December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Dossier on Tim May is Easily Obtainable
by Sean Roach 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:11 PM 11/13/96 -0600, Rick Smith wrote: ... >Records retrieved from [SOURCE DELETED] also show that the young Timothy >Christopher May exploited his interest in physics for destructive purposes, >like elaborate pranks involving fictious weaponry and national security >information. [INFORMATION DELETED FOR NATIONAL SECURITY REASONS -- ORCON >U31 -- OADR FOR RECLASSIFICATION] > >However, more careful investigators have uncovered evidence to suggest that >this was not entirely a prank. Records from [SOURCE DELETED] indicate that >the young Timothy Christopher May purchased a huge gap magnet from Edmund >Scientific Company and also produced science fair project titled "Ball >Lightning: A Stable Plasma?" Investigators suspect the timing of these >events is not a coincidence. ... Ball lightning? Plasma weapon? Could I have a copy of the schematics? I've long been interested in obtaining (purchasing, building) a plasma weapon. (I'm also been interested in obtaining a EM pulse cannon, but that's a different story.)

2 1

Re: Secrecy: My life as a nym. (Was: nym blown?)
by Duncan Frissell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 10:14 PM 11/11/96 -0600, Igor Chudov @ home wrote: >This is an interesting topic. I apologize if my questions are too trivial, >but here they are: > > 1) Can a person without an SSN have a credit record? Some > may say that a credit record is a bad thing to have, > but I am still interested in a possibility. If you have a credit history you can have a credit record with or without an SSN. Millions of foreigners have credit histories without SSNs BTW. Millions of people with wrong or false SSNs also have credit histories. The SSA decided a few years ago not to let the credit reporting agencies check the validity of the SSNs in their records with the SSNs in the SSA database. > 2) Will private lenders (such as credit card issuers or > mortgage companies) agree to extend credit to a person > without an SSN or to someone who refuses to give out his SSN? Not if they are in America but those outside America will. False SSN's may work though falsifying mortgage applications (with a federally insured bank) may be a crime. Individuals can also grant mortgages however and are free to do so without using an SSN. > 3) Will the state issue a driver's license to someone who does not > have/does not wish to give out their SSN? Those states that don't require SSNs will of course. Some (most?) states that require SSNs don't validate them. Canadian provinces don't require US SSNs to issue licenses. > 4) Will states' police (where applicable) approve purchases of > firearms if purchasers do not state their ssn (misstating it > may be a crime) on an application? It's been so long since I bought from a dealer. Do the current federal forms have a place for SSN? > 5) Employers are required to pay certain taxes and therefore > they, in my understanding, need to know their employees SSNs. > How can people get around that (unless they do not need to work)? Lie, be self employed, or be employed by a foreign entity. They won't be able to verify until the new Instant Check Right to Work Verification scheme that the Feds are testing breaks wide. Then it's self-employment -- better for you in any case. > 6) Can someone without an SSN obtain various kinds of insurance? Some kinds. Again, the numbers are rarely verified. Over the years, I've only seen one number be bounced back and that was submitted to a bank by a person who did not vet the number for facial validity. If one institution turns you down, go to another. >Say, John Anonymous is a young 15 years old who anticipates to become an >engineer and have a middle class life. He wants to get married, No problem (unless his fiance wants to run a credit check). Even if the marriage license app wants an SSN, just say you're a foreigner with no SSN. Foreigners can still marry in America. Even if you also state on the same form that you were born in the US, you could still be a foreigner who's never really lived here. "My father was the Canadian Ambassador at the time." >have children Still accomplished by unskilled labor totally without an SSN. >drive a car Put hands on wheel and foot on gas. Trivial. Lie or get a foreign license. UK licenses are good for decades. A dozen states (or so) still let you operate a motor vehicle sans public liability insurance BTW and non-drivers, corporations, other entities, in fact anyone or anything can own a car. You can drive a car owned by something/someone else. >obtain insurance Lie. Or get insurance from a nice Swiss company. >work at some big company, A lot less of that going around these days. Giving a false SSN may or may not be caught. Large companies often do credit checks these days but you will probably survive. If you're working at a large company as a contractor or temp of course, your small agency may not have checked you out much. You can satisfy the I9 form requirements for proving right to work by flashing your passport BTW and you can still get a passport without supplying an SSN (in spite of the law). >travel around the world No problem. The ICAO record format for the nice little machine readable strip on passports *does* have space to place a National ID Number, but the standards do not require that a nation issue a National ID Number and fill that block. The UK and the US and others have (so far) not done so. The US legislation (effective January 1988) that the Passport Office's Application ask you for your SSN and forward info on refusenicks to the Treasury Department for a possible $500 fine, specifically says that failure to provide the number shall not be grounds for refusal by State to issue a passport. In practice, Treasury has not fined anyone. >invest in mutual funds or buy stocks Lie, have a corporation or trust you control buy, buy overseas or via Canada, etc. >Reliance on government help is not important to him, so he would not >apply for an SSN solely to get Social Security, welfare and such. > >His parents are cypherpunks and did not obtain an SSN for John. How much >effort would it cost him to live a life outlined above? Less effort that cross country skiing (in calories burned). May even provide similar recreational value depending on John's ideology. DCF "You're real smart. I bet you never forget your Social Security Number. What's your Social Security Number"? -- The Susan Sarandon character in "Atlantic City" "I don't have a Social Security Number." -- The Burt Lancaster character in "Atlantic City"

