December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: POTP Security
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 19:30 11/10/95 -0500, jgrubs(a)left.webcasters.com wrote: >>The first commercially available implementation of our >>POTP (Power One Time Pad) encryption algorithm. The package includes >>a POTP Secure FTP Client, POTP Secure FTP Server, and POTP FileCrypt - >>a stand alone file encryption program. >What level of security does this cute, little puppy provide??? Since they advertize One Time Pad security, the first thing I want to know is how they distribute their keys. One Time Pads require a key as long as the encyphered message. A one-time-pad system without a convincing story about key distribution is bullshit. Bill ----------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz Periwinkle -- Computer Consulting (408)356-8506 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz(a)netcom.com Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA

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technical and social structures in the pseudonymous economy
by Bryce 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- When a person does business pseudonymously (where I consider pseudonymity to be == anonymity & non-repudiation & two-way communication (where non-repudation presupposes some sort of identifier of the actor)) then that person is exempt (for the most part) from the threat of physical retribution, the force of law, etc. Thus in order to be trusted with some valuable information such as money this person needs to offer up some collateral which can be debitted in the case that they violate their contract. Of course this raises the question of who holds the collateral, and it is a big open spot where statists might jump in with their tired old rhetoric (as soon as they clue in to what's going on here), but I sincerely hope that a highly redundant, interdependent, robust set of private "lien, escrow and arbitration" agencies take up the job. As a simple example, pseudonymous E-bank customers can be required to keep positive balances in their accounts, and in the case that they are caught trying to double-spend or commit other fraud, a fine can be withdrawn from this account by the bank. This model can be applied to any pseudonymous transaction or contract. It is important to note that this technique does *not* eliminate the risk of fraud-- it reduces the likelihood that the pseudonymous customer can commit fraud successfully and it *increases* the likelihood that the bank can do so. Of course this is not necessary if we are not giving the pseudonym any opportunity to cheat us (because we are using all on-line clearing etc.) but for most (I think) applications it is necessary to extend to the pseudonym some amount of trust, in the form of a "loan" or other credit, or, in the form of other digital credentials, access to information etc. etc. I consider this to be a very important idea for the development of the cyberspace economy/community/libertaria and as I mentioned it is a point where it would be more easy for the statists to attempt an inroad into said community. I envision a situation in which a pseudonym cannot cheat anyone out of more money than he has already put up as collateral on his contract. Thus mere cyber-fraud is never profitable. Instead, the only way to cheat people is to subvert the escrow&arbitration agencies into ruling unfairly in your favor, allowing you to abscond with your collateral and so forth. This, unfortunately, moves the whole mess of "law and society" from the elegant cryptographic solutions that we all love back into the realm of politics, social ideology and so forth, but I think we are in a better position to insure fair dealings now that we have these cryptographic capabilities like non-repudiation & privacy, and the currency & transaction protocols which follow from them. Note that