December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

CAVE Report
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

We've put the CAVE-based report at: http://jya.com/tr453.htm (46 kb with 7 images) CAVE = Cellular Authentication and Voice Encryption algorithm. Nokia, for one, uses a CAVE algorithm to secure its latest toy.

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Re: Database law... silver lining??
by Richard L. Field 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I am not suggesting patent-like protection. Rather, I'd argue that there is very little "independent creation" with respect to my personal database. Provided it is considered my database to begin with, information that I give on a warranty card, when I ask for credit, etc. remains mine under the proposed U.S. law. Just because a third party tries to assemble it from those sources doesn't mean it suddenly becomes free data, from a non-database source. By that line of reasoning, any protected database would lose all protection upon its publication by a licensee, so long as you copied it from the licensee and not the originator. This is not how I read the proposed law, and it is not how big database publishers would want it read. - Richard Field (Nothing in this line of argument is meant to imply that I am in favor of the proposal.) At 11:47 PM 11/21/96 -0800, Greg Broiles wrote: [my proposal snipped] > >Cute, but any such proposal is almost guaranteed to allow for independent >creation from a non-database source - e.g., warranty cards, info extracted >from you when you ask for credit, public records, etc. For example, one >comment to Article 3 of the proposed WIPO treaty on sui generis protection >of databases provides: > >"3.02 The protection provided does not preclude any person from >independently collecting, assembling or compiling works, data or materials >from any source other than a protected database." > >(see <http://www.loc.gov/copyright/wipo6.html> for more.) > >It's very unlikely that Congress (or the PTO) intends to do anything >that'll screw up what's already working well for big database publishers. >Your theory is similar to a patent flavor for databases, while the >proposals floated out so far are much more like copyright - e.g., >independent creation is OK, but copying is not, even with wide public >distribution, and long protection times. With patent, independent creation >is not OK, copying (the information, not the device) is encouraged/allowed, >and protection time is short.

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Re: Why I Don't Read SF Much Anymore
by Hal Finney 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: Duncan Frissell <frissell(a)panix.com> > The problem with straight SF for me is that computers and networks have > changed the future so much that (in the words of the motto of the SF > Writer's Association) The Future Ain't What It Used to Be. The science > fictional futures of my childhood are now dead as doornails. And I can't > enjoy contemporary SF that doesn't include a healthy dose of computers and > networking. I find this to be largely true as well. The cyberpunk genre does the best job at grappling with the impact of communications tech but it is traditionally dystopian. It would be nice to see a story about better living through crypto. What fiction can people recommend which presents crypto/privacy issues realistically? How about this new book that Neal Stephenson is working on, does anyone know what it's about? His short story, "Hack the Spew", a few months ago (in Wired, I think?) had a strong crypto flavor. Hal

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BIS E-money Report
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Thanks to IG, we've put a copy of the BIS report on E-money at: http://jya.com/bis_emoney.html Here's a blurb from the intro: Implications for Central Banks of the Development of Electronic Money October 1996 Since the end of 1995 the central banks of the Group of Ten (G-10) countries have been studying the development of electronic money and the various policy issues which it raises. Much of this work has been carried out by the Committee on Payment and Settlement Systems (CPSS) or by monetary policy experts from G-10 central banks. Electronic money was discussed by BIS member central banks at meetings in Basle in July and September 1996. In August, the BIS published a report on the Security of Electronic Money prepared by the CPSS and the Group of Computer Experts. This report provides a definition of electronic money and a description of its key features. It discusses the factors influencing the development of e-money products. Finally, it reviews the policy issues raised by e-money developments, as seen from a central bank perspective, and discusses the possible policy responses. --

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New Paper: Covert Channels in the TCP/IP Protocol Suite
by Craig H. Rowland 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

All, I have released a new paper entitled: Covert Channels in the TCP/IP Protocol Suite This paper demonstrates several methods of encoding secret data into the headers of the TCP/IP protocol. Main topics of interest include: - Encoding data into IP headers. - Encoding data into TCP headers. Specific areas of focus allow encoding of data into the IP identification fields and TCP sequence number fields for clandestine transmission of data to a remote host. Packets of data appear normal to network sniffers and packet filters, yet can contain hidden messages in either plaintext or ciphertext. Other methods revealed include a new technique where forged packets can be "bounced" off any Internet connected site to establish a communication path that appears to originate from the "bounced" host. Additionally, several methods are discussed regarding bypassing of packet filters with encoded data for communication with hosts inside a protected network. This paper contains actual demonstrations as well as source code for Linux 2.x systems to allow encoded transmissions between sites to be tested. If you are interested in reading this paper, please visit my website: http://www.psionic.com/papers.html This site has VERY limited bandwidth so please be patient if it is slow. Thank you for your time.. -- Craig