1 0

Re: A Disservice to Mr. Bell
by hallam＠vesuvius.ai.mit.edu 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Jim Bell writes > There are, I think, two reasons that the equity court system (and their > sleazy lawyers, both on and off the bench) are worried. First, what they > have now is, effectively, a monopoly on "justice." The re-emergence of > commonlaw courts would provide competition that has been long gone. Think > of it like any monopoly that suddenly has to accept competition. A bunch of self selected whackos running a kangeroo court does not mark a return to "commonlaw courts". Such courts do not exist within the constitution of the United States. Unlike the UK the US has a written constitution, if it isn't written down on paper then it does not exist. The structure of the courts, the legislature and such was the principle task of the constitution, that is why the bill of rights is a set of ammendments - they were an afterthought. I think the courts are worried the way a truck driver is worried about roadkill. Its always the agent-provocateurs who are the loudest voices. If I was an FBI agent looking to snare a few pillocks I would be trolling in cypherpunks with an AP like story. I would also be boasting about my knowing about people in hiding... If Bell and Thorn are Freeh's agents then would they kindly bugger off and find another place to troll. Alternatively they could arrest each other. Phill

2 2

RE: Remailer Abuse Solutions
by Hal Finney 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I had a similar thought a few months ago. Actually with DigiCash there is a specially nice feature from the point of view of the remailer. Suppose the cash is embedded in the message headers itself. The remailer receives the message with the cash in it, turns it in at the bank to make sure it is good, and withdraws a new blinded coin which it sticks in the headers of the outgoing message. The eventual recipient of that message can then have his software turn in that coin and if it is good that raises the priority of the message for him to read. The nice thing is that if the recipient doesn't have the DigiCash software, he will never cash the coin. That means that the remailer can, after a delay, reclaim uncashed coins for its own use. It doesn't have to charge postage explicitly, but it benefits as a middleman from unclaimed postage. This would also of course encourage people to learn to use digital cash so they could take advantage of these pennies from heaven in their mailboxes. Hal

1 0

Validating SSNs
by putney 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>At 4:13 PM 11/13/96, Black Unicorn wrote: >>Exercise for the reader: How does the bank verify SSNs? >OK, I'll bite. >My guess is that the bank sticks the SSN in a report to the IRS and the >bank is happy with the SSN as long as the IRS doesn't complain about it. >Now, does the IRS check? I suspect that they don't, either. Their objective >is to look for "matches" with SSNs that show up on filed tax forms, since >they want to verify the data on the tax form. Given the behavior of every >other large database I've ever seen, I'd guess that there would be a huge >number of SSNs that don't in fact associate with tax forms. If someone High >Up hasn't decreed that they should chase such things down (and allocated >heaps of money to do it), they'll ignore the mismatches. >This seems consistent with the reports of people who use bogus SSNs for >decades at a time. >Rick. >smith(a)sctc.com Yup - You've got it right. A bank's responsibility is to make the SSN match on tape with what the IRS has - thats it. It was part of the big stink in the 80's when congress first said that all banks had to withhold on all interest, the banks yelled, and then the SSN match program was instituted. There are significant fines for banks that do not follow up on mis-matches, or do not begin "back-up" withholding. One person is no big deal, but they add up fast! The IRS's job is to collect income so if the number matches with a filing then a-okay! Yo. Putney

