December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

RE: Redundancy in XOR encryption
by geeman＠best.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

in any practical or semi-practical application, you'll have to have a way to decompress the perfectly compressed data. A dictionary? A Huffman-tree-ish sort of thing? Are you going to transfer it out-of-band? **It** becomes the target of interest. ---------- From: paul@fatmans.demon.co.uk[SMTP:paul@fatmans.demon.co.uk] Sent: Tuesday, September 17, 1996 12:33 PM To: cypherpunks(a)toad.com Subject: Re: Redundancy in XOR encryption > > > > Compress P to get perfect compression (ie. 0 redundancy) > > Encrypt F (the compressed text) using a repeated key XOR > > > > of course this is all rather theoretical as there is no such thing as > > perfect compression, but I just thought it might be interesting to > > see if this is indeed strong, superficially it appears so to me... > > > > Paul: > I think that if the cryptanalyst knows that F has zero redundancy > that he can run searches from 0 to n bits for the key and have > the computer flag solutions that have zero redundancy. I never though of that. > I also think that a perfectly compressed file would have a relative > entropy value close to one also, hence the computer could flag possibles > that have both characteristics. yeah, these two are reasonably unlikely to occur together (only a reasoned guess, anyone got any comments on this?) so we really have a weakish system. > Hence, instead of searching for plaintext by counting coincidences, > we are searching the decrypts for solutions that have zero redundancy > and a relative entropy value close to one. How many solutions will > have both these qualities? I don't know. But if the compression method > is known, brute force will be tried, and only having to try to > decompress (read) data that has the resultant characteristics > of compressed information will speed things up by quite a bit. Yeah, this is still a form of brute force but I was thinking of this in terms of a smallish (sub 200 bit) key, so brute force against solutions with 0 entropy is a realistic possibility.

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RE: Workers Paradise. /Political rant.
by jbugden＠smtplink.alis.ca 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

snow <snow(a)smoke.suba.com> wrote: > Actually, don't some wealthy Canucks come south of the border for > certain treatments unavailable in the Great White North? Yes, some wealthy (and not so wealthy people) go south of the border for treatment. Some go because the treatment is unavailable here, others go if they chose not to wait for treatment here. The most common types of exported services are usually high cost and/or experimental but their availability is most often constrained by the low number of people who are qualified to render the service. Many services unavailable in a patient's local area are still covered by provincial health plans. This works when a patient has to travel from a remote region, to another province or to the U.S., and can cover experimental treatments. Some Canadian hospitals make use of U.S. care providers for services when a backlog exists in Canada. For example, Windsor has used Detroit MRI services to reduce waiting times. There are also people who go the other way (U.S. to Canada), usually when they have to pay their own bill. Detroit to Windsor is again not uncommon. > Are the PRICES as high in Canada as here? In general, prices are lower in Canada for the same level of care. I do not know if the underlying costs are also lower in general. Each province create a payment schedule for services that it reimburses. Hospitals bill the province for services, but all capital cost items (e.g. equipment, buildings) must be paid for from other sources (e.g. donation). Thus, we tend to have fewer capital intensive treatment facilities since the ROI is usually low. The figures that I have seen indicate that the U.S. pays 40%-50% more than Canada on overall health care services. Some of this is due to the rapid availability of higher cost/experimental services. Some of this is due to the higher cost of the administrative bureacracy. Due to the large difference in total costs, I do not think that travel in either direction significantly effects this number. Ciao, James Check out www.spinex.com for more effective alternatives to MRI for diagnosing spinal function at 1/20th of the cost. P.S. No, Canada is not perfect, and I don't know everything.

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[joke, non-code] Re: Get this for a snake-oil example :)
by f_estema＠alcor.concordia.ca 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Wed, 18 Sep 1996, Benjamin Grosman wrote on coderpunks: > Hey there...thought I'd drop this in to you... > someone I know is in the process of being set upon by a shamster (well, ^^^^^^^^ Shamster: SHA-enabled biocomputing hamster. Distantly related to Shneier's DESosaurus. Cute, cuddly and mathematically secure and authentic. I leave to the imagination its input and output processes. Eats snake oil for lunch.

