December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Clipper III on the table
by Omegaman 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Here we go again...from today's NYTimes...Clipper III ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -------- > Clinton Ready for Exports of Data Codes > > By DAVID E. SANGER > > WASHINGTON -- After several years of debate between the > computer industry and U.S. intelligence agencies, President > Clinton has decided to permit U.S. computer companies to export more > powerful data-scrambling software, but only if they establish a system > that will enable keys to the code to be obtained by law-enforcement > officials with a court warrant. <snip> > Several big computer companies, led by IBM, have agreed to the new > system, but many others, which have opposed past proposals by the > administration for data-scrambling policies, are likely to object. <snip> > But the Clinton White House, like previous administrations, citing > national security issues and fears of foreign terrorists or > criminals, is loath to permit the export of some of the most > powerful data-scrambling software. > > Their reason has chiefly been that intelligence agencies feared such > equipment would be used by foreign terrorists, drug cartels and > other criminals to hide transactions and communications. <snip> > Now, in a compromise, according to two senior officials in the > administration who have been deeply involved in the new policy, on > Jan. 1, U.S. companies will be permitted to export software that > encrypts, or scrambles, data using "keys" -- lengthy numeric codes > -- that are up to 56 bits long. (ooooo. 16 extra bits!) > Clinton has also decided to move the authority for exporting the > encryption software from the state department, which has had > export-licensing authority because the technology has been > classified as munitions, to the commerce department, which controls > the export of products that have both commercial and military use. <snip> > But starting in two years, U.S. companies choosing to export the > more sophisticated software would have to set up what the industry > is calling a "key recovery" system. > That system would enable intelligence officials and law-enforcement > agents, armed with court warrants, to go through a lengthy multistep > process that would give them the mathematical key to decoding > scrambled communications. > The approach replaces the administration's earlier proposed "key > escrow" system in which the government would have been the > repository of the numeric keys -- leading to fears of potential > government abuse, or a reluctance by legitimate foreign users to buy > the software. <snip> > Still, the success of the system will depend in large part on the > administration's efforts to convince other countries to adopt the > same "key recovery" system, allowing their intelligence agencies and > justice systems to cooperate in trailing criminals across national > borders. > But Clinton's aides acknowledged Monday that this process has just > begun, and so far only England and France have expressed much > enthusiasm. <snip> > Officials at IBM, which is expected to announce on Wednesday the > creation of an industry consortium to aid in establishing the "key > recovery" system, said Monday that no single entity would hold the > entire key. > Instead, it will be divided across several companies that would > handle any given message <snip> > There are other potential holes in the system. Customers in the > United States will be free to buy encryption software of any > complexity -- as they can today -- with keys that are much longer > than 56 bits and are nearly impossible to break. > That means terrorist groups or drug dealers could still buy such > software and sneak it out of the country, or even transmit it over > computer networks. > "There is nothing we can do about bright students or Joe Terrorist > who use sophisticated encryption systems to communicate with each > other," one senior administration official said. > "But when they brush up against legitimate groups, especially > banks," the official said, "then they are more likely to be dealing > with a system" where law enforcement could use the key recovery > system to decode the communications. > Copyright 1996 The New York Times Company ----------------------------------------------------------------- me -------------------------------------------------------------- Omegaman <mailto:omega@bigeasy.com> PGP Key fingerprint = 6D 31 C3 00 77 8C D1 C2 59 0A 01 E3 AF 81 94 63 Send a message with the text "get key" in the "Subject:" field to get a copy of my public key. --------------------------------------------------------------

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Re: e$: NSA Fluffy FUD?
by jya＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Sep 30, 1996 17:56:39, 'Robert Hettinga <rah(a)shipwright.com>' wrote: >Anyway, has anyone *else* seen this apocryphal NSA paper yet? Is it on the web? >I'm sure (he said, volunteering someone else's services unasked yet again) that >someone like John Young would be interested in seeing that fax... You bet, and begging for it. Fax: 212-799-4003 (USfA)