2 1

Cypherpunks Shooting Club II
by Lucky Green 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Last Sunday, only four Cypherpunks participated in the first field trip organized by the Cypherpunks Shooting Club. Though I dare say that we had loads of fun. Anybody interested in participating next Sunday is encouraged to contact me. A wide range of firearms will be provided. -- Lucky Green <mailto:shamrock@netcom.com> PGP encrypted mail preferred Member JPFO. "America's Aggressive Civil Rights Organization"

1 0

Re: A Disservice to Mr. Bell
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 11:19 PM 11/13/96 -0500, Phillip M. Hallam-Baker wrote: >Jim Bell writes > >> There are, I think, two reasons that the equity court system (and their >> sleazy lawyers, both on and off the bench) are worried. First, what they >> have now is, effectively, a monopoly on "justice." The re-emergence of >> commonlaw courts would provide competition that has been long gone. >Think >> of it like any monopoly that suddenly has to accept competition. > >A bunch of self selected whackos running a kangeroo court does not mark a >return to "commonlaw courts". As for the "self-selected" issue: In almost all areas of human endeavor, things are (often? usually?) done by people who are "self-selected." I suggest that there is simply no reason that even "self-selected" courts cannot work. And for the "wacko" part: To a great extent, the people who would tend to oppose the re-emergence of commonlaw courts are those who are the ones who most benefit from the monopoly (oligopoly?) on justice which has developed over many decades. Judges, prosecutors, and lawyers of course profit directly. But psychologically, people wedded to a statist philosophy would have their precious worlds overturned. They're not happy. Also: The reason for an (apparent, implied) association with extremism is, simply, because the system has been suppressed (actively or passively) for so long that it tends to be the "extremists" which most notice the possibilities of a commonlaw court. This is quite analogous with the fact that the label "extremists" was almost certainly applied to the revolutionaries who proposed the American Revolution, the abolition of slavery, giving the vote to women, pushed civil rights in the US during the 50's and 60's, etc. By definition, people proposing a change in the status quo are "extremists," if they weren't they wouldn't be proposing a change, huh?!? And this goes back to the "self-selected" issue above as well. While the main work of commonlaw courts, today, is the reversal of the abuses of the equity court system, as the commonlaw courts become once again well accepted they will simply not need to stand out and look "extreme" as they may look to you, today. > Such courts do not exist within the constitution >of the United States. Unlike the UK the US has a written constitution, if >it isn't written down on paper then it does not exist. You're obviously confused. 1. Commonlaw courts predate the US Constitution by a few hundred years. The former does not depend on the latter for authority or credibility. 2. The US Constitution is, at most, a statement of the authority of the FEDERAL portion of government. It is, arguably, only a statement of the powers granted to the Feds by the people; it is most certainly not intended to be a statement of every right retained by the people. (In fact, the 9th and 10th amendments make it clear that non-enumerated rights exist.) No authority over commonlaw courts (such as appointing judges) was given to the Feds by the people. 3. The Federal Constitution only references states, and I don't think it references state Constitutions at all. Yet clearly state Constitutions exist. Clearly, it isn't correct to say "if it isn't written down on paper then it does not exist." For example, people are not "written down on paper," yet they exist... > The structure of the courts, You should have said, SOME courts. Not "the courts," implying ALL the courts. Notice that the US Federal Constitution (at least, to my recollection) does not describe or regulate state courts, or for that matter local courts. Just Federal, which is as was intended. Given this, there is no reason to assume that commonlaw courts need to be described, authorized, or regulated by the Feds. If your argument is, "if it isn't defined by the Federal Constitution it doesn't exist," then you'd just destroyed your own argument. >the legislature and such was the principle task of the constitution, >that is why the bill of rights is a set of ammendments - they were an >afterthought. This has absolutely nothing to do with the commonlaw court system. Jim Bell jimbell(a)pacifier.com

