December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Jump Start ecash With IPhone
by clarissa_wong＠alpha.c2.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Proposal: Augment computer-to-computer Internet phone with local telephone-to-Internet-phone gateways to create a new telephone-to-telephone long distance network via the Internet. Result 1: No computer is needed for cheap long distance or international voice phone calls. Result 2: ecash gets its "Killer Ap", a service that (a) people want to buy and (b) requires micropayments for economic feasibility. (Details below.) Result 3: Creates a large, decentralized market that is difficult for anyone to regulate and that provides many opportunities to make money. Obvious Nonresult: Achieving privacy in long distance or international voice requires further development. Hardware and software beyond that in an ordinary telephone is needed at each end. Who Can Do It: ISPs (Internet Service Providers) are in the best position to operate nodes of this decentralized network. They have the Internet connection, the phone banks, the technical expertise, and some business experience. Telephone <---> ISP <---------> ISP <---> Telephone Scenario (Result 1): Granny Smith in Paducah wants to chat with her grandson Adam Smith, who is studying economics in Hong Kong. From her ordinary touch-tone phone she makes a local _voice_ call to Cheap Speech, Inc. and at the prompt enters the phone number for Adam. Cheap Speech finds that TalkToMe Ltd is a network node in Hong Kong within a local phone call of Adam and, through the Internet, establishes a connection. Then it patches in the voice call from Granny as TalkToMe dials out and reaches Adam. Granny Smith <--> Cheap Speech <-----> TalkToMe <--> Adam Smith Payments (Result 2): More than half the cost of running a traditional long distance voice business is for handling the billing. The cost of the technology to provide the service is thus less than the cost of the billing! Cheap Speech and TalkToMe cannot provide cheap voice service, as in the example above, unless they use a much more efficient payment system. That is why the low transaction cost of ecash is so important and that is why this message is being sent to cypherpunks rather than a telecom list or news group. So who uses the ecash? Surely Granny and Adam Smith can't shove it through ordinary telephones. They just want to get ordinary voice connections with ordinary telephones as they have for many years, only cheaper. Here is how I think ecash fits in: Granny Smith --> Cheap Speech Granny pays Cheap Speech through ordinary means, probably by monthly credit card charge, which is common for ISPs. The overhead for this probably is only around 5% (plus staff for account setup and support) because the ISP already is set up for that kind of payment system and Granny Smith is a local person providing repeat business, not a bad apple on a spending spree with a stolen credit card number. Cheap Speech --> TalkToMe Cheap Speech and TalkToMe do not have any previous business arrangement with each other and probably never have done business with each other before. They also are on opposite sides of the world. But Cheap Speech consults a Rating Service that says TalkToMe is reliable, so Cheap Speech sends a small amount of ecash to TalkToMe to open a connection and dial out to Adam. Since ecash clears instantly, TalkToMe does not need to know anything about Cheap Speech. No international billing network is needed. Little overhead is incurred. TalkToMe --> Adam Smith TalkToMe provides this service in exchange for the ecash from Cheap Speech. The main problem I see with this scheme is that Cheap Speech may have a cash flow problem. Payment to TalkToMe must be made immediately whereas payment from Granny Smith may take a couple of months to arrive. If, however, the volume of incoming calls (ecash coming in) matches the volume of outgoing calls (ecash going out), then the cash flow will balance out. Also, Cheap Speech could offer Granny a discount for prepayment. Regulation and Profit Opportunities (Result 3): Big, centralized organizations are big targets for lawsuits and regulation. They are the "deep pockets" lawyers love to pick. They are the leverage points for power-hungry politicians. But the Internet was designed to survive nuclear war. It was designed to route around outages, no matter their cause. A decentralized, Internet-based, international network of small, independent voice service providers could enjoy similar advantages. Many companies are creating _computer-to-computer_ Internet phone software. See the NetWatch Top Ten - Voice / Video On The Net at URL: http://www.pulver.com/netwatch/topten/tt24.htm We can depend on that technology to improve. I do not know of any companies who also are providing interfaces to ordinary telephones and designing a decentralized network with an ecash-powered payment system. That is our advantage. But the network described above has many limitations. These are opportunities to make money by selling your solutions to customers. Examples: It needs a directory and rating service for voice providers such as Cheap Speech and TalkToMe. (Perhaps Raph Levien will expand his rating services to a new domain?) The network will not be useful until it has many nodes. That is partly why this proposal is being sent to a large audience. Cypherpunks who cut their teeth building a remailer network perhaps can build a voice network, too? Think of it as a challenge. People who travel a lot will want cheap long distance telephone service while on the road. How do they arrange that if their only contract is with a service provider near their home? We need a more flexible payment protocol than the one described above. Enhanced services - fax, teleconferencing, time-delay and retry, phone mail, and collect calls. Multiple brands of ecash will require conversion services. Currently Mark Twain Bank's offering looks best, but when ecash succeeds, expect many more. Eventually, the network may work best with ecash denominated in currencies other than government-sponsored fiat currencies. Conclusion: If this idea is so good, then why am I telling you about it? (A) I cannot do it all myself. (B) Feedback on the idea from knowledgeable people is valuable. (C) If it succeeds, it will create a market with opportunity for plenty of people to make money, including me. (D) We have a limited window of opportunity to get this done. My guess is that we have roughly one year before other people embed their solutions into the Internet and financial system so deeply that this network will be locked out from commercial success. According to the theory of increasing returns, whoever gets to market first usually gets the market. (E) Even though the decentralized structure should help reduce exposure of the network-as-a-whole to harmful lawsuits and regulations, individual local providers may face sanctions from regulators of the FCC, state PUCs, national Telekom monopolies, etc. once they realize what's happening. (Operators of cypherpunk remailers endure similar risks.) The faster the system can be developed and deployed, with a large number of satisfied customers, the more widespread support it will have, the harder it will be to stamp out, and the safer life will be for everyone involved. It would be nice to be able to say "The Genie is out of the bottle." CW

