December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

CryptoAnarchy: What's wrong with this picture?
by mkj＠october.segno.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Please forgive what may be a stupid question, but I've been wondering about this for a long time, and today I'm tired of wondering. A consistent theme here is "crypto-anarchy", which appears to be essentially the idea that widespread cryptography will make tax collection impossible, bringing down governments. I don't see how this will work. The logical flaw in this argument seems so obvious (and at least some of the people who buy into it seem so obviously intelligent), that I can't help but think I must be missing something. Certainly the widespread use of cryptography will frustrate modern systems of taxation, such as income taxes, sales taxes, etc., which are based on the monitoring of financial transactions. But these systems are a mere flash in the pan; taxes existed, and governments sustained themselves perfectly well, long before these systems arose. Why then shouldn't we expect that modern governments, in the face of widespread cryptography, will simply revert to more traditional (and brutal) systems such as head taxes, land taxes, travel tolls, etc.? --- mkj

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[;)]
by Dave Del Torto 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

<http://www.well.com/user/ddt/info/jet-reply.html>

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Re: Cell Kill 2
by David K. Merriman 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 07:27 AM 04/27/96 -0400, John Young <jya(a)pipeline.com> wrote: > 4-27-96 NYT op-ed claims: > > On April 21, two Russian laser-guided missiles > reportedly zeroed in on the cellular phone of Dzhokhar > M. Dudayev, leader of the Chechen rebels, and killed Okay, I'll play: are we supposed to believe that a laser(optically)-guided missile homed in on a cellular(RF) phone? C'mon now. Who was driving the *real* targeting laser? Dave Merriman ------------------------------------------------------------- "Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys." P. J. O'Rourke (b. 1947), U.S. journalist. <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> http://www.shellback.com/personal/merriman/index.htm

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Re: www.WhosWhere.com selling access to my employer's passwd file
by Alan Olsen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 07:30 AM 4/27/96 -0700, Mark Allyn 206-860-9454 wrote: >They are gone now. > >mark.allyn.com% lynx http://www.WhosWhere.com Try http://www.whowhere.com/ . (Rich Graves mistyped the address.) --- Alan Olsen -- alano(a)teleport.com -- Contract Web Design & Instruction `finger -l alano(a)teleport.com` for PGP 2.6.2 key http://www.teleport.com/~alano/ "We had to destroy the Internet in order to save it." - Sen. Exon

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Re: www.WhosWhere.com selling access to my employer's passwd file
by Alan Olsen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 02:12 AM 4/27/96 -0700, Rich Graves wrote: >-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > >If you are involved with the affairs of a large organization, I urge you >to check www.whoswhere.com to see if they have a bunch of user email >addresses that they shouldn't. They also have some information that is seriously outdated. They have two e-mail addresses for me that are about 2-3 years out of date. (I wonder how some of this information was collected. One was from my Fidonet point address of years back. Not something accesable from finger.) >Of course there is little that one can do about this kind of invasion of >privacy. But they don't have to be so fucking blatant and stupid about it. >They have the email addresses of DAEMONS from our password files in their >database. I wonder if those addresses are from a "finger @sitename.org" hack. It becomes worrysome when the methods of hackers intersect with those of database compilers. >There is no need for mailbombing, or anything like that. Our lawyers are >simply going to nuke them from orbit. Please check them out before they go >offline, so that you will have a shot at whatever is left. Keep us informed as to the fireworks. it will be fun to watch. --- | Remember: Life is not always champagne. Sometimes it is REAL pain. | |"The moral PGP Diffie taught Zimmermann unites all| Disclaimer: | | mankind free in one-key-steganography-privacy!" | Ignore the man | |`finger -l alano(a)teleport.com` for PGP 2.6.2 key | behind the keyboard.| | http://www.teleport.com/~alano/ | alano(a)teleport.com |

