December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

A Disservice to Mr. Bell
by ph＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 1:32 PM 11/8/1996, jim bell wrote: >At 09:12 PM 11/7/96 -0800, Peter Hendrickson wrote: >> ...His conviction was not reversed until 1983 in the court of one >> Judge Patel... > However, the fact that it took 40 years to reverse (and didn't, presumably, > reverse the convictions of others, and didn't compensate people for lost > property) is yet another reason to take a few pieces out of the hide of the > SC, as well as a few pounds of flesh nearest the heart. Many of us are guilty of a grave disservice to Mr. Bell. I'm sure that just about every reader of this list can only cringe when messages such as the one above cross our screens. ("He can't be a paid provocateur - it would be too obvious!") Not only is Mr. Bell apparently calling for the murder of a judge, he is apparently calling for the murder of every justice on the Supreme Court of the United States! Now lots of folks are afraid that Mr. Bell's messages will be cited as evidence that the Cypherpunks are a terrorist organization. This does a grave disservice to Mr. Bell. What Mr. Bell is really doing, I think, is intentionally pushing the envelope of what is considered to be free speech and nobly placing himself in the front lines of cryptoanarchy. So long as Mr. Bell can continue to threaten the lives of our officials in the most public way without molestation, it is safe to say that the rest of us are not going to FBI summercamp. (Canaries play a similar role for miners.) Not only should we applaud his courage, but Mr. Bell's brilliance in inventing and executing this strategy cannot go unnoticed. Now, many of you have had some awfully hard words for Mr. Bell. I am sure we all regret them now that we fully understand Mr. Bell's formerly puzzling actions. I am going to have to ask you all to do something very hard - apologize. I will start: Thank you Jim Bell for your brilliant and courageous contribution to the Cypherpunks list! I am sorry I ever claimed it was otherwise. Peter Hendrickson ph(a)netcom.com "Stop and grieve at the tomb of the dead Kroisos, slain by wild Ares in the front rank of battle." - Attican cemetary monument, c. 540 B.C.

1 0

Free software could not threaten purpose of ITAR ...
by Ernest Hua 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

It never ceases to amaze me how inconsistent the anti-crypto people are on this issue ... I just took a look at VADM McConnell's answers during a Senate hearing on May 3, 1994 ... http://csrc.nist.gov/keyrecovery/ees_q-a.txt Questions from Senator Murray: Q: In my office in the Hart building this February, I downloaded from the Internet an Austrian program that uses DES encryption. This was on a laptop computer, using a modem over a phone line. The Software Publishers' Association says there are at least 120 DES or comparable programs world wide. However, U.S. export control laws prohibit American exporters from selling comparable DES programs abroad. With at least 20 million people hooked up to the Internet, how do U.S. export controls actually prevent criminals, terrorists, or whoever from obtaining DES encryption software? A: Serious users of encryption do not entrust their security to software distributed via networks o bulletin boards. There is simply too much risk that viruses, Trojan Horses, programming errors, and other security flaws may exist in such software which could not be detected by the user. Serious users of encryption, those who depend on encryption to protect valuable data and cannot afford to take such chances, instead turn to other sources in which they can have greater confidence. Such serious users include not only entitles which may threaten U.S. national security interests, but also businesses and other major consumers of encryption products. Encryption software distribution via Internet, bulletin board, or modem does not undermine the effectiveness of encryption export controls. Why is it, then, that we don't just allow non-commercial software to be exported? 1. I don't believe, for a moment that "serious users" of cryptography cannot entrust their security to "software distributed via networks o bulletin boards". Those are precisely the mediums through which PGP became popular. 2. Phil Z was being harassed precisely because PGP is most definitely a serious threat in the trend toward undermining ITAR. 3. Phil K's export request was rejected, and MIT was harassed over the PGP source book, precisely because source code is source code. It does not matter if it came on a disk or through a network or through a bulletin board or on a book. The point is that the NSA DOES view this as a serious threat, so they are fighting this tooth and nail. Ern

1 0

research help
by Jim Garvey 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Hi all. I'm writing a paper for a class I'm in. It has to answer the question "What evidence is there that new information technology poses a threat to out privacy?" I was wondering if anyone knew of some really good online sources I could access and use. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

