December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: anonymous age credentials, sharing of
by gw 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 04:24 PM 2/15/96 -0500, you wrote: >On Thu, 15 Feb 1996, gw wrote: > >> the People, want to support permanently binding a traceable, non-anonymous >> identity to all certificate attributes that are used in electronic exchange >> (age, etc...) then there is going to be the potential for someone to >> deliberately allow their credential to be misused. >> >> IMO, to prevent this totally would require implanting a non-forgable i.d. >> chip in everyone at birth ..... not very appealing. > >And even then, what about the people that undergo surgery to swap chips? > Seems less likely ... you would need qualified surgeon, etc. ... my suspicion is that biometric devices are actually more susceptible to bypass . >The only REAL way of authentication is biometrics. Anything else can be >swapped. For that matter, if you can replace an amputated finger, how about transplanting a hand? <shrug> I think the distinction between an implanted device and a naturally occuring biometric is 1. not that important, 2. not all that large, anyway. My point is -and I think this pretty obvious- without the "something someone IS" as opposed ot "HAS" there is no stopping the exchange of credentials. And then as you go to "HAS", it's just a matter of how far you want to raise the bar. I like that idea of surgically swapping tokens ... where do I find the Dr.? Assuming s/he's illicit, then where do I get the $? And the person to swap with? What's in it for him/her? >But if you amputate someone's hand or retinas then they won't >work(check for things like blood flow, etc.) > >Ben. >____ >Ben Samman..............................................samman(a)cs.yale.edu >"If what Proust says is true, that happiness is the absence of fever, then >I will never know happiness. For I am possessed by a fever for knowledge, >experience, and creation." -Anais Nin >PGP Encrypted Mail Welcomed Finger samman(a)powered.cs.yale.edu for key >Want to give a soon-to-be college grad a job? Mail me for a resume > >

3 2

Religious Right and CDA
by Thomas Grant Edwards 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Please see http://www.cdt.org/policy/freespeech/cc_ltr.html for a letter from Ed Meese, Ralph Reed, Donald E. Wildmon, and others which actually suggests language in the CDA. "Attached is the specific language we support which includes the House passed language on obscenity and includes revisions on both the House passed language on indecency, which would amend Title 18 and the Senate-passed language on indecency, which would amend Title 47. The combination of these provisions, we believe, would provide effective laws to curb obscenity and indecency on the Internet by establishing that all who knowingly participate in the distribution or facilitation of obscenity to anyone or indecency to children would be subject to the law." -Thomas

1 0

Re: NETSCAPE IS "IN MERGER TALKS WITH AMERICA ONLINE"
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Bill Frantz wrote: >... He noted that new data showed that 40% of US >Internet traffic was flowing through America OnLine's network and that >together with Netscape the two companies would effectively control the >technology now shaping the global network - "And then Microsoft would be >left without an Internet standard,". Perry sent me a polite note asking why I had posted the original post, and I replied: >(1) I thought it was of interest to people on the list, and not yet generally >available information. ... >(3) It speaks to the issue of whether there is a danger of oligopolistic >control of the net. Cypherpunks will, of course, work on technical solutions >to that danger. He suggested that in the future I make it clear why I think my posts are relevent to the subject of the list. At 7:44 PM 2/13/96 -0500, Deranged Mutant wrote: >I dunno. The World Wide Web Consortium supposedly exists to prevent >corporations from controlling the technology and standards. I agree that keeping the cost of market entry low, by having the technical standards freely available at no cost is an excellent way of furthering this goal. (The IETF has a similar policy.) In addition, free software (in the sense of the Free Software Foundation) will help. BTW - I do not consider oligopolistic control of the net of the net to be a serious danger in the five year time frame. I am less sanguine about the 30 year time frame. Bill

