December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

PGP 3.0/4.0
by A. Padgett Peterson P.E. Information Security 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Subj: Re: ViaCryptPGP 4.0?! (was Re: PGP integrated into Z-Mail) For those who have joined us recently, PGP v 2.6x is essentially free for individual use under MIT's (and the gov's) exemption/permission for the use of patents helt at the moment by PKP/Cylink/RSA (not even going to get into that mess). For commercial use a license to use the RSA and IDEA components is necessary through fate or some such ViaCrypt obtained such a license before PGP became a Big Thing and with Phil's blessing formed a commercial unit to distribute what is called ViaCrypt PGP. Because of what I do, I spent the money to purchse the first product, ViaCrypt PGP v2.4 (PGP 2.3 analogue). In due course, when PGP v2.5 and 2.6x came out, Viacrypt followed suit with v2.7 and then 2.71 for Windows and I upgraded. Because the next "public" release is scheduled to be 3.0, the next ViaCrypt which will include the corporate featured (with escrow capability) Business Edition will be known as 4.0 with versions for PC, Mac, Unix, and VMS. Both 2.7 and what I have seen of 4.0 (not released yet) have a switch that allows backwards compatability if desired (know back to 2.3, not sure about earlier ones). The most compelling features of 4.0 are the floating toolbar or "Enclyptor" which allows use inside any Windoze program that supports cut & paste (have used it inside a Telnet session with a remote host and inside ccMail) and the "group" feature. Have no connection with Viacrypt other than knowing some of the people and "putting my money where my mouse is". Warmly, Padgett

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DES hooks in Linux kernel
by Ian Goldberg 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

(aeb(a)cwi.nl is included, as he seems to be the last person to have touched loop.c before it was put into the standard Linux kernel sources, but I may be wrong.) The file loop.c, included in recent Linux kernel sources, includes calls to DES routines, such as: #ifdef DES_AVAILABLE static int transfer_des(struct loop_device *lo, int cmd, char *raw_buf, char *loop_buf, int size) { <snip> des_ecb_encrypt((des_cblock *) tmp,(des_cblock*) loop_buf,lo->lo_des_key,DES_ENCRYPT); <snip> } #endif AFAIK, the presence of these hooks (even if surrounded by the ifdef's) makes this file illegal to export from the United States. Its presence on ftp sites in the US could get someone in trouble. - Ian "this ITAR thing is really silly..."

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Using PGP for pseudo random numbers?
by Sean A. Walberg 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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"Physical Reality II"
by Duncan Frissell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Bad Boys, Bad Boys Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do when they come for you? Bad Boys, Bad Boys repeat endlessly. We did 1) & 2) yesterday. Here are some more points. 3) There must be a reason for them to come "for you". They need motivation. As people go through their ordinary day-to-day lives, they do a lot of things that weaken government control mechanisms without directly confronting them. The whole development of modern capitalism, the modern finance markets, and the modern telecoms environment are examples of the wild flowers of individual power growing up in the garden of the state economy. Note that governments used to control wages, prices, interest rates, and capital flows. In the US, we had Regulation Q which capped the interest rates banks and S&Ls could pay. Ownership of gold by Americans was banned. Most European countries had strict exchange controls as did most of the 3rd world. Computers which made money market mutual funds possible and telecommunications which made rapid funds transfer possible ended most of these controls without any violent confrontations. If you are borrowing "overnight funds" from Tokyo, it's a little difficult to seize them because they disappear at midnight. If a restriction is easy to bypass, it tends to die. Controls on capital flows have died because the holders of capital don't have to pay attention to those controls. The first phase of the electronic revolution freed the large financial institutions that could afford to play the international funds transfer game. Retail electronic funds transfer will free everybody else. Now this liberation of money may not seem to mean much but if money is free, it results in other freedoms. It is hard to control people who have control of their own funds. They can just move on you. Obviously, the ease of creating artificial entities and the use of some of the privacy protecting tools pioneered by cypherpunks can play a role in hiding out from the Bad Boys as well. Everything that makes a target harder to find reduces the number of hits. Louis Freeh complained during the great net kiddie porn bust of 1995 that some of the perps had encrypted their files and this made them harder to prosecute. In general, the sheer growth of business and communications makes it much harder to identify investigatory targets. As markets, networks, and communications double and then double again, the Bad Boys have too much territory to search. They get spread too thin. <More Tomorrow> DCF

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PGP backdoor? (No, I'm not paranoid.)
by Mark Bainter 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I was recently speaking with a newly-made aquaintence, and we were discussing the merits of various encryption systems. Now, I had heard about all the people who claimed the reason versions later than 2.3 wouldn't work with 2.3 was because of a backdoor for the government. I personally thought they were being paranoid. However, this guy tells me that he met Phil at defcon and phil told him that he co-operated with the government and gave them information that would enable them to crack key's for versions later than 2.3. I don't know whether to believe him or not, as I said earlier he is not a long-time friend or anything, so he could just be lying to me. If anyone has any information on this I would appreciate it. --- "Man did not enter into society to become worse than he was before, nor to have fewer rights than he had before, but to have those rights better secured." --- Thomas Paine 1791 >>My key is on the keyservers.