1 0

Re: Universal Service for the Net: Why it's a bad idea
by Frank Willoughby 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 07:53 AM 11/8/96 -0800, Declan McCullagh <declan(a)well.com> wrote: 8< [snip] >* Why should a Beverly Hills high school get a discount of 20 percent? > Can't they afford to pay for ISDN? Depends on how their telco's tariffs are set up. Here in Indiana, we have a monopoly called "Ameritech" who, out of the kindness of their hearts, charges ***per-minute*** ISDN rates. Expect costs of over $600/month for a permament connection (one line) to the Internet. Beverly Hills High School *might* be able to afford it. Most other places can't. <sigh> Best Regards, Frank Any sufficiently advanced bug is indistinguishable from a feature. -- Rich Kulawiec <standard disclaimer> The opinions expressed above are of the author and may not necessarily be representative of Fortified Networks Inc. Fortified Networks Inc. - Vendor-Neutral Information Security Consulting http://www.fortified.com Phone: (317) 573-0800 FAX: (317) 573-0817 Home of the Free Internet Firewall Evaluation Checklist

3 2

No Subject
by brazie＠ipa.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

UNSCRIBE

1 0

No More
by YoungSik Jeong 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I want take off mail list

3 2

RE: Smart Bombs
by jbugden＠smtplink.alis.ca 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Marshall Clow <mclow(a)owl.csusm.edu> wrote: >James wrote: >>Of course, not having a card may subject you to greater scrutiny at check-in >>time due to the reduced tracking ability. >> >I think that you have this backwards. There will be less tracking ability for >people flying w/o tickets. Less tracking for people w/o tickets, but more scrutiny for people w/o smart cards. I can easily see the working assumption that smart carded people have _already_ passed the security check, while those who pay cash would be under greater scrutiny.

2 1

RE: His and Her Anarchies
by jbugden＠smtplink.alis.ca 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>Black Unicorn <unicorn(a)schloss.li> wrote: >I'm sure if I look hard enough, I'll find the crypto content in here. > >On Fri, 8 Nov 1996 jbugden(a)smtplink.alis.ca wrote: > >> Copyright c 1996, The Globe and Mail Company r >> >> U.S. election reveals his and her politics >> Educated women have different agenda I think it relates to crypto policy via policy in general, also to both the libertarian and the inevitable cryptoanarchy argument we are currently tossing about and brought to mind a comment a few months back from Tim about how the occasional female members of this list tended to not make sense a lot of the time. Sorry if it wasn't clear enough. I had expected a comment regarding the smart bomb message since it would have been better to send to the risks list. Ciao, James

4 3

Re: WebTV a "munition"
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 01:12 PM 11/8/96 -0800, Rich Graves wrote: >Eric Murray wrote: >> >> Page 3 of the San Jose Mercury News has a small blurb >> about WebTV's browser/set-top box that "uses >> computer-security technology so powerful that the >> government is classifying it as a weapon >> that will require a special export license before >> it can be sold overseas".[...] >> shouldn't be too difficult. If they didn't use the "export" >> level SSL CipherTypes, then what're they up to? Are they >> fighting crypto export laws (for which they should be congratulated >> and supported) or are they just looking for free publicity? > >Based on the lack of public policy pronouncements from the WebTV folks, >I would answer C) They're clueless. I'm not sure that management even >understood, or wanted to understand, that they'd have an export problem. >See http://www.webtv.net/ However, I estimate that the "investment" of probably under $1 million, and certainly under $10 million dollars, would easily sweep away any legal obstacle to the export of these devices. Jim Bell jimbell(a)pacifier.com

1 0

Re: [rant] Race
by Lynne L. Harrison 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit To: cypherpunks(a)toad.com Date: Fri Nov 08 21:16:34 1996 > ObCrypto: Is it true that "Kemo Sabe" is Abanake for "Horse's Ass"? The author had some fun with their names. Kemo Sabe is a play on words and actually stands for "que no sabe" which, translated from Spanish, means "he who knows nothing." Tonto in Spanish means stupid. ************************************************************ Lynne L. Harrison, Esq. | "The key to life: Poughkeepsie, New York | - Get up; lharrison(a)mhv.net | - Survive; http://www.dueprocess.com | - Go to bed." ************************************************************ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMoPpgj5A4+Z4Wnt9AQFHsgP5AVSS0pG5Sp2VqtTm+BefXkA9IcA//LvQ IXISs4RaLUrUmPjMkggFbyoMEEmIIz2TjdUr2Rjn+0+T/8cmSSXTrUqofroOu8rC G00MlCPGzLWuQ5g3iuxGfxZMszWuYWEkb7m37nP0ozdPgR3xG6sYkAeuTPiny27x ZXXPgmMbidU= =m/jZ -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

1 0