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Re: The Limey PUNK needs TERMINATED
by George A. Stathis 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I saw what happened. It's very sad. George P.S. Nobody can threaten another site or another invidual and keep one's humanity for too long. I often regret angry emotions, as we all do. The saddening thing is when threats get _too_ far. I cannot control anybody's behaviour, nor have endless energy to explain things. I am but an ignorant little cog in the Wheels most of the time, and need an atmosphere of trust like everybody. I can see truth buried under a lot of people's rudeness, and I can see violence buried in a lot of people's politeness. Silence is sometimes the best policy. I do not enforce it on anybody. I take a vow of silence when saying anything makes things worse.

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Re: Why I Don't Read SF Much Anymore
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 6:09 PM 11/20/96 -0800, Hal Finney wrote: >What fiction can people recommend which presents crypto/privacy issues >realistically? How about this new book that Neal Stephenson is working >on, does anyone know what it's about? His short story, "Hack the Spew", >a few months ago (in Wired, I think?) had a strong crypto flavor. "A Fire Upon the Deep", Vernor Vinge presents one time pads as the most valuable item in intersteller commerce. Crypto also plays an important role during the final battle. He also has a new take on exceeding the speed (of light) limit, and a well drawn group-mind species. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | The lottery is a tax on | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | those who can't do math. | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz(a)netcom.com | - Who 1st said this? | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA

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Re: U.S. CIA employee caught spying
by Adamsc＠io-online.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Mon, 18 Nov 1996 17:05:47 -0500 (EST), Tim Scanlon wrote: >This is on the local DC news; >Harold Nicholson age 46, a CIA employee was arrested for spying today >at Dulles airport. He allegedly has been working for the Russians >for the past 2 years. Here's a good question to ask: "Why are we getting security policy from the [un]intelligence agencies?" What will get mentioned, however, will be: "If he'd been using PGP we'd never have caught him. This is why we need GAK!" # Chris Adams <adamsc(a)io-online.com> | http://www.io-online.com/adamsc/adamsc.htp # <cadams(a)acucobol.com> | send mail with subject "send PGPKEY" "That's our advantage at Microsoft; we set the standards and we can change them." --- Karen Hargrove, Microsoft (quoted in the Feb 1993 Unix Review editorial)