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Re: Clipper III on the table
by Jon Lebkowsky 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:51 AM 10/1/96 +0000, Omegaman wrote: >Here we go again...from today's NYTimes...Clipper III >---------------------------------------------------------------------- >-------- > Clinton Ready for Exports of Data Codes > > By DAVID E. >SANGER > > WASHINGTON -- After several years of debate between the > >computer industry and U.S. intelligence agencies, President > Clinton >has decided to permit U.S. computer companies to export more > >powerful data-scrambling software, but only if they establish a system >> that will enable keys to the code to be obtained by law-enforcement >> officials with a court warrant. ... That URL is http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/1001code.html -- Jon Lebkowsky http://www.well.com/~jonl jonl(a)hotwired.com

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RE: Utah as a Religious Police State [RANT]
by Moroni 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The mountain is not for the public . Not even mormon public. The records are.The mountain merely contains dup0licates of everything so in the event of a nuclear devastation the church could paste things together again. People can submit whatever they wnat to the records including wills and trusts and stuff ,but that has nothing to do with the gentile community at large . i can only think of the microfilms containing a gentile will if that gentile wanted one.

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mormons questions
by Moroni 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I have no desire to make this a mormon list so any additional questions can be answered by me at 1-717-343-2365. Intelligent questions only. moroni

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GAK Rat Pack
by jya＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

C|NET, October 2, 1996, 1:45 p.m. PT Computer alliance supports encryption policy By Alex Lash An alliance of 11 software and hardware companies has just announced its formation to develop key-recovery solutions for electronic encryption, a crucial component of the Clinton administration's latest plan to loosen the export of encryption technology. Announced yesterday, the administration's plan gives exporters of encryption or encrypted software a two-year window starting January 1, 1997, to build what the administration calls "key recovery" into their products. IBM, Apple Computer, Atalla, Digital Equipment, Groupe Bull, Hewlett-Packard, NCR, RSA Data Security, Sun Microsystems, Trusted Information Systems, and United Parcel Service have banded together to develop systems that will give the government what it wants, which is access to suspicious encrypted messages, so that compliant software companies will be able to get export licenses for hard-to-crack encryption codes. "Export controls are a fact of life," RSA President Jim Bidzos said today. "In an imperfect world this technique will at least allow you to take advantage of what governments around the world will allow." RSA's presence in the alliance is not only a coup for the government but a big surprise, as Bidzos has been one of the most vocal opponents of the Clinton administration's key escrow efforts. He has even accused the government of offering software companies special "sweetheart" deals to gain support for its encryption regulation plans. A key-recovery plan not only satisfies the government's desire for court-ordered access to encrypted messages, but also sets off alarm bells for privacy advocates and civil libertarians. Some within the U.S. software industry also claim they won't be able to sell encrypted products overseas if customers know the U.S. government has access to a skeleton key. "While some companies might choose to cast their lot with the government's key-escrow policy, the marketplace is likely to reject the approved products," said David Sobel, legal counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "Users want strong security, not guaranteed government access to their communications." However, the concept of key recovery is not anathema to companies that acknowledge that firms and folks using encryption to secure electronic transactions and communications will need backup copies of their keys, just as homeowners keep an extra house key under a flower pot. Under the new government plan, a company that promises to participate in key recovery will receive a six-month license to export up to 56-bit DES encryption. When the promise is fulfilled and the government can get access to the decryption keys, the 56-bit limit is lifted. If by the end of the two-year grace period the company has not fulfilled its promise to implement a key-recovery scheme, the 56-bit limit is dropped back down to the current 40-bit limit. "The fact that 56-bit DES [a type of encryption] will be available from significant sources is going to jump-start electronic commerce," said Ken Kay, executive director of the Computer Systems Policy Project, a public policy group comprised of 12 computer industry CEOs. Now that the details are out and endorsements are coming in, executive action is expected in the next two to three weeks, according to one senior administration official. President Clinton will soon sign an executive order that transfers jurisdiction over encryption export licenses from the State Department to the Commerce Department, a move that the computer industry has asked for in the past because they see Commerce as a more sympathetic agency. At the same time, Commerce will announce a new set of streamlined rules to grant companies a "fast track" to an export license if they comply with key recovery, the official said. Commerce plans to begin licensing on January 1. But the new plan will also give the Justice Department a voice in the licensing process, a detail that angers privacy advocates and software companies alike. "The transfer from State to Commerce has been called for for a long time, but a small tweak is that the FBI now has veto power," said Peter Harter, legal counsel to Netscape Communications. "Domestic law enforcement shouldn't have a seat at the table." Harter acknowledged that Netscape has not ruled out key recovery but said that the market must show demand for it. The administration has said it hopes to introduce a bill next spring that would encourage the build-up of key recovery by establishing laws on the conduct of third-party key holders. But it will not try to mandate key recovery through legislation. "I think we have a critical mass of companies willing to work with us," said Heidi Kukis, spokesperson for the Vice President's office. "That would make legislation to mandate key recovery very unlikely." Another fear is that the administration is using export limits to control domestic use of encryption. While Gore directly stated yesterday that domestic use of encryption will remain unregulated, the double standard for domestic and international products might discourage U.S. companies from developing two different versions, leaving U.S. and Canadian customers with the same products that the federal government has deemed safe to ship overseas. "We obtained and intend to hold the administration to its assurances that export controls would not be used to control domestic use," said Kay of the CSPP. "The CEOs have told the administration that if they want to do domestic controls, they should do it frontally through the democratic process and introduce legislation." [End]