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Re: trusting the processor chip
by norm＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 9:53 AM 4/25/96, Jeffrey C. Flynn wrote: .... > >It looks like I may have no other option than to give some processor some >degree of trust. Which processor I should choose, and why that one? .... In the days of microcode this was my best (worst?) scenario. Setting up for fast divide has been an art long before Pentium divide fame. In microcode you don't spend time testing for cases that you can prove won't happen. Some obscure cases can arise only with a rare combinations of two 48 bit operands. The microcode flaw would be to put the processor into privileged mode even while getting the right answer. There would plausible deniability even if the flaw were discovered. (Gosh, I didn't test for this fall thru case because here is the proof that it can't happen.) Of course there is a bug in the proof but no one reads proofs. This can now be exploited by anyone that knows what division leaves the machine in privileged state. This is an attack on those systems that are rated to run untrusted machine code, using privileged mode code to limit the operation of the untrusted code. Only one person is necessary to pull this off. He must be trusted to produce microcode and the implementer of the divide algorithm. Test code will not find the transition to privileged code just because you can't test the whole machine state after every tested instruction. Normally the bogus privileged state of the machine will quickly expire (on the next interrupt) and will cause no permanent state change even in those few cases where a magic division occurs naturally.

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Re: www.WhosWhere.com selling access to my employer's passwd fi
by Lou Zirko 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

DNS lookups fail currently for www.whoswhere.com and whoswhere.com. Gee, this is quick work. Who are those masked men, opps lawyers? > Date: Sat, 27 Apr 1996 02:12:20 -0700 > From: rich(a)c2.org (Rich Graves) > To: cypherpunks(a)toad.com > Subject: www.WhosWhere.com selling access to my employer's passwd file > Organization: Uncensored Internet, http://www.c2.org/uncensored/ > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > > If you are involved with the affairs of a large organization, I urge you > to check www.whoswhere.com to see if they have a bunch of user email > addresses that they shouldn't. > > Of course there is little that one can do about this kind of invasion of > privacy. But they don't have to be so fucking blatant and stupid about it. > They have the email addresses of DAEMONS from our password files in their > database. > > There is no need for mailbombing, or anything like that. Our lawyers are > simply going to nuke them from orbit. Please check them out before they go > offline, so that you will have a shot at whatever is left. > > - -rich > > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- > Version: 2.6.2 > > iQCVAwUBMYHku43DXUbM57SdAQGQpwP/U9TzWE2vEjHYZo4eniVctFe3pVe0KIQe > FvdNOWTykqfgEyhagKuifmRwUgjjIcIZONzRDw1Hi7UrJbOghH3j9sW5wxsphbxU > 3U0hHuKumAczUHn03IVkkF4JpobawEgHqqP1Y++PhNopAvqnVSu+hnf5aIS1R390 > MlUiwpoo0OE= > =+Mm2 > -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- > > Lou Zirko (615)851-1057 Zystems lzirko(a)isdn.net "We're all bozos on this bus" - Nick Danger, Third Eye -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: 2.6.3i mQENAzFseHQAAAEH/2gtDJSlsDvTo7m+Caj5zKuLO4dVl6L9e4xxFOAqKMtkHDIh 2z6NqqGnAKDai3eDXInBuOTGoyb82pkV7wD7naQDx7bppfwmJNguOPvlrErOZHcA NbAkyXCoKHgDxeXLq0MMcyC8+kBxYNKhMPm17g7tny4DKD+fzat4k3UiSAves6Y7 jLgQwwQ7TLYIGg7iPAsbMTnOF5iP51Ib47Ozjb3suJvJjUOTSUdl4V3e9EHWiniH G6kI1cfOdUmLXIgNZ34utTwwb2H/LhEDYrydmXJG6FfUolAThCwCbTG++Hq7/Ywr BOawFj3BhySTvpp/bSCJt1Mz/eELEq9xwQCaVD0ABRG0G0xvdSBaaXJrbyA8bHpp cmtvQGlzZG4ubmV0PokBFQMFEDFsfBcSr3HBAJpUPQEBRHoH/R+rkuMa9Vw+Civd 5QQM0tBMEPDUa7G2qNLKO0FBmVHoqq+VGeD9X2X+EBld0AwuWvshQfsViG2uBNxk Cr44y+Q0tXByCZqR8snTZG12BtFaCZv51XVieo2ygWQdmNp5DyMEyIOXUByORT2m 2Jx2VngcFt5rpzZLRALqwBDkV00Xcm8MPQzqGq8ZQA3nmExQkdpnSJIJX0irWjDM OueDrn9mBz2NwIZmddShYGUdhRXgpLYPHLMpo2fxE0dXiWkaDlyx47k4MIWaDoF4 nnTXxmEcS98AkT2PfqU4dT3UfZpZnHqkWQ7d4JqvXs9RmmH9K/NyBB+LykOvA1/t W6deAaWJAJUDBRAxbHtD30Eh39zrXZUBAYPsA/0dIEjlSuc8wrX5KJzAhXqUKBbg e3toQJk8RZwm4f80SC2DopEXYdmwAVrhOou7vezeu29mYVunKaDKg5xjnUfVR1WS ZXy54ZfYEG4Zrdi4vJgydb96AwoF3VAYyAbV45XBTfy3ujZjZRxpZS96X7iKk+6l quslrTmMFLhju4vWKw== =wksf -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----