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Re: Bidzos on CNBC, discussing Leahy's Bill
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 01:26 PM 3/5/96 PST, Jim Bidzos wrote: > >I'm in favor of the Bill because it specifically prevents, by law, the >US Govt from mandating key escrow. Justa sec! I thought it was the 1st amendment to the Constitution which was supposed to prevent mandatory key escrow. Why should you be happy about a law: A law which is made by Congress can be UNmade by Congress. >Also because it would, by law, >force export control of crypto out of the Dept. of State and into the >Dept. of Commerce, effectively allowing any crypto used in the US and >"widely available" to be exported. While I agree this segment of the bill may be an excellent result, there is no reason that we should have to tolerate the bad portions of this bill to get the good portions. >(The bill does a few other things. >One, it provides for criminal penalties for key holders who abuse >their role as an escrow agent, assuming anyone *chose* to use key >escrow. Which may, inadvertently, give the average individual the ILLUSION of protection. Remember, prosecutions occur because the GOVERNMENT wants them to occur; there is no such thing as a "private prosecution," unfortunately. I'm not particularly afraid of abuse by key escrow agents, because I have no intent of using one. >Second, it makes the use of encryption -any encryption- a >crime if used in the commission of or support of any criminal >activity. Having not read the bill, I can't know for sure, but I'd imagine that if the term "support" is in the bill, they define that term as broadly as they want to. Sorry, but I'm not satisfied. If an act is criminal, let's prosecute the act itself. Any attempt to prosecute USE of encryption must, essentially by definition, impute an INTENT to the user, an intent that the government will fabricate after-the-fact. The government will also use this law to keep themselves in business, as you probably understand I believe. >I think the bill would be better off without these >provisions, but I suspect this is an attempt to give the >administration something.) Let's give them NOTHING. The government is already hamstrung in their attempt to restrict encryption. I expect that nothing in this bill helps us out in any way. >I anticipate that the Administration, led by the intelligence and law >enforcement interests, will vigorously lobby against this bill... As surprising as this may sound, I hope THEY "win." Because that won't really be a win for them, and it won't really be a loss for "us."

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No Subject
by owner-cypherpunks＠toad.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Thu, 7 Mar 1996, Duncan Frissell wrote: > However, a CA operating outside the licensing structure of current CA's > would have very low costs and hence no investment to lose in litigation. > Costs would be almost entirely marketing related and as long as you stayed > out of jurisdictions with some of the new CA law, no regulatory costs or > barriers. > I don't think this is definitional. If nothing else they can take the equipment. If you don't incorporate, your personal assets are at risk; if you do, you have to keep a real separation between the corporation and yourself, pay the taxes, etc. Ok, make it a non-profit labor of love; low risks, no returns, then maybe you are right. Just hope that there ar no punitive or large consequential damages, and no one pierces the corporate veil (unlikely, I admit, but not impossible). What law applies to a certificate used in a multi-jurisdictional transaction is less obvious to me than I would like. I think I have talked a student in my seminar into writing a paper to educate me. [The above may have been dictated with Dragon Dictate/Win 2.0 voice recognition. Be alert for unintentional strange word substitutions.] A. Michael Froomkin | +1 (305) 284-4285; +1 (305) 284-6506 (fax) Associate Professor of Law | U. Miami School of Law | froomkin(a)law.miami.edu P.O. Box 248087 | http://www.law.miami.edu/~froomkin Coral Gables, FL 33124 USA | It's warm here.

