> whether a contract was signed properly, about whether the signer had the TC> right authority, etc. And it is apparently not necessary to have the TC> "state" establish itself, for example, as the keeper of signatures. But the state does establish Notaries Public, and courts put special credence in the validity of signatures witnessed by them. Which is to be expected, of course, having the King's X being good in the King's courts. I don't see this as an either/or binary at all. To me, the natural thing to do is for a person who is already a Notary under the laws of a state to offer digital notary services. I would expect the State of California or Commonwealth of Massachussets to have the Secretary of State's office (or whoever is in charge of Notary Credentials there) to digitally sign the public keys of any Notaries commissioned thereby. In fact, I would like to see provision made for a digital signature to have an expiration date included, so that the SoS office could have its signature on a key set to expire along with the Notary's commission. Thus the existing state framework for verification of identity and consent on contracts is extended into the electronic sphere seamlessly. None of which prevents you or I from doing business without the services of the Royal Notary. * ZenCrafters - Total Enlightenment in about an hour --- * Monster(a)FAmend.Com *

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Re: CPAC, XtatiX, and the Censor-State
by Mike Duvos 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

In alt.cypherpunks, Censorship Suck <FBI(a)Sucks.NSA> writes: > That's pretty bad, when there's not even any sex. Yes. Most of these Web pages are not even political or sexual in nature, but cute boys anywhere on the Net these days cause the Fundies to have Grand Mal seizures. > My previous suggestion was to create "virtual" WWW sites > (when necessary, possibly as a stop-gap measure when there > is a censorship attack). I read your earlier post, and find the notion of hosting Web sites on Usenet intriguing. Tim has always pointed out that Usenet already exists as a persistent uncensorable repository of virtually everything, and that applications (eg BlackNet) needing such a facility should simply use the existing one. > By virtual, I mean by posting to USENET, probably encrypted, > with the decryption key following a couple days later. > It involves considerable development for either a newsreader > or preprocessor, but then, the work is implied. A > "gathering" design is necessary. Conceptually, seamlessly extending the Web over Usenet is not complicated. Each document could be posted as a single PGP conventionally encrypted article, with some reasonable convention for encryption keys and message ids that would enable links to be followed. Browsers could be modified to maintain a open connection to an NNTP server, and to fetch and decrypt articles specified by an nntp:<message-id> link in lieu of using http. Suppose I post my favorite banned Web pages to alt.anonymous.messages on a weekly basis, and distribute browser plug-ins and patches to enable Usenet to host Web content. I forsee the following glitches. First, as anyone who has posted a large number of articles to Usenet knows, many servers will only get a subset of them. Second, policy for article expiration is site-specific, and can be made to depend on a number of parameters. Posting once a week may be fine for some servers, and not for others. Third, it is only practical to employ Usenet to host static Web content. This rules out Web-based chat boards, and other such politically interesting content, as well as anything that is cgi-bin based. Fourth, Web content on Usenet will be in an easily identified format and trivial to filter out at local sites. > Because you are exactly right: the ISPs can be attacked, > regardless of the fault-tolerant design of the Internet. > Some version of the above tool WILL route around "damage" > attempts. > Interesting, that this would in part require cryptography. > Would the government go so far as to try and outlaw crypto > posts to USENET? Good luck. Odder things have happened. > Someone should make a complete list of all the > contacts/emails involved in contacting ISPs to get them to > censor. There may be something to learn. (sort of a traffic > analysis deal) It's the "usual suspects." We know who they are, and they are making no attempt to keep their activities secret. -- Mike Duvos $ PGP 2.6 Public Key available $ enoch(a)zipcon.com $ via Finger $ {Free Cypherpunk Political Prisoner Jim Bell}

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NSA cracker - how many TW
by Secret Squirrel 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

iang(a)cs.berkeley.edu > seems also unlikely. (Actually, for all I know, terawatt power sources > may exist; that's out of my field. Please let me know if this is the case. > I just know that at my rates, 7.12 TW for 33 minutes (at about $.10/kWh) I've extracted some figures from an industry publication and arrive at a worldwide electricity generation capacity of 1.6 TW. Assuming that 1% of that power is smuggled into the deep space cracker we're not even close to 33 minutes, and it doesn't matter whether we're looking at a one-off every so often rather than a continuous 40 a day. And that's still on optimistic assumptions including 1) testing keys for free 2a) running on earth at 3 K rather than 300 K or 2b) no bother transmitting power & signals into space (Like if the cracker had been secretly installed on Voyager 2 that'd be your 33 mins gone waiting for the radio.) IBM have published a communications scheme that claims to recover energy normally lost - it was on their website a few months ago. I skipped reading it at the time because it sounded dotty.

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Re: Basically F-C-ed
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Responding to msg by usura(a)replay.com (Alex de Joode) on Mon, 21 Aug 4:28 AM >Airport police was very quick to point out that such >practices were legal, now when they do that ...... What, Alex, FC stands for F*cking Counterterrorists, making work for themselves? Oh my, are those bitter out of work XX-cold warriors heeding X-feebie Liddy, prolonging the 60's blame-the-radicals payoffs.

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