1 0

New discussion group "CDA96-L" = COMMUNICATIONS DECENCY ACT of 1996 (fwd)
by Robert A. Hayden 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 13 Feb 96 22:49 PST From: Gary Klein (bear-at-heart) <gklein(a)willamette.edu> To: Neil Radford <N.Radford(a)library.usyd.edu.au> Subject: New discussion group "CDA96-L" = COMMUNICATIONS DECENCY ACT of 1996 In light of the recent furor over the airwaves, in the media, and in lawsuits regarding the COMMUNICATIONS DECENCY ACT of 1996 that United States' President Clinton signed into law on February 8, 1996, I have created a forum for people to discuss the concerns raised by this (and similar) pieces of legislation. LISTNAME: CDA96-L FULL TITLE: Communications Decency Act of 1996 Discussion Group FORMAT: Un-moderated, Postings must come from registered subscribers SUBSCRIPTIONS: via LISTPROC software LISTOWNER: Gary M. Klein <gklein(a)willamette.edu> Management & Business Economics Librarian Hatfield Library Willamette University Salem, Oregon 97301 USA DESCRIPTION: CDA96-L is open to the networkng community. Its primary role is to serve as a means of communication among people who are concerned about the implications of the United States of America's COMMUNICATIONS DECENCY ACT of 1996 (signed into law by President William J. Clinton on February 8, 1996). Its secondary role is to serve as a discussion forum for similar legislation or regulation that may be in the formative or final stages in any other country, or at any local jurisdiction that would restrict, limit or inhibit use of Internet resources based on "decency", "morality", "offensiveness", or based on the age of someone using, operating, or accessing an Internet resource. SUBSCRIBING TO THE "CDA96-L" LIST: Anyone may subscribe to the list by sending a <sub cda96-l your name> command to <listproc(a)willamette.edu> For example, if Idi Amin wanted to subscribe, the post would be: mailto: listproc(a)willamette.edu text: sub cda96-l Idi Amin OTHER LISTPROC COMMANDS: Will be supplied to each subscriber as part of the Welcome Message. (please feel free to cross-post this announcement in appropriate places) GARY M. KLEIN "not your average librarian & indecent communicator" Hatfield Library / Willamette University / Salem, Oregon 97301 USA work 503-370-6743 / gklein(a)willamette.edu

1 0

RE: Some thoughts on the Chinese Net
by Robichaux, Paul E 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Jon-- I would suggest that the Chinese solution to these problems is singular, and simple: the total inability to conduct any transaction anonymously. My guess would instead be that the Chinese would register IP addresses to individuals. The precedent's been set already with registration of photocopiers, typewriters, and mimeograph machines. As Perry pointed out, RSA-signing each and every packet would be prohibitive. Assuming that their real interest is in controlling diffusion of information to and from the 'net-- and not moderating what goes on in the Chinese intranet (or inter-intra-net, I guess) I think address registration would be a logical first step. The simple portion is a national (Chinese) database associating true names with key IDs. These keys will be usable only to sign documents, not to encrypt information, similar to the Federal DSS. If the binding is instead true name <-> IP address, then the censors drop, block, delay, or spoof packets from thoughtcriminals instead of refusing to sign them. This avoids both the signature overhead and the expenditure of hard currency on gwai lo. Now that all information has a recognizable source, dissidents in China can be arrested, and unacceptable information never makes it into the country. Registering IP addresses of course won't block out thoughtcrime originating outside China, but unless everyone else adopts the packet signing scheme you outline the censors will still have to filter incoming material semi-manually. As far as I can tell their government is at least as interested in keeping things in as they are keeping out the Four Horsemen. -Paul

1 0

Re: PGP
by cmca＠alpha.c2.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- [To: cypherpunks(a)toad.com] [Subject: Re: PGP] It was written (not on paper) by "Sentient1" <Shade(a)cdale1.midwest.net>: > Could you settle a dispute? Is it, or Is it not, legal to take >PGP source code and the like out of the country if it is written on >paper? Yes it is. MIT published a book consisting of nothing but PGP source in OCR type, and it has been exported. Chris McAuliffe <cmca(a)alpha.c2.org> (No, not that one.) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6 iQCVAwUBMSQ2ZoHskC9sh/+lAQEd0gP/ZSj0lQYlWN9XxDEzSCRRSnt13TKG3DYU cqGLcbJb9hsp7Ye4+oW8Ei1+iXGOX/2u/TB7gNfQQ0MFR96bqSl0VzCq1R1Z4vqC vb6lv2pURpMwltTy7+k3gWx2p6Dsc6uTXC8ydTLKcWLg9o98JsR8ZtnxyOdzWtGM SoeaAP+T7Wk= =25iG -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

1 0

Re: Subject lines?
by Bruce Baugh 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:27 AM 2/14/96 -0500, olbon(a)dynetics.com (Clay Olbon II) wrote: >Ok, has everyone forgotten to use a subject line today, or is there a >problem with toad.com? Every message I received today that was dated 14 >Feb (except one - from "E. ALLEN SMITH" <EALLENSMITH(a)ocelot.Rutgers.EDU>) >had no subject and no from line (other than cypherpunks). I'd noticed the same thing, and am a little disgruntled, since it screws up my usual mail filtering. Bruce Baugh bruce(a)aracnet.com http://www.aracnet.com/~bruce