because the escrow&arbitration agencies are likely to be large, redundant and interdependent a petty criminal will not have much chance of subverting them, but a major one-time heist is theoretically effective, as is the organized, large-scale extortion which does not heist it all at once but which instead siphons off an extortion (tax) payment at regular intervals. (Note strong resemblance between this last criminal strategy and the behavior of most governments.) Of course I'm not the first to think about these kinds of things. Nick Szabo (szabo(a)netcom.com) in particular has thought a lot about making the escrow&arbitration process mathematically deterministic, when he talks about his "liens" and "smart contracts", but my intuition is that the domain of contracts which are amenable to mathematically-controlled escrow&arbitration is much smaller than the domain of contracts which need a trusted intelligence to do the escrow&arbitration. (Nick also discusses the trusted-intelligence issues, such as using n-of-m key splitting to distribute the arbitration power.) In summary: lien, escrow and arbitration agencies, which are endowed by the principals with the authority to adjudicate fraud cases, and which are entrusted by the principals with the electronic cash, crypto keys, and so forth to enforce their decisions, will be essential to the operation of the pseudonymous economy. These agencies will themselves be the targets and/or the perpetrators of theft, however. Concerned citizens of the world need to start thinking about how to minimize these risks. Factors to consider include: The relatively low start-up costs of such agencies, the role of governments, mafia, or other force-wielding organizations, and "the problem of pseudonymity" (can't tell if two pseudonyms are under same True Person's control) possibly leading to a single organization controlling a large enough share of escrow&arbitration services that it can initiate heists or extortion. I'll be trying to write these ideas of mine into a set of HTML documents for display on my web pages. I appreciate all constructive correspondance. (P.S. Of course a pseudonym's reputation may be considered by some to be valuable enough to use as this "collateral" or "lien". It wouldn't be so considered by me. I'd take cash.) Regards, Bryce signatures follow "To strive, to seek, to find and not to yield." <a href="http://www-ugrad.cs.colorado.edu/~wilcoxb/Niche.html"> bryce(a)colorado.edu </a> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 Comment: Auto-signed under Unix with 'BAP' Easy-PGP v1.01 iQCVAwUBMKLZp/WZSllhfG25AQH/UQQAuGGRVjQBqpzY3+3ndpTdipFYkEIiRkaF c+6+FbdsUokCqcbSkTS1Dc/vOt3FRgtScvW9fvbMj0S5oqaLzvrHebLYASgeoihx AezLI0q8Cf2yKCYC4+e5bq/QPB78ZVsEGnnEDxIedRiLIFz72hCmCi9t+ybCYB9r yaRjAyNiAxg= =fGb2 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Worth of Crypto Consulting
by Armadillo Remailer 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Hi all, I have been doing some crypto consulting to small businesses for a while, but it looks like I may be swimming with bigger fish in the near future. I was wondering what "real" crypto consultants are getting these days. I will be advising these people on the security of systems others are developing, and helping them develop their own software, but I have no idea what the market value of my time is. Reply to the list, or send a message encrypted to the key below to alt.anonymous.messages with the subject "anonymous consultant". Many thanks, Anonymous Consultant -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: 2.6.2 mQCSAzCg84IAAAEEAOQ8cz/jqonUOWmS9lMWMh1CnFqwV8mYTbBS2zla5UQ61Tdn 272AUeKSil0PkUKqRcFW4xFbOJsMACryo15/iciuRQkwQ27ypDL0gcyjEIeYt6Aa h4j8b+XWWtjkRg5LApn6vms+ocI+MkFn6phJkOTb+xC18W572HFMiqhPvugNAC0Q AAAAAAG0LUFub255bW91cyBDb25zdWx0YW50IDxhbHQuYW5vbnltb3VzLm1lc3Nh Z2VzPg== =pIE2 -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----