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Re: The GAK Momentum is Building...
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:49 PM 9/18/96, Declan McCullagh wrote: >On Tue, 17 Sep 1996, Timothy C. May wrote: >> >> (BTW, I predict that the tainted term "key escrow" is now gone from the >> official lexicon. I haven't seen the Clipper IV proposal, but I surmise >> that the baggage the term "key escrow" carries means that some more >> benign-sounding term will be used in the final proposal. Something like >> "Key Recovery System." You heard it here.) > >I agree, of course. But Gore's office has been telling me about the "Key >Recovery System" for months. It's nothing new in the DC cryptolexicon. Yeah, I shouldn't have added the "You heard it here" line, implying I had invented the term. As others have noted, this seems to be the new term for key escrow. The brainwashing must've taken hold on me, and as a good citizen-unit I had absorbed the message: "Key Recovery is Security, Ignorance is Strength." --Tim May We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I 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, Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Cryptologie: Conference internationale - 25 SEPT - Paris
by Jerome Thorel 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

(message sent to interesting persons - bcc: field) Conference The Public Voice and the Development of International Encryption Policy Sponsored by Electronic Privacy Information Center Global Internet Liberty Campaign Internet Privacy Coaltion Open Society Institute - Soros Foundation Planete Internet September 25, 1996 Centre de Conférence Internationale 19 Avenue Kleber, Paris 16, France Program, registration and further information (English): http://www.epic.org/events/crypto_paris Or (French) http://www.netpress.fr/crypto PARIS, September 16 The international developement of the Internet leads governments, users organisations and corporations to find a compromise for the use and disposal of encryption, which allows to keep the secrecy of digital communications. Governments want to keep the possibility to intervene on communications in order to fight computer crime. The industry (private companies) search a way to keep an eye on their communications' integrity not to erode their competitivity. And privacy organisations want to preserve citizens' privacy and freedom of speech in expression networks such as the Internet. Before a meeting of governmental experts (under the auspices of the OECD Sept 26, 27 in Paris), the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a Washington, DC-based organisation, asked scientists, international right jurists and associations to meet on September 25 for a conference. The conference will stresses on legal aspects of computer-based secrecy, based on propositions made by some countris to create a regime of "encryption under conditions" (encryption under control), on the Trusted Third Party Services (TTP) scheme. Companies that will keep encryption keys of corporations and individuals would have to keep them at disposition of law enforcement authorities. Who will play this TTP role? Which garanty for end users? EPIC asked the world's most valuable experts to answer these questions. PROGRAM SUMMARY find the whole and last one at http://www.epic.org/events/crypto_paris/schedule.html Cryptographers: Zimmermann (PGP Inc), Diffie (Sun, pub-key system inventor), Anderson (Cambridge U., UK), Blaze (Bell Lab), etc. Scientists and experts: Horibe (Hitotsubashi U.), Carpenter (IAB), Simons (ACM), etc. Privacy advocates from EPIC (Rotenberg, Banisar), ACLU (Steinhardt), Privacy International (Davies), and French League for Human Rights. Officials and/or governmental experts from : OECE crypto & security ad hox commissions, Attorney General Dept and High Court (Australia), Economic Ministry (Germany), Austrian Law Institute, etc. CONTACTS FOR INFO & REGISTRATIONS USA: EPIC: Mark Rotenberg <rotenberg(a)epic.org>, Dave Banisar <banisar(a)epic.org>. 666 Pennsylvania Ave., SE, Suite 301, Washington, DC 20003. +1 202 544 9240 (tel), +1 202 547 5482 (fax) FRANCE Planete Internet (Net Press), Paris: Xavier Cany <cany(a)netpress.fr>, Jerome Thorel <thorel(a)netpress.fr>. 191 Av. Aristide Briand, F-94230 Cachan. +33 1 49 08 58 33 (tel), +33 1 49 08 58 31 (fax). Jerome Thorel * Planete Internet Journaliste / ID#72052 * Editor / Redak chef 191 Av. A. Briand * Tel : (331) 49085830 94230 CACHAN * web : www.netpress.fr

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Re: SSN database scam?
by Jim Byrd 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 01:22 PM 9/18/96 +0200, Gary Howland <gary(a)systemics.com> forwarded: >Forwarded from www-security mailing list. [snip] >Can anybody comment on the item forwarded below my sig file? It claims >there's a database w/ people's credit card no's etc on it and you have to >give your name and social security number to get off of it. This strikes >me as being a scam to get your ssn, but this went around at work and >people are actually calling and giving it out. I know ssn's aren't really >as secure as they're supposed to be, but still... I happen to work for Lexis-Nexis, but I don't speak for the company. Yes, P-Trak is real, it was recently made available to our customers. It is NOT a scam to get SSNs. Lexis-Nexis is a large and reputable company, best-known for its huge legal database system, Lexis. The Nexis side has news reports from a large variety of sources. P-Trak originally made SSNs available, but Lexis-Nexis removed this feature in response to protests.