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Re: active practice in America
by Marc J. Wohler 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:39 PM 9/30/96 -0800, Tim May wrote: >As for the historical reasons for the "conspiracy to not take seriously the >civil rights of an aggrieved minority" nonsense, isn't it about time to >roll back such laws? Whatever the putative justification for such things >might have been 30-40 years ago, this is now, that was then. "this is now, that was then" This is the same same argument used by those who wish to revise and limit the First Amendment. mjw

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Where to find some papers on the the information economy?
by Donald Weightman 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The "World Economy Survey" in the Current ECONOMIST makes some interesting points about the intractabilty of the information-based economy to traditional manufacturing-based econometrics, which looks at things like industrial outputs as the basis for forecasting, and, not least, macroeconomic policy. The gist of it is that the older measures overweight the more traditional transactions -- production & sale of widgets and ingots -- and undercount digital economic activity -- writing code, for example -- because no one knows how to measure the latter. The implications for the political control of cybercommerce are pretty striking -- how can a government control -- using the traditional blunt instruments like fiscal and monetary policy -- sectors it cannot see, measure, or quantify? Anyway, the ECONOMIST Survey cites a couple of papers I'd like to see: Charles Goldfinger; "The Intangible Economy and its Implications for Statistics and Statisticians". Eurostat -- ISTAT seminar, Bologna, Feb. 1996 Danny Quah; "The Invisible Hand and the Weightless Economy". LSE Centre for Economic Performance, occasional paper No. 12, April 1996. I ran some Web searches with null results. Does anyone know how I can get these quickly? Thanks, and apologies if the cross-posting is burdensome. Don Weightman dweightman(a)radix.net

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LEO_rat
by jya＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

10-1-96. WaPo: "U.S. to Ease Encryption Restriction." Page One lead. Sources at IBM say scientists there have devised a scheme that uses several steps to encrypt information and the keys for unlocking it. Law enforcement officials authorized to unscramble information would not get a key for unlocking a message but instead the instructions for how to break open a specific encrypted message. ----- http://jya.com/leorat.txt LEO_rat ----- For an earlier report on IBM's LEO-rat, see http://jya.com/ibmgak.txt

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Re: ASAP letter on e-cash
by jya＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Forbes, ASAP, October 7, 1996, p. 18. Bankrupt the Bureaucrats! Eugene Ludwig's principal concern ["The Money Changers," August 26] is not counterfeiting, theft, or fraud: Those crimes have victims, and regulators are never concerned with victim crimes. As comptroller of currency, he is worried sick about tax evasion (i.e., avoidance) and money laundering because he knows that technology like Chaum's Ecash could put him and his entire bureaucracy out of their cushy jobs, regardless of the actions of the executive branch or Congress. Counterfeiting a $100 bill, even one of the new ones, is easier than counterfeiting one of David Chaum's Ecash payments, and the previous level of government "concern" regarding offshore counterfeiting of $100 bills is instructive here (they let it go on for years!!). Some in government have gotten a clue by osmosis, such as Senator Conrad Burns (R-Mont.), but the damage is already done. My solution: Vote Libertarian! Jim Ray liberty(a)gate.net [Right E-steamed Cypherpunk]

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