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Re: Who needs time vaults anyway?
by John Lewell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Dan Oelke writes: >Now, if we just had objects between 1 and 10 light years away >that you could bounce lasers off of...... ;-) There are plenty of objects out there. But isn't there some danger of attracting the attention of high-spending aliens? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- John Lewell...66a St John's Wood High Street London NW8 7SH United Kingdom tel: +44 171 722 3098...fax: +44 171 483 1063....email: jrl(a)trel.demon.co.uk Trel...The Commercial Internet Product Finder..<http://www.lpac.ac.uk/Trel/>

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Re: coding and nnet's
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 11:40 PM 11/11/95, Michael Pierson wrote: >I wouldn't be surprised to learn of somebody like FinCEN using >neural-net systems to do pattern analysis on funds transfers and >the like, or the NRO or NSA investing research money into investigating >the usefulness of NNs for image processing or for scanning raw ELINT, >SIGINT or COMINT data. In fact, I'd be quite surprised if they weren't. These are well-known applications. The drug enforcement folks have programs running at a place called the "El Paso Information Center" (EPIC), from what I recall. Analyzing flights, passenger lists, etc., using various AI/pattern recognition programs. (Some say the El Paso locale has tendrils reaching to E Systems, Cray installations, etc., but I wouldn't know.) I recall reading of some contracts let out, and other RFCs, for AI programs for FinCEN use. Not surprising. (If I ran FinCEN, this is what I'd surely have a bunch of folks working on. Scary thought.) A bunch of AI-oriented job shops, such as Kestrel Institute and ADS, have links to intelligence and law enforcement. Really too many possible examples, and not surprising. >While NNs may not be of direct relevance to cryptanalysis, I suspect >they are, or will be, of great relevance to the task of identifying >what communications should be cryptanalyzed or otherwise scrutinized. >Especially given the high volume of traffic our 'thinkpol' aspire to >be able to listen to. Sure. Preprocessing of intercepts and signals, etc., is a natural application. The point about neural nets not likely to be used in pure cryptanalysis was a carefully limited point. --Tim May Views here are not the views of my Internet Service Provider or Government. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^756839 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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MS Corrects Press Release on "Samba" Security Problem
by llurch＠Networking.Stanford.EDU 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The Win95 product manager let me know yesterday that they'd corrected some of the errors on their Web server. I'm sure Microsoft is planning to publicize the changes in greater detail, so I'll just summarize them here. Load the original security bugfix news release at gopher://quixote.stanford.edu/0R1271897-1279147-/win95netbugs side-by-side with the corrected version now at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/software/w95fpup.htm to see the changes. Notable corrections are: 1. Microsoft has retracted the puzzling allegation that SMBCLIENT sends "illegal commands" across the network. 2. Microsoft is now a bit more forthright in acknowledging that the problem applies to all language versions of Win95. They didn't change the date, and they still say that Samba is shareware. And they still fail to give proper credit to the third parties that actually found the problems for Microsoft. Oh well, can't have everything. Microsoft has also promised that localized (foreign-language) versions of the "updated files that address the issue" will be made available within two weeks. I still don't understand what the hold-up is, but a time frame is good. In addition, Microsoft is reconsidering the position of the NE4100 and certain NE2000- compatible PCMCIA cards like the EFA-207 on the hardware compatibility list because, well, they aren't. Yusuf has given his imprimatur of Official Microsoft Response to the discussion of the well-known IPX SAP routing and security issue saved at gopher://quixote.stanford.edu/0R161799-178969-/win95netbugs. Previously this had only been posted with the "speaking only for myself" disclaimer,. Microsoft had acknowledged only the specific "server name conflict issue" covered by PC Week, not the underlying general problem that has been widely discussed on Usenet. Maybe we'll get a good article into the Knowledge Base now. I'm still hoping they'll document the known and acknowledged ProviderPath problem with wsock32.dll. Progress comes slowly. -rich

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Re: Pegasus Mail
by Rich Salz 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I sure hope some tells David Harris that his program is now export controlled. From my reading of his message, it seemed like he thinks he "beat the system" because he didn't include actual crypto code. Software that says "plug your own crypto here" is considered an anciliarry device according to the ITAR. Or, as I heard some NSA people call it, "the classic 'crypto with a hole'." Seems kinda silly that the hole is the crypto, but hey that anciliiary device clause, you just gotta love it. If Pegasus mail were written to support generic user-loadable content transforms, that would be different. But even then, you have to be careful how that's done. If just did some global search-and-replace and came up with "keyed compression" you wouldn't get past anyone. But if you had an opaque state block that the user modules could set/use/clear, and you passed that along with your in/out buffers, then you'd be safe. Of course, they'd know what is really going on, but are powerless to prevent it. /r$

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Information Resource Engineering Inc.
by Arley Carter 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I'm looking for information about encryption products made by this company. Any pointers will be appreciated. Regards: -arc Arley Carter Tradewinds Technologies, Inc. email: ac(a)hawk.twinds.com www: http://www.twinds.com "Trust me. This is a secure product. I'm from <insert your favorite corporation of government agency>."

