December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

[NOISE] Re: Freedom and security
by cpunk＠remail.ecafe.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Apr 30 1996 at 19:38:55, angels(a)wavenet.com wrote: > If it were permitted to kill those who disagreed with you, > then no one would be free to speak their mind at all, for fear > of the consequences. A person's freedom of speech is reduced by being afraid of the consequences of that speech. Likewise, a person's freedom of speech is improved by being less afraid of the consequences. Therefor, we can scrap the first amendment, and just drink plenty of beer.

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Re: Freedom and security
by Duncan Frissell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 07:38 PM 4/30/96 -0700, CyberAngels Director : Colin Gabriel Hatcher wrote: > >Maybe you feel like a veterano and can afford to look condesendingly at all >the thousands of fresh-faced netizens just arriving online and say "well if >they can't take the heat they should stay out of the fire" - but if we are >to call ourselves an emerging "community" then we must take responsibility >for our city, and that means caring about other people's problems. > >The internet is not just a collection of bits and bytes - it's real people >doing real things to each other. > >When your address is forged and you get flamed and bombed, or if you start >receiving anonymous death threats, your freedom is under threat. It's not >enough to say "Well I just turn off my monitor" If these millions of the "Great Unwashed" managed to get *on* the Net in the first place without Fascist assistance, they can figure out how to survive there without Fascist assistance. DCF

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Re: [LONG] Churchill Club: 20th Anniversary PK Crypto
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> Paul Raines, Project Manager, United States Postal Service described > ... The post office brings four things that private > industry can't: ... (2) ... well established reputation, ... > (4) it can act as a trusted third party. > >Oh. Well that's good to know. > > --MarkM I just report them like I hear them. They are priced higher than Verisign too. Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Bill Frantz | The CDA means | Periwinkle -- Computer Consulting (408)356-8506 | lost jobs and | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz(a)netcom.com | dead teenagers | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA

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partial NSA key detected on USPS site
by Dave Del Torto 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Is it too late for April, fooles? <http://www.usps.gov/images/stamps/96/comp.gif>