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Re: ViaCryptPGP 4.0?! (was Re: PGP integrated into Z-Mail)
by Deranged Mutant 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Derek Atkins <warlord(a)MIT.EDU> writes: > > And, what does this have to do with ViaCrypt PGP 4.0? Would it be 3.0 > > compatible or is it something entirely different? > > I dont know. I dont work for ViaCrypt, and they have been fairly > secretive in their work. For all I know, they've made ViaCrypt PGP > 4.0 completely incompatible with PGP 2.6.2 and PGP3. I would have thought you and Colin would have some communication with Phil regarding PGP3, since PGP is his trademark. The web page referred to it as being in beta, so maybe they are working with the old specs... could also be that they completely rewrote and improved on the old version. (Of course if I have questions I should address them to ViaCrypt...) Rob. --- Send a blank message with the subject "send pgp-key" (not in quotes) to <WlkngOwl(a)unix.asb.com> for a copy of my PGP key.

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Re:
by Housley, Russ 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Blake: At least three companies have MSP implementations that can be liscensed. Russ ______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________ Subject: RE: Author: "Blake Ramsdell" <Blaker(a)msn.com> at internet Date: 2/28/96 12:19 AM > Further there is a good implementation of MOSS. It was even announced at > the workshop. Did you miss it? TIS has done an implementation that is > available for anonymous FTP, albeit only within the US. It's integrated > with MH, not the most favored mail user agent, but the current version has > shell scripts that perform minimal MIME functions to facilitate integration > with other agents. Is there a version that can be used in commercial applications? There is for PGP, S/MIME, and (I think) for MSP. From a developer's point of view, this will influence my decision between specifications. Blake

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Re: PGP backdoor? (No, I'm not paranoid.)
by jf_avon＠citenet.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

perry(a)piermont.com wrote: > >Mark Bainter writes: <snip> >> However, this guy tells me >> that he met Phil at defcon and phil told him that he co-operated with >> the government and gave them information that would enable them to crack >> key's for versions later than 2.3. I don't know whether to believe him >> or not, >Your informant is taking extremely good drugs. You should find out who >his connection is should you want to get any. > >Perry Dear Perry, many peoples hear many things. The difficult part is to figure out what is the validity of what ones hears. I personnally heard a things or two, even if I am not involved in any way in the trade of crypto. I heard them through outside channels, completely independently from any crypto-activist, wether pro or con (CPunks et al or Govt). Theses sources are of utmost qualifications. Wether or not there is a "vast conspiracy" either to make us believe that, for an example, PGP *is* or *is not* crackable we *do not* know. Every side have vested interests. Many opinions that PGP is secure rest on *actual* evaluation of our computing capabilities, actual or forecasted. And experts are *very often* wrong. Have a look at history of sciences... You'll realize that most accomplishments were held as impossible even shortly before they were discovered/created. Such is the history of intra-abdominal surgery, of space flight and of many other knowledge and/or technology. In most instances of life, it is much wiser to realize that *we do not know* and accepting ignorance as such rather than adopting the first tempting rationalization that comes to mind. Because in the former case, you still have the possibility to enhance life by learning, while in the second, you can only hope that you did not adopt a wrong belief that will eventually cost you dearly. Remember, when an ostrich puts it's head in the sand, which part of it's anatomy it is showing to the world... So, why waste bandwith with a post that apparently mainly seems to be aimed at dismissing somebody but brings *absolutely no* new knowledge to the discussion? Please, next time, post privately. Funny jokes are, IMHO, welcome because they have some life-enhancing value. So please, at least be funny... Your post makes me wonder for what terribly conspiring organisation are you working for... JFA The collectivists be DAMNED! **** OLD KEY: DO NOT USE ANYMORE UNLESS FOR VERIFYING SIGNATURES **** 1024 bits Key ID:57214AED 1995/10/04 Jean-Francois Avon <jf_avon(a)citenet.net> Key fingerprint = 84 96 76 AE EB 7C AB 15 88 47 87 B0 18 31 74 9F