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(fwd) Digital Signature Patent
by rah＠shipwright.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

For those as get Info Week... Cheers, Bob Hettinga --- begin forwarded text Mime-Version: 1.0 Date: Mon, 13 Nov 1995 08:08:47 -0500 To: rah(a)shipwright.com Subject: Digital Signature Patent for your information... ----------------------------------------------------------------------- RSA WANTS LICENSE FOR DIGITAL SIGNATURE TECHNOLOGY RSA Data Security claims it owns the dominant patent covering digital signature technology, and wants other companies and government agencies to pay them license fees for using it. The U.S. government is fighting RSA's claim, saying the digital signature algorithm it uses in its digital signature standard is covered by a different patent. If RSA can make its claim stick, the government will owe the encryption company royalties for use of its digital signature standard. source: Information Week 13 Nov 95 p20 via edupage --- end forwarded text ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah(a)shipwright.com) e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA (617) 958-3971 "Reality is not optional." --Thomas Sowell The e$ Home Page: http://www.webstuff.apple.com/~vinnie/Rah >>>>Phree Phil: Email: zldf(a)clark.net http://www.netresponse.com/zldf <<<<<

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List of reliable remailers
by Raph Levien 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I operate a remailer pinging service which collects detailed information about remailer features and reliability. To use it, just finger remailer-list(a)kiwi.cs.berkeley.edu There is also a Web version of the same information, plus lots of interesting links to remailer-related resources, at: http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~raph/remailer-list.html This information is used by premail, a remailer chaining and PGP encrypting client for outgoing mail, which is available at: ftp://ftp.csua.berkeley.edu/pub/cypherpunks/premail/premail-0.33a.tar.gz For the PGP public keys of the remailers, finger pgpkeys(a)kiwi.cs.berkeley.edu This is the current info: REMAILER LIST This is an automatically generated listing of remailers. The first part of the listing shows the remailers along with configuration options and special features for each of the remailers. The second part shows the 12-day history, and average latency and uptime for each remailer. You can also get this list by fingering remailer-list(a)kiwi.cs.berkeley.edu. $remailer{"extropia"} = "<remail(a)extropia.wimsey.com> cpunk pgp special"; $remailer{"portal"} = "<hfinney(a)shell.portal.com> cpunk pgp hash"; $remailer{"alumni"} = "<hal(a)alumni.caltech.edu> cpunk pgp hash"; $remailer{"bsu-cs"} = "<nowhere(a)bsu-cs.bsu.edu> cpunk hash ksub"; $remailer{"c2"} = "<remail(a)c2.org> eric pgp hash reord"; $remailer{"penet"} = "<anon(a)anon.penet.fi> penet post"; $remailer{"ideath"} = "<remailer(a)ideath.goldenbear.com> cpunk hash ksub reord"; $remailer{"hacktic"} = "<remailer(a)utopia.hacktic.nl> cpunk mix pgp hash latent cut post ek"; $remailer{"flame"} = "<remailer(a)flame.alias.net> cpunk mix pgp. hash latent cut post ek reord"; $remailer{"rahul"} = "<homer(a)rahul.net> cpunk pgp hash filter"; $remailer{"mix"} = "<mixmaster(a)remail.obscura.com> cpunk mix pgp hash latent cut ek ksub reord ?"; $remailer{"syrinx"} = "<syrinx(a)c2.org> cpunk pgp hash cut reord mix post"; $remailer{"ford"} = "<remailer(a)bi-node.zerberus.de> cpunk pgp hash ksub"; $remailer{"vishnu"} = "<mixmaster(a)vishnu.alias.net> cpunk mix pgp. hash latent cut ek ksub reord"; $remailer{"robo"} = "<robo(a)c2.org> cpunk