2 1

The Key for the IPG 200 Megabytes at NETPRIVACY.COM
by wichita＠cyberstation.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

In response to the numerous requests for us to post the key that we used to produce the almost 200 megabytes of raw encryptor stream at our web site, we are pleased to provide the ASCII values of same as follows: OFFSET 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 237 55 181 123 98 190 172 218 32 95 1 76 254 70 151 109 109 115 87 146 142 2 233 129 176 197 154 22 122 168 96 9 3 115 234 241 54 78 120 81 33 128 196 4 177 8 69 53 71 116 0 245 126 158 5 29 239 80 219 86 236 193 50 7 31 6 84 188 5 215 175 213 222 4 180 144 7 187 162 205 215 60 144 120 75 195 66 8 178 81 212 56 123 177 189 113 101 91 9 211 194 48 171 17 64 197 118 148 24 10 32 67 114 171 26 131 19 149 121 32 11 235 112 114 45 28 80 37 142 138 15 12 229 228 155 214 66 246 174 195 224 215 13 116 233 106 209 66 233 175 229 244 245 14 74 81 136 163 100 21 114 240 48 184 15 124 151 145 74 34 33 14 70 132 37 16 82 253 70 97 72 20 106 41 162 30 17 136 18 105 227 219 232 121 49 119 218 18 6 97 193 180 228 204 92 158 116 222 19 145 91 34 200 199 235 178 116 103 196 20 79 104 90 22 69 212 91 65 171 133 21 92 208 76 127 37 83 92 140 27 249 22 229 22 132 205 5 67 203 8 196 141 23 136 80 68 156 228 38 254 97 170 179 24 43 152 124 172 91 52 79 94 248 131 25 202 82 36 41 11 229 As explained at the web site, that key is expanded to an 8192 byte key and used as described therein. www.netprivacy.com In order for those few who have not had the opportunity to check it out, we will leave it up another week and then take it down and put up a new shorter one, maybe a 2,560,000 byte one permanently and a monthly 2,560,000 byte one where we publish the key each month. Of course, no university, coderpunk, or cypherpunk, or any collection of same, has broken the system, nor will they ever. As most of you now know, it is absolutely unbreakable. We have had over 100 universities, IBM, Microsoft, Intel, hundreds of other corporations, several dozen different government agencies, and thousands of other individuals to download the data and look at the algorithm. Of course, like everyone else, they have been benighted, even if some of them will not own up to it. Several people have requested me to provide a narrative description of the algorithm explaining why the raw encryptor output stream seems to be so remarkably random. I am preparing such a document and it should be ready next week, or the week after. I will post it accordingly. Thanks so very much, Don Wood

1 0

Worrying...
by Benjamin Grosman 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Isn't it worrying that so many people can happily devote their time to trying to annoy others?

1 0

Re: [REBUTTAL] Censorship on cypherpunks?, from The Netly News
by Richard Charles Graves 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

hyperlex(a)hol.gr ("George A. Stathis") wrote: > >>> Mr. Gilmore, and other like minded parties, might want to consider >>> what would happen if one parent company owned *all* communications >>> media. Would they they be so supportive of the ideology of ownership >>> and communciation they espouse? >> >>And just how plausible do you think this is? I believe it is next to >>impossible, unless it is the result of government regulation. > >Man you're nutts. There are very few and quite vast Media Companies >in the world, and they're on the verge of becoming monopolies. > >Even your American President is in reality a puppet of the Trilateral >Commission, who effectively also control CNN, the Washington Post, >and many many many other things all over the world. You're so naive. The Trilateral Commission is just a puppet of General Electric, the British Royal Family, the Illuminati, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Elders of Zion, the Knights Templar, the Military- Industrial Complex, the Communists, the Secret Government, Dead White Males, the Freemasons, the CIA, Scientology, and my Aunt Marge. -rich special agent, zog northwest i do not speak for the world affairs council

2 1