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Re: Freedom and security
by liberty＠gate.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- CyberAngels Director Colin Gabriel Hatcher wrote: <snips> >>...Freedom does not increase through more laws. > >Nor does freedom increase through less laws or no laws. You have gotta be kidding me, but let's start by differentiating among laws. I'm a crypto-minarchist, not a crypto-anarchist, so I still have hope for some (MUCH less) government. I think laws against murder are good, and lead to more safety for those not in jail. I think laws against "consensual crimes" are bad, and lead to government/police corruption extending all the way to the top [see sigfile]. When I have to say, "where's the victim?" it's a shitty law. Many laws fail my test. > Freedom increases >as respect and care for one another increases. This is what I called flowery rhetoric in the last post. > Meanwhile, since we do not >live in utopia, all societies at a certain level of economic development >and of a certain size of population require law and law enforcement to >protect citizens from predators. This is what astounds me, the advocates of more government always focus on crimes WITH obvious victims during debates. Once power is achieved, the victimless crime laws get written. I have said I do want murderers, and even some (not all) pedophiles, in jail. If a child pornographer chooses to visit my page and commits a thoughtcrime involving my babypictures, I say leave him alone. If he commits a real crime with an unwilling victim I say punish him even more than the present government punishes him. Libertarians, when we achieve political power, will find ourselves with abundent jail cells left over from the tax-and-spend drugwar to put real criminals (the ones who have an individual victim) in. >[...flowery rhetoric] Does anyone really doubt the extent of State >control and power across the Net? There are certainly enough statists who feel a need to increase it. > > >.... laws only breed more laws, which always lead to >>less freedom. > >I disagree with this statement. I do not believe that laws breed more laws >nor that laws lead to less freedom. I believe bad laws compromise freedom >(eg CDA) while good laws protect freedom. I am heartened by your opposition to the CDA (though I did not notice a Cyberangels voice in the debate/protest leading up to this abominable law...) but I must point out that you offer no good test, like my "where's the victim?" test, to differentiate good laws from bad ones. As to more laws leading to less freedom I stand by my words. Go down to any law library and have a look at the Code of Federal Regulations. As wordy, poorly-written laws proliferate, we all become "criminals," subject to the arbitrary power of the state's prosectors. When the state prosecutors are a partisan Democrat followed by a partisan Republican, and the "criminals" are high-ranking Democrats and Republicans, you end up with a lesser respect for all laws, even the good ones. Again, see my sigfile. Now imagine the Libertarian party was doing the same drug-smuggling...Would the feds [let alone the media] be so silent? I doubt it. >Cryptography enhances and protects privacy, which does not inevitably lead >to greater security. Security for the sender, yes, in that no one else can >read the message, but security for the Community? I find it worrisome that you capitalize the word, despite my rant involving Director Freeh. I repeat: The community is made up of individuals. > Doesnt that depend what >the message said? The technology itself is neutral. Therefore, I guess, the "Community" must forcibly take my key to make sure that last PGPmessage wasn't child porn, right? It is important to make sure I don't commit thoughtcrime. > Child pornographers >encrypt their hard drives so that law enforcement cannot gather crime >evidence - that is certainly a state of greater security for the >pornographer, but it does not improve our Community, and as child >pornography increases, the law is by definition broken more and more, and >so the Community becomes less free than before. And that's not the tyranny >of government but the tryanny of criminals. Look. I don't care if some old man beats off to the tune of baby pictures. There is no victim. If he finds a victim, toss him in the slammer, or kill him. Right now, the tax-and-spend drugwar is creating a revolving-door justice system when it comes to victim crimes, and the people (naturally) disrespect the law. Respect for ALL law, good and bad, is poisoned by this foolishness and when combined with a disrespect for the historical power of juries to nullify shitty laws, and ignorance of history. >I do in fact support cryptography for personal security, not least because >I can ensure that my messages are authenticated. CyberAngels PGP public >key will be up on our new website opening very soon. I've had enough of >people forging my email. <sarcasm on> Oh, why bother with this self-help, vigilante solution to the need for authentication. Why not just pass another law? PGP is a pain-in-the-ass to install and learn. I'm sure the Congress and President Clinton (who has also experienced e-mail forgery) would support it, and then you won't have to bother learning PGP or reading that awful PGPdoc1 & PGPdoc2. </sarcasm> >"Two people may disagree, but >that does not mean that one of them is evil" I think it should be legal for me to sell my body for sex, or put any substance into it I choose, because _I_ own my body. The "Community" may think I'm evil for advocating this immoral misuse of "their" property... At the same time, I may think the "Community" evil for trying to steal/claim my property... Either I'm right and the "Community" is evil, or the other way around. Which one is it? JMR Regards, Jim Ray <liberty(a)gate.net> "My cynical belief is that there is a lack of motivation in either party to fully and properly investigate [Mena] because the results will damage as many Republicans as Democrats." - former prosecutor Charles Black, in April 22, 1996's Wall Street Journal p.A22 Hey kids! Try this fun Westlaw search: mena /p cocaine Best to look in the newspapers, and not the cases! [see above] _______________________________________________________________________ PGP key Fingerprint 51 5D A2 C3 92 2C 56 BE 53 2D 9C A1 B3 50 C9 C8 Public Key id. # E9BD6D35 -- http://www.shopmiami.com/prs/jimray _______________________________________________________________________ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 Comment: Freedom isn't Freeh. iQCVAwUBMYdQAW1lp8bpvW01AQHBmwQAmWdWABJpRbg0QzF77vR1ykKN4DOsY4S6 0kRsIEWjm5JDXswnJYy2ZiS/aDLk5mYAzcMh1PR/CrBTdk8McYIkTQCbxxrOfbFx +ySBi9fg22wp1ySjlP+G36W7PKOBDfl6tzOq4ZQA7JFe63HwiLhgBl5TeC9YP96p V1nN3FkwfM4= =AkHe -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: Freedom and security
by angels＠wavenet.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Mike McNally wrote >What exactly do you consider "security" and "freedom" to mean here? Whose >security? Whose freedom? Every society has a social contract whereby the freedom of the individual is defined within the context of the society. Freedom means your freedom to be who you want to be, think how you want to think, say what you want to say, hold whatever beliefs you wish, balanced against the Community's need for stability. You may demand the freedom to kill those who disagree with you but no community will grant you that freedom. But no one living in a community where murder is outlawed can serious claim that their freedom has been taken away by that particular law. You cannot be free to speak your mind unless there are laws preventing others who disagree with you from killing you. If it were permitted to kill those who disagreed with you, then no one would be free to speak their mind at all, for fear of the consequences. Hence my point about freedom and security - by which I mean personal security. Freedom of speech cannot function without law. >I can take responsibility for ensuring that any Internet communications I >make are protected from inspection or interception by using technological >solutions. I call that "security". If you're interested in "security", >what are you doing to protect my freedom to use encryption and anonymous >remailer technologies? I am not currently aware that either your right to encrypt nor your right to use anon remailers is under threat, so why should I do anything? But while encryption and anon remailing protect *you* from certain threats to your freedom, they are also being used for example to make the international trade in child pornography more effective and less easy to prosecute. The technology itself is neutral and can be used or abused. That is why the focus should be on individual actions rather on the technology. My concern is not so much with network sabotage or infiltration (there are plenty enough organizations addressing that problem) but with personal safety within the Internet community - that means you, not your hard drive. ********************************************************* Colin Gabriel Hatcher - CyberAngels Director angels(a)wavenet.com "Two people may disagree, but that does not mean that one of them is evil" *********************************************************