hash mix"; $remailer{"replay"} = "<remailer(a)replay.com> cpunk mix pgp hash latent cut post ek"; $remailer{"spook"} = "<remailer(a)valhalla.phoenix.net> cpunk mix pgp hash latent cut ek reord"; $remailer{"rmadillo"} = "<remailer(a)armadillo.com> mix cpunk pgp hash latent cut"; $remailer{"ecafe"} = "<cpunk(a)remail.ecafe.org> cpunk mix"; $remailer{"wmono"} = "<wmono(a)valhalla.phoenix.net> cpunk mix pgp. hash latent cut ek"; catalyst(a)netcom.com is _not_ a remailer. lmccarth(a)ducie.cs.umass.edu is _not_ a remailer. usura(a)replay.com is _not_ a remailer. Groups of remailers sharing a machine or operator: (robo syrinx c2) (flame hacktic replay) (alumni portal) Use "premail -getkeys pgpkeys(a)kiwi.cs.berkeley.edu" to get PGP keys for the remailers. Fingering this address works too. remailer email address history latency uptime ----------------------------------------------------------------------- mix mixmaster(a)remail.obscura.com ----------- 1:32:59 99.95% ideath remailer(a)ideath.goldenbear.com -_.-------- 5:58:20 99.94% rmadillo remailer(a)armadillo.com +++ ++++++++ 39:25 99.92% penet anon(a)anon.penet.fi ---+------- 6:09:10 99.86% ecafe cpunk(a)remail.ecafe.org #*#*# #--*+* 38:11 99.86% alumni hal(a)alumni.caltech.edu *+*--***+* * 13:43 99.63% wmono wmono(a)valhalla.phoenix.net ****++-++* * 17:07 99.62% replay remailer(a)replay.com **+**+*++* * 11:27 99.60% vishnu mixmaster(a)vishnu.alias.net **-*+*+ **+* 14:30 99.38% robo robo(a)c2.org #*#*####** * 4:30 99.26% hacktic remailer(a)utopia.hacktic.nl **+**+**** * 10:30 99.26% spook remailer(a)valhalla.phoenix.net *****+-++* * 23:14 99.25% flame remailer(a)flame.alias.net + +**++*** * 20:38 99.21% portal hfinney(a)shell.portal.com #**--+#* * 13:15 99.08% bsu-cs nowhere(a)bsu-cs.bsu.edu *##++ ##** * 7:53 99.01% c2 remail(a)c2.org * -++++++ 45:17 96.60% ford remailer(a)bi-node.zerberus.de _ . _ _- 53:08:59 93.60% rahul homer(a)rahul.net +-**----**+* 15:00 99.98% extropia remail(a)extropia.wimsey.com .--..-* 11:56:59 84.16% syrinx syrinx(a)c2.org --++++-+- + 7:07:35 79.75% History key * # response in less than 5 minutes. * * response in less than 1 hour. * + response in less than 4 hours. * - response in less than 24 hours. * . response in more than 1 day. * _ response came back too late (more than 2 days). cpunk A major class of remailers. Supports Request-Remailing-To: field. eric A variant of the cpunk style. Uses Anon-Send-To: instead. penet The third class of remailers (at least for right now). Uses X-Anon-To: in the header. pgp Remailer supports encryption with PGP. A period after the keyword means that the short name, rather than the full email address, should be used as the encryption key ID. hash Supports ## pasting, so anything can be put into the headers of outgoing messages. ksub Remailer always kills subject header, even in non-pgp mode. nsub Remailer always preserves subject header, even in pgp mode. latent Supports Matt Ghio's Latent-Time: option. cut Supports Matt Ghio's Cutmarks: option. post Post to Usenet using Post-To: or Anon-Post-To: header. ek Encrypt responses in reply blocks using Encrypt-Key: header. special Accepts only pgp encrypted messages. mix Can accept messages in Mixmaster format. reord Attempts to foil traffic analysis by reordering messages. Note: I'm relying on the word of the remailer operator here, and haven't verified the reord info myself. mon Remailer has been known to monitor contents of private email. filter Remailer has been known to filter messages based on content. If not listed in conjunction with mon, then only messages destined for public forums are subject to filtering. Raph Levien

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