1 0

Re: A Cyberspace Independence Refutation
by lmccarth＠cs.umass.edu 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

James Donald writes: [in reply to strata] > Your other arguments casually dismiss the very real power that large numbers > of able people with good communications can exercise, have just exercised > very recently. Large numbers of able people with good communications very recently exercised their putative "very real power" against the passage of the CDA. They had no substantial impact AFAICS. (I intend no slur against the effort.) Could you name some examples, and add some qualifications that made the difference in those cases ? > Nation states are a new creation. In the past many different > kings ruled many different bits of one nation, and one king often > ruled parts of more than one nation. > > Today nation states are almost universal, and people can no longer > imagine what a nation is, other than a nation state. Just in case I'm one of those who "can no longer imagine what a nation is, other than a nation state", you should perhaps define the term more concretely. I guess The Nation of Islam might fit, or the worldwide community of Palestinians. > But the net is a nation, and is not a state, and nationalism is a force that > governments usually cannot withstand. OK, first of all I'm not convinced that the net qualifies as a "nation", but it's hard to say until I better understand what you mean by "nation". _Strong_ nationalism is a powerful force that governments often exploit to their own considerable advantage, and indeed also brings down governments in some cases. Offhand, it looks to me as though the USSR did a decent job of withstanding various strong internal nationalistic forces for a long time, and was brought down mainly by other considerations. > What makes a government strong is its cohesion, but the state cannot > create its own cohesion. When states attempted to confront nationalism, > they often lost cohesion and vanished altogether, like a string of sand. > > The "Nation state" is in essence a tactic for avoiding this hazard. Perhaps "often" is the case; from previous experience, I suspect your grasp of the relevant history is clearly superior to mine. (You have some great stuff on your web pages.) I note that you did not claim "all". > Governments are acutely aware of this problem, and act very cautiously > in the face of such threats. Many people seem to imagine that a > government innately and naturally has cohesion, that it is naturally > one thing, naturaly capable of acting coherently and cohesively as > an individual can. On the contrary, governments maintain their > cohesion with difficulty, and continually act, or refrain from acting, > in fear that they might lose it. OK, but govts. do indeed manage to muster plenty of cohesion in various actions. > In an all out knock down battle between a particular government and the > internet, in a state where a substantial proportion of the middle class > was on the internet, the government would be in serious danger of > evaporating like a jellyfish in the sunshine. I disagree, but assertions will get us nowhere. > The government can get away with a substantial amount of harassment and > restraint, but has only limited power to act without itself being acted > on, to change the world without itself suffering change. Sure, but the govt. has been changed before and can change again. I'm honestly very happy to see all this optimism. But unless and until my pessimism fundamentally changes, I couldn't sleep at night if I were to lie down and accept the optimistic claims. -Lewis "You're always disappointed, nothing seems to keep you high -- drive your bargains, push your papers, win your medals, fuck your strangers; don't it leave you on the empty side ?" (Joni Mitchell, 1972)

1 0

Patents and Trademarks invalid
by Zachary R Amsden 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Here's an idea: whenever someone uploads something like the RC2 source code, why not have everyone attach it to their .signature? Is criminal justice seriously going to pursue tracking down millions of people that did this? Or would they pull the plug. Food for thought (please don't e-mail me about this - I have enough e-mail already. Post instead)

3 2

Re: Cookie Crumbles
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Responding to msg by jsw(a)netscape.com (Jeff Weinstein) on Thu, 15 Feb 1:22 AM > You may choose not to believe me, but I have been >planning to add an option to disable cookies in the >next release for quite some time now. > > Just disabling cookies won't keep sites from tracking >your movements. Many sites require you to register and >log in when you access them. These sites will be able >to track your movements through them with or without >cookies. Jeff, You shoot electro-ammunition straight, so your credibility is solid. HQ should take target practice from you. Although explanations on this list may not be comprehensible to the public, or to NSCP's PR Dept. What are the chances that NSCP might add a feature that would allow customers to say yes or no at login to tracking their movements at any site visited, with a friendly notice that tracking analysis was being done? That might redeem the exchange value of cookies, and perhaps come closer to gving customers equality with the merchants, and merchants credibility with customers. As you are giving Netscape here, despite Wall Street's treachery. Thanks for your even-tempered and well-aimed potshots here. John

1 0