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fun with the web and security
by daw＠orodruin.CS.Berkeley.EDU 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Here's a fun way to exploit security holes via the web: http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~daw/js1.html A rough representation of its contents follow. Whee! The web is awfully convenient for exploiting security bugs.... The following URL contacts your sendmail SMTP server and attempts to exploit an old, well-known security hole, trying to gain root access. Click _here_ to try it. As it stands, clicking on the URL above does not do anything harmful to your machine-- but it could! (This is a test of the emergency broadcast system. This is only a test.) ______________ We can get you to send arbitrary text, to an arbitrary port on an arbitrary host, from your machine. (If you are inside a firewall, we can thereby send arbitrary text to any internal machine by getting you to click on the link above.) The technique is simple: we list the host and port in a gopher URL, and encode the text to be sent in the path. For instance, a successful exploit of the hole could leave a backdoor root shell, and inform us via a pseudonym at an anonymous remailer. The exploit could be hidden by use of the JavaScript "width=1,height=1" techniques pioneered at John LoVerso's _JavaScript security hole page_; then you wouldn't even know when you'd been attacked. The exploit could be forced on you via many standard tricks: the Redirect: or META-EQUIV Refresh: or JavaScript mechanisms work fine, for instance. This is most dangerous when you are behind a firewall. Typically, there will be many machines inside a firewall which run insecure software. Normally, that would be safe, since the firewall prevents an outsider from connecting to the unsafe sendmail servers inside-- yet the example URL above allows outsiders like us to exploit security holes on the inside of your firewall. Nothing stops us from putting the IP address of a vulnerable machine inside your firewall in the URL above, and waiting for you to click on it: the firewall doesn't prevent connections from you to the internal vulnerable machine, and thus can't stop this attack. Using JavaScript, we don't even have to wait for you to click on anything. Furthermore, a JavaScript program could systematically and invisibly try all the machines inside your firewall. We could have used many other well-known security holes: there's nothing special about this particular sendmail bug (except that it was convenient for us to implement). ______________ Be afraid. Be very afraid. -- Ian Goldberg and David Wagner.

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"wisecrackers" by Levy in March Wired
by Vladimir Z. Nuri 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I sent this to <steven(a)echoync.com> but the address bounced. in any case I thougt I would cc: the list. this is a fun article to read, and I encourage everyone here to check it out. ------- Forwarded Message To: steven(a)echoync.com Subject: wisecrackers feedback Date: Tue, 27 Feb 96 18:12:02 -0800 From: "Vladimir Z. Nuri" <vznuri(a)netcom.com> hello, I'm a cypherpunk subscriber. I liked your wired article on the cpunks ("wisecrackers") a lot. I thought I would mention some things: 1. you didn't seem to address the issue that factoring has not been proven to be difficult. a fast factoring algorithm is not ruled out by any existing mathematical theories, although no one expects that one exists. in other words, it is purely mathematician consensus that insists that factoring is a hard problem. hence RSA has not actually been proven to be a secure way of encoding information. its only secure because no one knows how to factor numbers quickly, and everyone is pretty confident that such a capability does not exist, although no one has proven it (yet). RSA rests on the difficulty of undoing a "trapdoor function" and as far as I know, there is no proof that any operation used for cryptography is intrinsically difficult to undo. (there are proofs that some functions are "intrinsically difficult" but they can't be used for crypto, because what you need in crypto is some operation that "is difficult when you don't have secret information, but is easy when you do."-- that is, not "always difficult". that's a trapdoor function, such as that used in RSA-- the secret knowledge makes the operation possible, whereas without it, it is "computationally impossible", i.e. possible in theory but not practice.) in fact there have been very incremental improvements in factoring algorithms. but no one can say, "factoring number [x] takes exactly [y] years" because no one knows what is the optimal factoring algorithm-- they only know the best one that has been *found* to date. (which is the quadratic sieve you mention). the question of whether factoring really is difficult is interesting to study. there is a whole class of computer problems called "NP" that can be shown to be "difficult" in an equivalent way. whether they are truly "difficult" is an open question. surprisingly, factoring has not yet been proven to be in this "NP" class, despite that many other problems have been. also, some mathematicians say that people have been trying to factor numbers since the dawn of time (well, at least since the greeks) so that if there was a good algorithm, we would probably have found it by now. I would argue against this position, saying that computers are a very recent invention on the horizon of human knowledge. the study of algorithmic complexity did not really begin in earnest until the 70's or so, again an extremely recent blip of time in regards to the history of human mathematical thought. 2. I think you were overplaying what Morris said to Zimmermann at the end. it made for good drama but I suspect the truth is more mundane. the fact that he asked "how much would the NSA spend for [x]" (where here [x] is "break PGP keys"). does not imply that they can actually do [x]. rather, what it implies is that their first inclination is to assume that something is theoretically possible, and then determine how much it would cost to do [x]. then, they determine whether the stategic results of obtaining [x] are worth its cost. in other words, the NSA has to approach all cryptoanalysis from this basic point: can we justify the cost based on the stategic value of the intelligence. they have to make this choice all the time as to where they invest their resources based on the payoff. their first question is, "what is the strategic value of cracking [x] code". I believe that they are run internally such that projects that are feasible and that they have the money are not actually carried out just because they are possible-- the strategic value has to be determined. what Morris was asking Zimmerman was, "how much would it be worth to an attacker to be able to read PGP messages". the NSA might well come to the conclusion that nobody important is using PGP and therefore trying to break it to read their messages is a waste of time. my opinion is that what was implied by Morris's position. frankly, I think the threat of prosecution against Zimmermann suggests the NSA may not be able to break the RSA cypher at certain key lengths no matter how much of our tax money they burn trying. 3. a group broke a 384 bit PGP key a little while ago. I was surprised how little coverage this got. perhaps it was due to the choice of keys. some are more "respectable" than others. <g> Paul Leyland and Jim Gillogly (Derek Atkins maybe?) were involved as well as some cpunks. anyway, keep up the good work. (heh. loved the description of the media outlets as "bottom feeders"). bye ------- End of Forwarded Message

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