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anonymous proxy server in 100 lines of Perl (fwd)
by Martin Hamilton 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I'm sure this could be squeezed onto one line. Sheesh - comments even! :-) Martin ------- Forwarded Message From: Randal Schwartz <merlyn(a)stonehenge.com> To: libwww-perl(a)ics.UCI.EDU Subject: anonymous proxy server in 100 lines of Perl Date: 20 Nov 1996 20:21:43 -0700 No cookies. No referer. No From. All we need is a dozen of these around the planet. :-) Gisle, thanks. You truly are "the wizard of aas". :-) And yes, this is the code for the next Web Techniques magazine column. #!/home/merlyn/bin/perl -Tw use strict; $ENV{PATH} = join ":", qw(/usr/ucb /bin /usr/bin); $|++; ## Copyright (c) 1996 by Randal L. Schwartz ## This program is free software; you can redistribute it ## and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. ## Anonymous HTTP proxy (handles http:, gopher:, ftp:) ## requires LWP 5.04 or later my $HOST = "localhost"; my $PORT = "8008"; sub prefix { my $now = localtime; join "", map { "[$now] [${$}] $_\n" } split /\n/, join "", @_; } $SIG{__WARN__} = sub { warn prefix @_ }; $SIG{__DIE__} = sub { die prefix @_ }; $SIG{CLD} = $SIG{CHLD} = sub { wait; }; my $AGENT; # global user agent (for efficiency) BEGIN { use LWP::UserAgent; @MyAgent::ISA = qw(LWP::UserAgent); # set inheritance $AGENT = MyAgent->new; $AGENT->agent("anon/0.07"); $AGENT->env_proxy; } sub MyAgent::redirect_ok { 0 } # redirects should pass through { ### MAIN ### use HTTP::Daemon; my $master = new HTTP::Daemon LocalAddr => $HOST, LocalPort => $PORT; warn "set your proxy to <URL:", $master->url, ">"; my $slave; &handle_connection($slave) while $slave = $master->accept; exit 0; } ### END MAIN ### sub handle_connection { my $connection = shift; # HTTP::Daemon::ClientConn my $pid = fork; if ($pid) { # spawn OK, and I'm the parent close $connection; return; } ## spawn failed, or I'm a good child my $request = $connection->get_request; if (defined($request)) { my $response = &fetch_request($request); $connection->send_response($response); close $connection; } exit 0 if defined $pid; # exit if I'm a good child with a good parent } sub fetch_request { my $request = shift; # HTTP::Request use HTTP::Response; my $url = $request->url; warn "fetching $url"; if ($url->scheme !~ /^(http|gopher|ftp)$/) { my $res = HTTP::Response->new(403, "Forbidden"); $res->content("bad scheme: @{[$url->scheme]}\n"); $res; } elsif (not $url->rel->netloc) { my $res = HTTP::Response->new(403, "Forbidden"); $res->content("relative URL not permitted\n"); $res; } else { &fetch_validated_request($request); } } sub fetch_validated_request { my $request = shift; # HTTP::Request ## uses global $AGENT ## warn "orig request: <<<", $request->headers_as_string, ">>>"; $request->remove_header(qw(User-Agent From Referer Cookie)); ## warn "anon request: <<<", $request->headers_as_string, ">>>"; my $response = $AGENT->request($request); ## warn "orig response: <<<", $response->headers_as_string, ">>>"; $response->remove_header(qw(Set-Cookie)); ## warn "anon response: <<<", $response->headers_as_string, ">>>"; $response; } ------- End of Forwarded Message

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Draft OECD crypto guidelines on WWW
by Robin Whittle 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I have obtained the OECD draft crypto guidelines from: http://www.quintessenz.at/Netzteil/OECD/index.html where they are a Word 6 file. I have converted them to HTML and put them at: http://www.ozemail.com.au/~firstpr/crypto/oecd_dr.htm This is probably not the absolute latest draft, but it is the best I can get. I think there is a lot of good material here, but they still seem wedded to the idea of key-recovery or some other means of governments accessing plaintext or keys. They seem to assume there will always be a copy of the key around the place somewhere. In general, in the future cryptographic exchanges will use fresh key-pairs for each session, so not even the user can get a copy of the private key. Maybe key-recovery techniques are designed to cope with this, but the question is why would anyone want to use such a system other than that the government (and some corporations aligned with the government) want them to? There is no reason why ordinary or criminal users should be interested in key recovery/escrow, or weakened key-spaces - what they need is simple to use, totally secure, end-to-end encryption. The whole aim is to make a bulletproof secure pipe that doesn't depend on any other data, technology or administrative actions. The draft guidelines have my comments at the start, including a suggested rewording of paragraph 88 which currently states that crypto systems *should* provide for lawful access to the plaintext/key. The OECD people do not seem to have considered the fact that criminals will wrap their material in a crypto system they can trust before putting it through the government mandated system that they don't trust. My comments include a more detailed discussion of this argument, particularly in the situation where criminals are communicating with non-criminals. In a nutshell, how is all the cost, risk, doubt and complication of key escrow/recovery etc. justified by its benefits for serious crime prevention/deterrence, when the great majority of criminals and a large number of ordinary private and commercial users will be applying their own strong encryption first? Does anyone know of writing that specifically tackles this question? This is a separate question from those about whether governments can be trusted, or about absolute rights to privacy etc. It is simply a cost/benefit analysis. To me the benefits for reducing serious crime seem slim indeed and the costs - not least the general feeling that people may be using daily a system specifically designed for tapping their communications - seem to be very high. - Robin . Robin Whittle . . http://www.ozemail.com.au/~firstpr firstpr(a)ozemail.com.au . . 11 Miller St. Heidelberg Heights 3081 Melbourne Australia . . Ph +61-3-9459-2889 Fax +61-3-9458-1736 . . Consumer advocacy in telecommunications, especially privacy . . . . First Principles - Research and expression - music, . . music industry, telecommunications . . human factors in technology adoption. . . . Real World Interfaces - Hardware and software, especially . . for music .

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