December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: lp ?
by thad＠hammerhead.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Michael Shields quoted and wrote: > Anonymous <nobody(a)REPLAY.COM> wrote: > > > -- then through the same > > > Vienna, Virginia (USA) site ... > > ...a major router at a major interconnect run by UUNET, a major provider. > datasrv appaently contracted with UUNET for traffic. Naturally it would > go through their network, which is centered in the US. So, if this person was sending cryptographics codes from Switzerland to Israel, the code would have been imported to the US, then exported by UUNET. They can't do that, can they? Probably nobody would prosecute, but it might be something to threaten UUNET with if one of their Northern Virginia neighbors ever wanted something the couldn't get otherwise. thad -- Thaddeus Beier email: thad(a)hammerhead.com Technology Development vox: 408) 286-3376 Hammerhead Productions fax: 408) 292-2244

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So much for free speech...
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 1:34 PM 11/6/95, s1113645(a)tesla.cc.uottawa.ca wrote: >On Mon, 6 Nov 1995, Dr. Frederick B. Cohen wrote: > >> In the United States, we have the right to express whatever view we >> wish, so long as it doesn't endanger others (e.g., insight to riot, >> scream "fire" in a crowded theater when there is no fire, etc.). >> Everyone has an inherent right to question why a person seeks moments of >> anonymity or privacy. > >You're forgetting our good friends the libel laws. Another reason to go anon. >You have the right to say whatever you please, but you'll have to be able >to defend it in court if it damages someone's reputation. It can also get >you fired. (or shot if you're MLK) Sadly, the tradition of "free speech" is under assault. On many fronts. The new "civil rights" laws are just one avenue for the suppression of what was once considered free speech. Submitted for your disapproval: "13-year-old student arrested for racial slurs" (Santa Cruz Sentinel, p. 1, 3 November 1995) by Michael Green, Redding Record Searchlight "REDDING -- When a 13-year-old Redding student was arrested for allegedly making racial slurs, police and school administrators said it was necessary to maintain order and send a strong message against racism. "But some legal experts take a dimmer view of the boy's arrest, saying that calling someone names, even offensive ones, is not a crime and in fact is constitutionally protected. ... "The Redding-area boy, who is white, allegedly made racial insults toward a 12-year-old Hispanic student before being arrested last Thursday. ... "Police Chief Bob Blankeship said he would encourage officers to use the civil rights laws to stop racial harassment if prosecutors determine it is appropriate. ... "The boy was arrested on suspicion of violating the Hispanic student's civil rights. Penal Code section 422.6 makes it a misdemeanor to interfere with another person's rights or harm their property because of their race, gender, religion, disability or sexual orientation." ----- Wow! "Verbal abuse." Throw away the key. "Freedom does not mean the freedom to think bad thoughts," as Big Bro once said. If they don't get you for illegally using random numbers, they'll get you for uttering incorrect words. Back to reality. No word on whether prosecution will take place (I doubt it...this will likely be dropped, now that the message has been sent to the students, and now that civil rights folks are getting interested). Children are usually not accorded full constitutional protections, especially not in public schools, but this does not mean the police should arrest those who utter the wrong words! (Maybe suspending the student, though I certainly wouldn't do that.) This is the "safe and secure" world we are in, where bad thoughts and bad words are punished. Or threatened with lawsuits. Anarchy seems infinitely preferable to me. --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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New sendmail coming on toad.com; expect disruptions
by John Gilmore 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Hugh and I will be installing a new sendmail on toad over the next day or two. You can expect some delays and troubles from the list over that period as we shake it down. We hope that the result will be faster and better service for y'all. John Gilmore

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Re: toolkits?
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The most common typo (of any significance) I seem to make is leaving out the "not" in a strongly worded statement: >You may have gotten no responses because it generally is not up to a state >government to ensure that "mediocrity" in the Internet is avoided (though >I'm not sure what is meant by "mediocrity." If it is security and >anonymity, this is definitely the state government's responsibility, or ^ not >even area of interest.) It's almost as if I'm "leaning on the horn" so much as I'm typing, that I leave out the all-important "not" modifier. My apologies. --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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Recovering lost coins in ecash
by szabo＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> One problem a number of people have reported in DigiCash is disappearing > money. Several people have reported that if a transfer is misconfigured > the cash can flow out of the wallet, be rejected at the other end and > disappear from the system - i.e. misprinted names on cheques mean lost cash! These users need to learn the features of the software. Backups of spent coins are retained in the payment history ledger. Select the payment from the ledger, and hit _Cancel_ to cancel the payment. This credits the lost coins to your account. The story behind this (which is, alas, not so apparent to the user) is that this essentially spends the coins at the bank, so that if they were lost, the amount will be credited to your account. If the coins were already cleared and credited to the payee then you ask the payee for your money back (or to properly deliver the purchased service), relying on their business reputation (ie, complain loud and publically if you don't get satisfaction). For the latter case an escrow service would be a useful third-party add-on to the basic ecash system, to allow exchanges in larger amounts without incurring this risk from the payee. This bit of electronic magic is one place where ecash is superior to physical cash -- but at the expense of not being obvious from the metaphor. It also illustrates the superior flexibility of online clearing -- double spending is used as an error recovery tool, to find out whether the payment was in fact lost, rather than as an indication of fraud. Nick Szabo szabo(a)netcom.com Internet commerce consultant