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Macintosh Mixmaster port... Who's doing it?
by Myers W. Carpenter 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Does anyone have any idea who might be attempting a Macintosh Mixmaster port? I and some other people were eyeing the idea. If you know who might be doing this port I would appreciate hearing from them. Thanks. myers

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Re: The Near-Necessity of Health Insurance
by E. Allen Smith 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: IN%"tcmay(a)got.net" 18-SEP-1996 02:54:27.36 >Personally, I have not been a patient in a hospital in my entire adult >life. Nor have I seen a doctor, except for a mandatory college physical in >1970 and an insurance company physical in 1977. I just haven't broken any >bones, had any serious illnesses, or felt the need to visit a doctor, an >emergency room, or a walk-in clinic of any sort. I suppose I've been lucky. >Also, I dislike hospitals and avoid doctors unless there seems to be a >compelling need. So far, there has not been. While this is certainly your business, I would suggest at least one physical a year, including blood work, as a good preventative measure... I believe it _has_ been shown to extend lives; I can do a Medline lookup if desired. >In other words, the person who insures himself (through savings and >investments) and who offers to pay for treatment out of his own funds, may >be at a serious disadvantage. He pays the inflated rates for services, and >may face delays in being admitted to a hospital. [...] >(Obviously the folks who use their insurance routinely, as one of my >engineers once used to do (he'd take his kids to the hospital every time >they sneezed), are being subsidized by those of us who avoid hospitals at >all costs.) Actually, the major subsidy appears to be that employer-paid health insurance isn't a taxable benefit. The status regarding self-insured persons such as you is constantly changing, but they're looking at subsidizing that also. Essentially, taxes paid by those with low or no employer-paid health insurance are subsidizing those with high-cost employer-paid health insurance. -Allen

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Re: Anthrax on the 'net [Was Re: Fear of Flying -- from HotWired ]
by Adamsc＠io-online.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Tue, 17 Sep 1996 17:14:53 -0400, Mike Fletcher wrote: >>>Gee, biotech has come a long way. Now I can download the Anthrax DNA >>>sequence from the net and insert it in some carrier bacteria and start >>>making Anthrax bacteria. Neat! >> Now the bad news: the DNA replicator only works under Windows 95 and comes >> with buggy drivers! > Buggy drivers? But isn't that the point in this case? :) True, true... <g> And you *really* don't want to see what happens when it crashes! >> Unfortunately, it can be very deadly. The idea here is that it rarely infect >s >> humans - in the normal course of events. If a determined biowarrior is tryin >g >> to infect people, all bets are off. > > The Frank Herbert (of _Dune_ fame) book _White Plague_ comes >to mind. Basically a molecluar biologist's wife and kids are killed >by an IRA bomb while visiting Dublin. He snaps and creates a plague >which kills women (men are carriers) as revenge. All without using >that nasty Internet (in fact, the book was written back before even >ARPAnet). I remember reading this one. Very applicable! # Chris Adams <adamsc(a)io-online.com> | http://www.io-online.com/adamsc/adamsc.htp # cadams(a)acucobol.com | V.M. (619)515-4894 "I have never been able to figure out why anyone would want to play games on a computer in any case when the whole system is a game. Word processing, spreadsheets, telecoms -- it's all a game. And they pay you to play it." -- Duncan Frissell

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Re: Snake-Oil FAQ
by droelke＠rdxsunhost.aud.alcatel.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Dale Thorn <dthorn(a)gte.net> wrote: > > Krenn wrote: > > It would be nice to have a list of actual products which are deemed > > potential snake-oil. Such a list could be maintained anonymously > > through a nym to avoid all the annoying legal problems with commenting > > on another's product. Though truth is the best defense against libel > > charges, it would be very annoying to be sued or some such by some > > hairbrained snake-oil peddler. > > Think how much more annoying it would be if the shoe were on the other > foot. > Libel/Slander is very different from doing a review. Unfortunately, in todays legal climate, it is way to easy to find a lawyer that will harass someone for a negative review. Unless you are prepared to fight such a legal battle, it is much easier to do anonymous reviews, and build up a reputation as a good reviewer through use of signatures, etc. If you have a good product, and get negative reviews, the truth will come out eventually through other channels. Either the product really isn't good, or the reviewer loses his reputation and his messages descend into the noise. Thats life - deal with it! Dan ------------------------------------------------------------------ Dan Oelke Alcatel Network Systems droelke(a)aud.alcatel.com Richardson, TX

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