December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Locksmith's Guild wants limit on free speech
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Commenting on Tim's comment about the decline of the guilds of "licensed professionals" (I'm a licensed architect long-time arguing against the breed's conceits and camouflages and irresponsibilities): Here in NYC there is a new trial policy to allow architects and engineers to "self-certify" their construction documents as in compliance with the building code rather than being approved by a municipal examiner. Over decades a sub-species has grown called "code consultants" or "expediters", which advises and processes documents for A-E's who have become ignorant of the arcana of the building code. This group of several hundred, has pretty muchly dominated, by default or by design, the non-governmental side of construction through their specialized knowledge of the code, procedures, interpretations, regulations and who to see for favorable treatment in the Building Department. A-E's used these folks with happiness, usually, for it relieved the self-certified high-minded animals to concentrate on the important stuff of design and schmoozing and puffing feathers. On the municipal side, agency employees found that it was easier to deal with these consultants than contrary professionals. And, the culture welcomed ex-public officials into their well-paid ranks to lubricate the wheels. An odd result so far is that while owners and professionals like the idea of speeding up the process they are reluctant to take on the concomitant responsibility for deficiencies in meeting code standards in final construction. The city will inspect 20% to keep tabs. Both fear that they do not know the code well enough to take the risk of being found at fault by random municipal inspections of construction. A-E's dread the liability and blame by owners for well-known construction corner-cutting, and owners suspect their professionals competency and ethics -- afraid that the pros will certify in ignorance or cupidity and that the owners will face costly corrections without having the traditional scapegoat of over-weening government to justify cheating in the field. The code consultants I've talked to say they wait for the animals frightened of their own shadows to return to the safe stables. Perhaps "code consultants" precurse the trajectory of cryptographers?

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Anti-porn conference in Manila
by rishab＠dxm.ernet.in 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The Religious Alliance Against Pornography has been holding a biggish conference in Manila; the focus is on child pornography, and a major topic of discussion is the evil of electronic networks. The Interpol is among those participating; the head of their kiddie-porn division claims Britain is the source of most European stuff, and bemoans the fact that too little is spent on monitoring traffic, as the war against drugs is considered more important. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Rishab Aiyer Ghosh "In between the breaths is rishab(a)dxm.ernet.in the space where we live" rishab(a)arbornet.org - Lawrence Durrell Voice/Fax/Data +91 11 6853410 Voicemail +91 11 3760335 H 34C Saket, New Delhi 110017, INDIA

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Re: bruce s(t)erlings talk
by rah＠shipwright.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>>can you get me a copy of bruce serlings talk given to law enforcement ^^^^^^^^ Uh, yes, well... I wonder if he's related to Rod... S>T<erling, yes? Post 'em first, and lot God sort them out... Bob ----------------- 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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Smoke & Mirrors
by VACCINIA＠UNCVX1.OIT.UNC.EDU 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- A friend of mine has a business setting up networks for business's in the Baltimore area. He contracts out the security end of the setup to a firm called "Smoke and Mirrors". They create firewalls and handle encryption capabilities. I think the company is in the baltimore area, and was wondering if anyone on the list has heard of this company? With a name like smoke and mirrors I guess they better be good. Anybody know? Vaccinia(a)uncvx1.oit.unc.edu -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6 iQCVAgUBLyLIZD2paOMjHHAhAQHIuwQAhMdaCsA5j7W/Z/m2VHLeaendI7/JHNGv qm1hePuz3OolJmYgaWyAODlefcLkaKNapeEh5/xRoleEI8dUWuC+njJKvw6MKkr/ b6b/UbcKpLf/qqpFVuz+BbCnBUIY8iALhCLe832o5yxzAV2GT64Sj5gfjhUa3XVy 5dR4yI51SNc= =ZvUV -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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E-Mail Security - New Book
by schneier＠chinet.chinet.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

E-MAIL SECURITY WITH PGP AND PEM: HOW TO KEEP YOUR ELECTRONIC MESSAGES PRIVATE ...a new book by Bruce Schneier John Wiley & Sons, 1995 ISBN 0-471-05318-X $24.95 The world of e-mail is the world of postcards. Between you and your correspondents may lurk a foreign government, a business competitor, an overzealous law enforcement agency, or even just a nosy neighbor. The problem is, all of these potential eavesdroppers, given fairly simple access tools, can read your messages as easy as a postal worker can read your postcards. E-MAIL SECURITY is about protecting electronic mail fm spies, interlopers, and spoofs--people who may want to destroy, alter, or just look at your private communications. The book shows how you can protect the financial information, contract negotiations, or personal correspondence you entrust to public or private networks--and it shows how this protection is available right now, with free or inexpensive software. The book discusses PGP and PEM: how they work, how they are different, and how to choose which one is right for you. TABLE OF CONTENTS: Part I: Privacy and Electronic Mail Chapter 1: The Problem Chapter 2: Encryption Chapter 3: Key Management Chapter 4: Authentication Chapter 5: Certificates Chapter 6: Keeping Your Private Key Private Chapter 7: Odds and Ends Chapter 8: Patents, Governments, and Export Laws Part II: Achieving Electronic-Mail Privacy Chapter 9: Requirements and Features Chapter 10: Privacy Enhanced Mail (PEM) Chapter 11: Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) Chapter 12: Comparing PGP and PEM Chapter 13: Attacks Against PGP and PEM Appendix A: Pretty Good Privacy Appendix B: Privacy Enhanced Mail ***************************************************************** If you are interested in a copy of E-MAIL SECURITY, please send a check for $25 + $5 postage (ask for rates abroad) to: Bruce Schneier 730 Fair Oaks Ave Oak Park, IL 60302 The book won't be available until at least the end of the month, so please be patient.