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Re: Credentials Without Identity
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 13:35 11/5/95 +0100, Mats Bergstrom wrote: >This applies very much so in Sweden too. It *is* illegal to maintain any >database with 'information on persons' (like their email addresses) without >approval from the Data Inspection. But it's an open secret that this law >is broken on a massive front and no bureaucrat is really trying to uphold it. So the address book I keep in my hip pocket is illegal! ----------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz Periwinkle -- Computer Consulting (408)356-8506 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz(a)netcom.com Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA

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Re: censored? corrected [Steve Pizzo cited in The Spotlight]
by Rich Salz 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>Sorry. But still, then intent was to be user-friendly (right?), and >a side effect was to make it possible to renumber without anyone noticing. No. DNS was created because the management of everyone editing and downloading one huge file was just falling apart. The Arpanet always used names instead of numbers. Moving hosts around was always possible. CIDR doesn't affect that fact that if nntp.com switches, say, to BBN Planet then I will have to get a new address. CIDR just says you can route based on smaller/larger granularity than IP Network Address classes. >That's the connection between DNS and routing, and it's why using names >instead of numbers is Good. There is no connection. Using names instead of numbers is good. It does bring up an interesting philosophical question about where the True Name really is. And how DNS must be part of your TCB unless/until you have end-to-end mutual authentication. /r$

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Software development
by jolson＠squeaky.free.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Two suggestions for new product development 1. Secure virtual disk drives for OS/2 2. A combination of secure email server/client for public domain use such as this E-Mail list.

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DejaNews all over again--a URL for Usenet Searching
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I usually avoid passing on URLs of interesting sites, in the name of conserving bandwidth (*), but this one really has me jazzed: http://dejanews.com/ It allows searching of Usenet archives (a few months' worth, from what I can see). This was pointed out to me on the Cyberia list, by Eugene Volokh, who wrote: " Check out http://dejanews.com/ -- truly a remarkable service. They index a huge number of Internet news groups, and let you search through them for any word or words you want. " Want to know what people are saying about some new book? About some political topic? Most importantly, about you behind your back? Check it out! Lots of fun, and a bit scary." A good way for newcomers to find out what's been written on some topic that interests them, or to see who's writing what. (I checked out the index for: "Blacknet," "Chaum," and a bunch of other things...the possibilities are endless, and I suspect this will be the URL I go to more often than any other.) --Tim May (* Perhaps someday we might ask people what their favorite URLs are. We've done polls on books, so why not URLs?) 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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re:using PGP only for digital signatures
by Bill Stewart 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 04:12 PM 11/4/95 -0500, James Black <black(a)eng.usf.edu> wrote: >Hello, > I am in a discussion (during the week) with a system administrator >about seeing if we can just make PGP publically available to everyone, >but now the discussion seems to be to just allow PGP to do digital >signatures, and I don't think that is the best choice, then. They are >not against PGP being used, but there are legal issues as to whether they >can offer it to everyone, as some students are international students, >and are not allowed to use the version for the US, or so I have been >informed, so now I need to see if we can have the international version, >so these students can use it. :( > Is there any good programs (for the Unix, SunOS) that just does digital >signature encryption? What they are trying to do is make certain that no >one can send a message to anyone, claim to be in the faculty, and cause >problems that way. My position is just a student programmer, but I am >trying to learn as much as I can, to answer questions and deal with problems. Yeah, there's RIPEM-SIG, which is approved for export so you can even give it to your non-Yankee students, and it's compatible with the RIPEM secure email stuff. So your US students, and anyone else who wants to download the software from England, can send secure email, and everybody can check the signatures. I'm not sure if RIPEM-SIG has caught up with the features in the latest versions of RIPEM, which include an X.509 variant on Web of Trust. Somebody else has brought up the insecurity of using security software on multi-user machines, where the system administrator or anybody who cracks root can steal your passphrases and even replace the trustable software with trojan-horse versions; your students will be safer if they only trust stuff running on PCs from software they've verified themselves. But you can at least do signature-checking safely on a multi-user machine if the software is protected adequately. #--- # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, Freelance Information Architect, stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com # Phone +1-510-247-0664 Pager/Voicemail 1-408-787-1281 #---

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