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Re: [History] USPS tried to monopolize email? (c. 1981)
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 09:51 AM 5/2/96 -6, Peter Trei wrote: > I've been trying to recall a nasty little episode from about 15 years ago. > Paul was adamant that the USPS would never seek a monopoly >position on any e-service. > > However, back in the early 80's (It had to be in the 1980-83 range, >I suspect 1981) I clearly remember a proposal that the USPS be >granted the monopoly status as email carrier that it then and >still enjoys for first class mail. As I recall, the proposal would >require email to be routed to the nearest post office to the >destination, and there printed and delivered as paper mail. > > Needless to say, this did not happen. There was a service of this kind, that was implemented about that time frame (1982?). Don't recall the name. However, I don't think they got any kind of explicit monopoly. It wasn't particularly successful, as I recall, probably because of the low penetration of computers into business during that time frame. But it was probably intended as a way around the "chicken-and-egg" problem that you can't use email unless the the recipient does, etc. Recall that the use of faxes "exploded" in about 1985: Before this, faxes were rare and they were probably primarily used for inter-office communication. (If only 10% of the businesses own faxes, then only (10%x10%=1% of communications can be completed by fax; If 90% have faxes, 90%x90%=81% can be.) After this, and by about 1986 or so, just about every ad in industry-type magazines listed a fax number for communications. We're seeing an echo of this for e-mail, 10 years later. Within a year, it'll be rare to see an ad that _doesn't_ list an email address. Jim Bell jimbell(a)pacifier.com

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Re: Freedom and security
by Clay.Olbon＠dynetics.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 7:38 PM 4/30/96, angels(a)wavenet.com (CyberAngels Director : Colin Gabriel Hatche wrote: >My concern is not so much with network sabotage or infiltration (there are >plenty enough organizations addressing that problem) but with personal >safety within the Internet community - that means you, not your hard drive. This is a totally facetious point. I am fully capable of protecting myself and my family from ANY threat posed by a single individual over the internet (and from most threats posed in person as well). There is no "personal safety" issue. This is fantasy. When someone dies from an email message, come back and talk to me about security. Until then, the biggest threat to my security on the internet comes from groups such as yours and from the government. In attempting to limit access to anonymous remailers and cryptography, you are attempting to limit my ability to protect myself, while substituting dubious governmental protection. I say dubious, because in the real world, there will always be those who break the law (if cryptography is outlawed...). You do have one point I agree with: >Freedom of speech cannot function without law. This is absolutely correct. There must be a law to protect the freedom of speech, and we have that law, it is called the 1st amendment to the Constitution. I saw a .sig the other day that said "What part of 'Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech' do you not understand" (unfortunately I don't remeber whose .sig it was). The self anointed internet censors often try to muck up the basic issue of free speech with the "evil" pornographers and bombmakers theme in an attempt at convincing the public to give up freedom for illusory security. You fall in that net.censor category, in that you are attempting to restrict freedom. Although you may actually believe in what you are doing, you are wrong. Fortunately, I still have the right to disagree strongly. Clay --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Clay Olbon II | Clay.Olbon(a)dynetics.com Systems Engineer | ph: (810) 589-9930 fax 9934 Dynetics, Inc., Ste 302 | http://www.msen.com/~olbon/olbon.html 550 Stephenson Hwy | PGP262 public key: on web page Troy, MI 48083-1109 | pgp print: B97397AD50233C77523FD058BD1BB7C0 TANSTAAFL ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