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Another Book By Schneier...
by werewolf＠io.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Saw this on one of the cryptography conferences..... From: schneier(a)chinet.chinet.com (Bruce Schneier) Subject: E-Mail Security - New book by Bruce Schneier Message-ID: <D2qsIJ.Dzz(a)chinet.chinet.com> Organization: Chinet - Public Access UNIX Date: Sat, 21 Jan 1995 06:25:31 GMT E-MAIL SECURITY WITH PGP AND PEM: HOW TO KEEP YOUR ELECTRONIC MESSAGES PRIVATE ...a new book by Bruce Schneier John Wiley & Sons, 1995 ISBN 0-471-05318-X $24.95 The world of e-mail is the world of postcards. Between you and your correspondents may lurk a foreign government, a business competitor, an overzealous law enforcement agency, or even just a nosy neighbor. The problem is, all of these potential eavesdroppers, given fairly simple access tools, can read your messages as easy as a postal worker can read your postcards. E-MAIL SECURITY is about protecting electronic mail fm spies, interlopers, and spoofs--people who may want to destroy, alter, or just look at your private communications. The book shows how you can protect the financial information, contract negotiations, or personal correspondence you entrust to public or private networks--and it shows how this protection is available right now, with free or inexpensive software. The book discusses PGP and PEM: how they work, how they are different, and how to choose which one is right for you. TABLE OF CONTENTS: Part I: Privacy and Electronic Mail Chapter 1: The Problem Chapter 2: Encryption Chapter 3: Key Management Chapter 4: Authentication Chapter 5: Certificates Chapter 6: Keeping Your Private Key Private Chapter 7: Odds and Ends Chapter 8: Patents, Governments, and Export Laws Part II: Achieving Electronic-Mail Privacy Chapter 9: Requirements and Features Chapter 10: Privacy Enhanced Mail (PEM) Chapter 11: Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) Chapter 12: Comparing PGP and PEM Chapter 13: Attacks Against PGP and PEM Appendix A: Pretty Good Privacy Appendix B: Privacy Enhanced Mail ***************************************************************** If you are interested in a copy of E-MAIL SECURITY, please send a check for $25 + $5 postage (ask for rates abroad) to: Bruce Schneier 730 Fair Oaks Ave Oak Park, IL 60302 The book won't be available until at least the end of the month, so please be patient.

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Ben Goren Eyes Only
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Mon, 23 Jan 1995 Ben Goren <ben(a)Music.ASU.Edu> said: Mr. Goren, Mail to <ben(a)Music.ASU.Edu> ricochets. Hep.

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Re: The Remailer Crisis
by wcs＠anchor.ho.att.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Tim writes: > One thing I should've noted is that a Linux-based cheap remailer is > mostly useless without a "live connection" to the Net. I disagree - live connections are great for fast-response systems, but we got along just fine in the uucp dialup world with occasional connections; in an environment like remailers where you _want_ batchy performance, the clunkiness can even be a "feature". I don't know how many providers are offerring uucp or ip dialout from their servers, or whether they're much cheaper than real ip, but you can do ok with, say, hourly polling to a TIA or term connection to fill your mailbox from a POP server, or nightly if that's enough. TIA also has the advantage over SLIP/PPP that outgoing mail from your system will _always_ have unverifiable IP addresses - you look like netcom.com, just like everyone else TIA-connecting from netcom does. And connections from shared-IP-address-pool systems like netcruiser or dialup PPP systems probably don't do much logging of who's used what IP address beyond when nameserver caches clear. Bill

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RE: syrinx remailer up and running
by Johnathan Corgan 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>Well folks, the syrinx remailer is up and running now. The particulars: > >Address: syrinx(a)c2.org Could you post the capabilities of this remailer, like cpunk, hash, pgp, ksub, latent, etc.? == Johnathan Corgan "Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent." jcorgan(a)scruznet.com -Isaac Asimov

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Re: Data Vaults (vs. Data Havens)
by wcs＠anchor.ho.att.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Tim and Eric write things like: > I fully concur. The connotations of the word "haven" imply activities > that ordinary people don't see themselves doing. This means that > ordinary people won't generally use something called a "haven", even > if they might use exactly the same service called something else. We can always call them "Private Storage Servers" or some such; an interesting question is whether the main uses will be for retrieval by the storer, or by someone else, or by a bunch of others, and how we describe the service may affect that. Bill

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