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No Subject
by owner-cypherpunks＠toad.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Well, it turns out that (according to a nice person at SurfWatch who put up with the rant I mailed in and send back a denial rather quickly) io.com isn't actually blocked. At least, so they say. No comment on whether there's anything like the "25 complaints" policy. I don't own SurfWatch, but if anybody does and finds www.io.com blocked, I'll send in another rant. I wonder whether they've actually considered the liability situation in re: blocking sites that shouldn't be blocked? I mean, sure, they seem nice enough about setting things right (like with the Nynex sites whose url's had "xxx" in the paths), but it seems to this non-lawyer that a case could be made for damages inflicted by being known as a purveyor of filthy indecency for even a short while. ______c_____________________________________________________________________ Mike M Nally * Tiv^H^H^H IBM * Austin TX * pain is inevitable m5(a)tivoli.com * m101(a)io.com * <URL:http://www.io.com/~m101> * suffering is optional

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No Subject
by owner-cypherpunks＠toad.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- someone wrote: >[homepage on IO] > >BTW, did you hear that IO got on the SurfWatch "bad list" because there >were more than 25 complaints about objectionable material in the io.com >domain. (Apparently, when SurfWatch hears more than 25 complaints >against a particular domain, the just deny access to the whole domain >rather than particular URLs.) A quick phone call to the Surf Watch people revealed that they rarely block whole domains, and that they are not currently blocking all of io.com. - -- mutant(a)compuville.com "They that can give up essential liberty to mutant(a)cypher.net obtain a little temporary safety deserve (send mail with Subject: neither liberty nor safety." send-pgp-key for PGP key) -Ben Franklin ~1784 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMT9NaH0ndmRPxibdAQFSJwQAtq/s1c+GZlHvgVOhNgM8Dseq0SQ+6L8U bx8FV0l85anNk+fjRnY5hD8RflHFeVzLis2yDmn8BLjYzVnHBEWBXXncpwg3okoQ FOMJJTZZbOec10ESy3pvRPwgie60IaR3qIcHUmUHRqbv5dOjgDg5GhYWeZ8rhCCN 0pisfaQBsVc= =qgSw -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: A brief comparison of email encryption protocols
by cme＠cybercash.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- At 15:54 2/29/96, Derek Atkins wrote: >So, there needs to be a compromise, some shorthand method to describe >the hint. One solution is to provide a "keyserver" type and then some >string that says which "keyserver" to use. For example, if there is a >DNS-style keyserver deplyed, I could put '1,"mit.edu"' in all my >signatures, if we assume that '1' is the DNS-style keyserver code. > >I'm sure there are other possible solutions as well, and any real >suggestions are welcome. is a URL just too big? My sigs are already several lines long. E.g., Key: ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/cme/cme.asc -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMTYY/1QXJENzYr45AQFr5QQAkff2u+VvCvpPYTyYCVsj1NFMD/dsN+Ps Dyc7cX4iMDynls+dibG8cTAw6FrqKtvZ6qSDdu15oI49rHiEzTZOWj/VUKjlalmu rp0QZ7iSiYinsHFK4H/ZfWarx/3RfngGFXjNOLQUjpe0Otqz1nnHqaVkCXPbz/VG gmQbMKn5syA= =hKEC -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+ |Carl M. Ellison cme(a)cybercash.com http://www.clark.net/pub/cme | |CyberCash, Inc., Suite 430 http://www.cybercash.com/ | |2100 Reston Parkway PGP 2.6.2: 61E2DE7FCB9D7984E9C8048BA63221A2 | |Reston, VA 22091 Tel: (703) 620-4200 | +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+