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Re: The Joy of Java
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 7:51 AM 4/27/96, Dan Busarow wrote: >At Usenix 96 in San Diego it was pointed out that applets are an abberation. >This is a complete language designed to displace C++, Visual Basic and >other OO languages. Thinking of Java as simpy a Web enhancement tool >is short sighted. > >Personally it is more attractive than C++ for product development and >we are trying to get it on FreeBSD, SCO UnixWare and SCO OSR5. Using >Java for applets _only_ is like fucking your mother... Most of us are >not into it. Ignoring the gross violation of the CDA, I agree. I think of it (and so do a lot of others) as: - a cleaned-up C++, with features of Smalltalk, Objective-C, and Lisp - a tool with built-in hooks for Net-centric computing - some safety features that distinguish it from C++ and the like - a bytecode/virtual machine approach that means the same code can be run on any platform for which a VM exists (the key to applets, but also the key to portability...what the world might have looked like for the past 15 years has the UCSD p-system succeeded instead of MS-DOS) Is it safe to run untrusted applets on your machine? Probably not. Running strange programs probably is never safe. I don't view this as something any new language is likely to solve, unless it's a language with such limited expressability as to be "safe and boring." As Perry has noted, financial institutions can ill afford to have applets being dropped into their main computers unless they are safe and secure. Not too surprising. But, then, they also have other security issues they constantly have to deal with that others don't. I suspect the safety issues will continue to crop up, but will be dealt with in other ways. The signed classes approach, the approaches used in E, etc. Netscape's limits on what applets can do, for example, may be extended in other ways (a kind of firewall approach?). To borrow a viewpoint, I don't expect the Java-based gargoyles in "True Names" to be "trustworthy"...TANSTAAFL. --Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Re: trusting the processor chip
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

First, there ain't no way that electromagnetic radiation is going to be detected coming from the surface of a ULSI chip. Radiated power levels are going to be in nanowatt or picowatt level from any one metal or poly line, and of course will be undetectable at any distance. Not to mention the size of the radiator implies inefficient launch of pulses (the lines are likely to be rarely longer than a millimeter). At 11:04 AM 4/27/96, David Lesher wrote: (quoting someone else) >> > More likely,I think, an organization like the NSA >> I thought that most (all?) chips already radiated on the >> electromagnetic spectrum? Isn't that what tempest is about? TEMPEST is not about emissions from the surface of a ULSI chip, for example, but about the emissions (and controlling them, shielding them, detecting them) from equipment in general. Most of the "van Eck" radiation (so-called because he wrote the first major public papers on this mode) comes from the deflection circuitry for CRTs, where the radiated power levels (and lengths of radiating elements) are considerably larger than what I mentioned above. It is the CRTs that mostly cause problems. The PCBs inside modern computers also emit wideband pulses, and this may be detectable and usable to an adversary. Good shielding practice helps (those little FCC stickers....). TEMPEST deals with suppressing the emission even more. >B) Sure the Fort has Fab facilities. But Acme Gas & Grocery fixes >cars, yet they do NOT have the diagnostic computer for my [in my >dreams..] new BMW. > >Preventium & leading edge chips requires MASSIVE amounts of >money for the infrastructure, and yesterday's versions do not cut >it. [Tim, got any real $$ here?] I suspect it's like monitors: 14" >SVGA's cost $200; 16" $650; 19" $1200 & 21", don't ask. Sure, >tomorrow the 16" is $500, but you need it TODAY. I hate to say it, but all this stuff has been covered extensively in the past, in the archives. Yes, the NSA has its own wafer fab. Or, more precisely, the most recent example I know of is that National Semiconductor accepted a contract to build a fab at Fort Meade. This is not surprising, as the NSA is responsible for supplying coding and ciphering materials to U.S. forces worldwide, and so must generate ROMs, PLAs, and other special chips to cipher machines around the world. Having the fab at the Fort helps security. (Sandia Labs also makes such gizmos for them, and has pretty good security, I suspect.) These wafer fabs are probably 1.25 micron fabs, far from the .35 micron fabs now being used to make the 166 MHz Pentiums you can buy at Price Club. --Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Re: Click here to become an International Arms Trafficker
by Lou Zirko 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