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Re: Nazis on the Net
by tallpaul＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I stand behind my original post and the analysis in it. I am amused at the tremendous attempts by people with certain political affinities to bail out Weaver by a series of arguments based either on profound ignorance of political realities or with their own private dictionaries. The whole argument of racism vs. white separatism vs. white suppremicist seems more to come from people who argue whether someone is a Baptist or a Christian or a Southern Baptist or a Protestant. (In mathematical set theory one would trace the fallacy in thinking to the false idea that any given element of a set cannot be the element of more than one set. Thus, if (X is a member of Y) it cannot also be a member of Z.) I understand that James D. is not accusing me of being a "child molester" but merely using it as a reductio ad adsurdem argument. Let me continue in this vein. The issue of child molestation was dragged in and had no relevance on the immediate political isues of Weaver et al. But imagine people are arguing about the deep fundamental differnces between someone who is a "child molester" vs. a "pedophile" vs. a "boy lover." --tallpaul On Apr 22, 1996 22:26:41, 'jamesd(a)echeque.com' wrote: >Content-Length: 2008 > >"E. ALLEN SMITH" <EALLENSMITH(a)ocelot.Rutgers.EDU>' wrote: >> > Randy Weaver was neither a neo-Nazi nor a racist. He was >> > (and, so far as I know, still is) a white separatist. >> > (One would think liberals would tolerate this - they >> > tolerate the equally offensive black separatists, >> > after all...). > > >The well known child molester tallpaul wrote: >> Might we know the source of his complete info on Weaver's political and >> racial beliefs. >> >> I see, in essence, three hypothesis: >> >> 1) Cover the ass of a potential neo-Nazi or racist (or both) without any >> reference to what is really true; >> >> 2) Get information from outer space; > > >Well, child-molester-tallpaul, I notice that the liberal lapdog press >calls him White-Separatist-Randy-Weaver as though he was baptized >"white separatist" at birth. > >Presumably if they had one grain of evidence that he was a Nazi or a >white supremacist, they would call him White-supremacist-Randy-Weaver. > >I notice that you have not one grain of evidence that he is a nazi, >just as I have not one grain of evidence that you fuck little boys >up their asses, but you insinuate that he is a Nazi until somehow proven >innocent (and how can anyone prove himself innocent of thought crime), >and you also insinuate that anyone who suggests otherwise must be >a nazi or nazi sympathizer himself. Obvious proof that you are >a homosexual child molester. > >(Note for the seriously humor impaired. I have no more reason >to believe that tallpaul rapes little children than tallpaul >has to believe that Randy Weaver was a white supremacist or >tallpaul has to believe that Allen Smith is a Nazi sympathizer.) >--------------------------------------------------------------------- > | >We have the right to defend ourselves | http://www.jim.com/jamesd/ >and our property, because of the kind | >of animals that we are. True law | James A. Donald >derives from this right, not from the | >arbitrary power of the state. | jamesd(a)echeque.com > >

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[History] USPS tried to monopolize email? (c. 1981)
by Peter Trei 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Since I saw Paul Raine's presentation on proposed USPS electronic timestamping and CA services (btw, they are also proposing to archive business e-correspondence for a fee), I've been trying to recall a nasty little episode from about 15 years ago. Paul was adamant that the USPS would never seek a monopoly position on any e-service. However, back in the early 80's (It had to be in the 1980-83 range, I suspect 1981) I clearly remember a proposal that the USPS be granted the monopoly status as email carrier that it then and still enjoys for first class mail. As I recall, the proposal would require email to be routed to the nearest post office to the destination, and there printed and delivered as paper mail. Needless to say, this did not happen. I am not certain, but would not be at all surprised, if this suggestion actually emanated from the letter carrier's union. I remember a line from some official, along the lines of "We don't know exactly what this thing [email] is, but we own it!" I know that I am not hallucinating this, but the above is pretty much all I recall. Anyone else have more details? Peter Trei trei(a)process.com

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