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No Subject
by owner-cypherpunks＠toad.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> In a statement from Washington, the America's Carriers Telecommunication >Association says it "submits that it is incumbent upon the FCC to exercise >jurisdiction over the use of the Internet for unregulated interstate and >international telecommunications services." > "For example," adds the ACTA statement, "online service providers generally >charge users around $10 for five hours of access and then around $3 for each >additional hour. Five hours equals 300 minutes, divided by $10 is 3.3 >cents per >minute. The average residential long distance telephone call costs about 22 >cents per minute or seven times as much." It seems that once again, big business is trying to get in the way of progress and competition because they are afriad they are going to lose some money. It seems to me that the ACTA is upset because someone found a way to "do it cheaper" and the telco's stand to lose a lot of long distance dollars. So rather then using this technology and perhaps lowering LD rates, instead they seek to block out the technology from the public. I wonder what would happen if someone discovered an drastically cheaper alternative to gasoline, but it never made it main stream because the oil companies would go out of business. Seems like the same type of situation with the telco's. > Says ACTA, "Technology may once again be surpassing government's ability to >control its proper use. However, the misuse of the Internet as a way to >'by-pass' the traditional means of obtaining long distance service could >result in a significant reduction of the Internet's ability to transport >its ever >enlarging amount of data traffic." No, the technology is surpassing the telco's ability to provide low-cost communications. > Specifically, ACTA petitions the FCC to define the type of permissible >communications that may be effected over the Internet. Permissible communications? This sounds like something out of the CDA ... I say, just try and regulate it. I want to see the FCC try and monitor several million computer transmissions every day and see how well regulation works. Thomas J. Sawyer sawyer(a)nextek.com

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Re: Another Motivation for the CDA
by Deranged Mutant 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Note: This post is 100% free of crypto and conspiracy theories. My response to Tim: > >I think you're reading too much into motives, Tim. I don't think that > >most in congress are capable of thinking that elaborately, and besides, > >if someone is convicted of violating the CDA for saying "fuck" online, > >that is the type of felony that one can get a judge's waiver for... Jim Bell's response to mine: > I am NOT relieved at hearing this. If one must have a "judge's waiver," > then that means he probably can "request" whatever other conditions he > chooses to put on his waiver. The government still has a motivation to make Yes and no. Depends on the judge. Some are hard-assed about granting waivers, others aren't. Part of the problerm is that judges have too much discretion. Another is in the constitution, w/regards to right to vote (it can be denied to felons... I know a couple of people convicted of DWIs that can no longer vote... they just don't care enough to go to a judge and get a waiver.) Not that you would want to put faith in getting a waiver. I'm just critical of Tim's assertion/speculation that gun-control is related to voting for the CDA. 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: TCP/IP Stego (was CU-SeeMe)
by JonWienke＠aol.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>A tcp header contains quite a bit of useful information.. but most of it >wouldnt be easily manipulated (by me) to get a bit. You cant very well >alternate the port number you are using, or change the packet sequence >numbers. However, the tcp protocol forces each tcp header to contain a >'checksum' field.. which is (more or less) the sum of all the octets in >the packet. This is used as error correction for the protocol. It >shouldn't be too difficult to force TCP to fiddle with the data in the >packet a bit to force the checksum to be a particular sort of thing (i.e. >even or odd number) .. 0 for even and 1 for odd would get us our one >bit of data per packet. This is a bad idea, because in addition to the extra processor overhead, it is an incredible waste of bandwidth. For a 512 byte packet, you are only getting .02% efficiency, because you wouldn't be able to use the actual data in the packet; otherwise someone would probably notice the increased error rate if you dink around with the checksum. This does not provide adequate plausible deniability. Stegoing a 16 bit WAV file gives you 50% efficiency, (you can replace the 8 least significant bits with stego data and still keep 10 bits worth of sound quality) and someone else would be unable to prove there was any encrypted info in it if you did it right. Jonathan Wienke

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Re: Assassination Politics 9!
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:13 PM 3/3/96 -0500, John Young wrote: >On Mar 03, 1996 10:57:14, 'nobody(a)REPLAY.COM (Anonymous)' wrote: > > >>Just because you two aren't interested, doesn't mean others aren't. >>Work is actually in progress in implementing such a system. > > >The Economist of March 2 has a cover story on state, church and private >terrorism, the effectiveness and failures of each, the arguments and >apologies, the savages and the victims, the lucrative concocting of >imaginary enemies -- military, religious, political, personal. > >It's conclusions are ... well, have a read and dread how the Demon Trio of >state, church and private super-righteous sub-humans will murder you and >your loved ones next to fulfill their blind ambitions. Well, I'm not particularly interested in how the Establishment is going to demonize those who would seek its eventual downfall. While I probably wouldn't have any argument against complaints about "state and church terrorism," I really doubt whether the so-called "private terrorism" you mention above qualifies. Most traditional "terrorism" (as least "traditional," by the standards of the last 20 years) is thought to involve relatively unfocussed attacks against people and locations, but in situations where attacks against selected government officials would be far more selective and effective. Naturally, those same officials wouldn't approve of replacing a scattershot technique with one that targets them more directly. Since I propose exactly that kind of replacement, I am presumably not the most ingratiating figure to these people.

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