# 37 > At 02:46 PM 04/26/96 -0400, Vince Cate wrote: > > > > "Click here to become an International Arms Trafficker" > > > > Well, I'm ITAR violator # 6 :-) > > Dave Merriman > ------------------------------------------------------------- > "Giving money and power to government is like giving > whiskey and car keys to teenage boys." > P. J. O'Rourke (b. 1947), U.S. journalist. > <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> > http://www.shellback.com/personal/merriman/index.htm > > > Lou Zirko (615)851-1057 Zystems lzirko(a)isdn.net "We're all bozos on this bus" - Nick Danger, Third Eye -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: 2.6.3i mQENAzFseHQAAAEH/2gtDJSlsDvTo7m+Caj5zKuLO4dVl6L9e4xxFOAqKMtkHDIh 2z6NqqGnAKDai3eDXInBuOTGoyb82pkV7wD7naQDx7bppfwmJNguOPvlrErOZHcA NbAkyXCoKHgDxeXLq0MMcyC8+kBxYNKhMPm17g7tny4DKD+fzat4k3UiSAves6Y7 jLgQwwQ7TLYIGg7iPAsbMTnOF5iP51Ib47Ozjb3suJvJjUOTSUdl4V3e9EHWiniH G6kI1cfOdUmLXIgNZ34utTwwb2H/LhEDYrydmXJG6FfUolAThCwCbTG++Hq7/Ywr BOawFj3BhySTvpp/bSCJt1Mz/eELEq9xwQCaVD0ABRG0G0xvdSBaaXJrbyA8bHpp cmtvQGlzZG4ubmV0PokBFQMFEDFsfBcSr3HBAJpUPQEBRHoH/R+rkuMa9Vw+Civd 5QQM0tBMEPDUa7G2qNLKO0FBmVHoqq+VGeD9X2X+EBld0AwuWvshQfsViG2uBNxk Cr44y+Q0tXByCZqR8snTZG12BtFaCZv51XVieo2ygWQdmNp5DyMEyIOXUByORT2m 2Jx2VngcFt5rpzZLRALqwBDkV00Xcm8MPQzqGq8ZQA3nmExQkdpnSJIJX0irWjDM OueDrn9mBz2NwIZmddShYGUdhRXgpLYPHLMpo2fxE0dXiWkaDlyx47k4MIWaDoF4 nnTXxmEcS98AkT2PfqU4dT3UfZpZnHqkWQ7d4JqvXs9RmmH9K/NyBB+LykOvA1/t W6deAaWJAJUDBRAxbHtD30Eh39zrXZUBAYPsA/0dIEjlSuc8wrX5KJzAhXqUKBbg e3toQJk8RZwm4f80SC2DopEXYdmwAVrhOou7vezeu29mYVunKaDKg5xjnUfVR1WS ZXy54ZfYEG4Zrdi4vJgydb96AwoF3VAYyAbV45XBTfy3ujZjZRxpZS96X7iKk+6l quslrTmMFLhju4vWKw== =wksf -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----

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