December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Award from Computer Press Ass'n (shameless self-congratulation)
by Declan McCullagh 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I just learned that Brock Meeks and I won the top award for "Best Online Feature" from the Computer Press Association during its 12th annual awards ceremony in New York City. Our winning article was the investigative story "Keys to the Kingdom" that exposed the hidden agendas of so-called blocking software programs. It ran in CyberWire Dispatch last July. The judges said we had: "produced an investigative piece on a serious and important subject--a rare feat in any media. 'Keys to the Kingdom' revealed that parental control software--which ostensibly filters out pornographic Internet sites--actually restricts access to all types of material both innocuous and important. Thus, software users unwittingly restrict their rights of free speech and access to information. This story, colorfully written and packed with details, raised this important issue to the online community and resulted in high profile follow-ups with mainstream media such as the Washington Post, New York Times and the Wall St. Journal." Our article is at: http://www.eff.org/pub/Publications/Declan_McCullagh/cwd.keys.to.the.kingdo… 6.article -Declan ------------------------- Declan McCullagh Time Inc. The Netly News Network Washington Correspondent http://netlynews.com/

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Re: Award from Computer Press Ass'n (shameless self-congratulation)
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Congrats Declan, and Brock. The best blow-by was that "colorfully written and packed with details." Too bad, that ass-kiss o'death "high-profile follow-up with mainstream media."

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We Close All Sales For You!!!
by computermas＠aol.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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INFORMATION
by twinsvideo＠infosel.net.mx 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

donn't think that i'm lame or somthin' but i realy need information on how to hack so, could you please tell me how to hack and what do i need in order to hack. don't worry i won't get into trouble. please hurry it's urgent. T H N X A L O T ! ------------------------------------- Name: twins video,s.a. de c.v. E-mail: twinsvideo(a)infosel.net.mx Date: 18/06/97 Time: 6:46:10 PM This message was sent by Chameleon -------------------------------------

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HACKERS SMASH U.S. GOVERNMENT ENCRYPTION STANDARD
by sameer 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

C2Net Software, Inc. 1212 Broadway Oakland, CA 94612 510-986-8770 For Immediate Release HACKERS SMASH U.S. GOVERNMENT ENCRYPTION STANDARD Oakland, California (June 18, 1997)-The 56-bit DES encryption standard, long claimed "adequate" by the U.S. Government, was shattered yesterday using an ordinary Pentium personal computer operated by Michael K. Sanders, an employee of iNetZ, a Salt Lake City, Utah-based online commerce provider. Sanders was part of a loosely organized group of computer users responding to the "RSA $10,000 DES Challenge." The code-breaking group distributed computer software over the Internet for harnessing idle moments of computers around the world to perform a 'brute force' attack on the encrypted data. "That DES can be broken so quickly should send a chill through the heart of anyone relying on it for secure communications," said Sameer Parekh, one of the group's participants and president of C2Net Software, an Internet encryption provider headquartered in Oakland, California (http://www.c2.net/) "Unfortunately, most people today using the Internet assume the browser software is performing secure communications when an image of a lock or a key appears on the screen. Obviously, that is not true when the encryption scheme is 56-bit DES," he said. INetZ vice president Jon Gay said "We hope that this will encourage people to demand the highest available encryption security, such as the 128-bit security provided by C2Net's Stronghold product, rather than the weak 56-bit ciphers used in many other platforms." Many browser programs have been crippled to use an even weaker, 40-bit cipher, because that is the maximum encryption level the U.S. government has approved for export. "People located within the US can obtain more secure browser software, but that usually involves submitting an affidavit of eligibility, which many people have not done," said Parekh. "Strong encryption is not allowed to be exported from the U.S., making it harder for people and businesses in international locations to communicate securely," he explained. According to computer security expert Ian Goldberg, "This effort emphasizes that security systems based on 56-bit DES or "export-quality" cryptography are out-of-date, and should be phased out. Certainly no new systems should be designed with such weak encryption.'' Goldberg is a member of the University of California at Berkeley's ISAAC group, which discovered a serious security flaw in the popular Netscape Navigator web browser software. The 56-bit DES cipher was broken in 5 months, significantly faster than the hundreds of years thought to be required when DES was adopted as a national standard in 1977. The weakness of DES can be traced to its "key length," the number of binary digits (or "bits") used in its encryption algorithm. "Export grade" 40-bit encryption schemes can be broken in less than an hour, presenting serious security risks for companies seeking to protect sensitive information, especially those whose competitors might receive code-breaking assistance from foreign governments. According to Parekh, today's common desktop computers are tremendously more powerful than any computer that existed when DES was created. "Using inexpensive (under $1000) computers, the group was able to crack DES in a very short time," he noted. "Anyone with the resources and motivation to employ modern "massively parallel" supercomputers for the task can break 56-bit DES ciphers even faster, and those types of advanced technologies will soon be present in common desktop systems, providing the keys to DES to virtually everyone in just a few more years." 56-bit DES uses a 56-bit key, but most security experts today consider a minimum key length of 128 bits to be necessary for secure encryption. Mathematically, breaking a 56-bit cipher requires just 65,000 times more work than breaking a 40-bit cipher. Breaking a 128-bit cipher requires 4.7 trillion billion times as much work as one using 56 bits, providing considerable protection against brute-force attacks and technical progress. C2Net is the leading worldwide provider of uncompromised Internet security software. C2Net's encryption products are developed entirely outside the United States, allowing the firm to offer full-strength cryptography solutions for international communications and commerce. "Our products offer the highest levels of security available today. We refuse to sell weak products that might provide a false sense of security and create easy targets for foreign governments, criminals, and bored college students," said Parekh. "We also oppose so-called "key escrow" plans that would put everyone's cryptography keys in a few centralized locations where they can be stolen and sold to the highest bidder," he added. C2Net's products include the Stronghold secure web server and SafePassage Web Proxy, an enhancement that adds full-strength encryption to any security-crippled "export grade" web browser software. # # # Pentium is a registered trademark of Intel Corporation. Netscape and Netscape Navigator are registered trademarks of Netscape Communications Corporation Stronghold and SafePassage are trademarks of C2Net Software, Inc.

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Declan as a Crime Beat Reporter
by lucifer Mixmaster Remailer 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> hee, hee, I hope that Declan comes up with an amusing mishmash of your > own life. turnabout is fair play. maybe if he doesn't, someone else > can take a stab at satirizing mr. debauched millionaire playboy > who dabbles in cryptography theory. An interview with cypherpunks founder Timothy C May, Jim Bell and various other Cypherpunks also present. Interview conducted by Declan McCullagh Declan: Tim, can you tell us how you first became interested in the use of cryptography to preserve freedoms supposedly guaranteed by the constitution. Tim: Well, I had just quit working at Intel, where I made more money than all of you put together, when I really started to get interested in cryptography, At the first physical meeting, when John, Eric and I had just founded the cypherpunks, we discussed anonymity, digital cash and compared rifle collections. Jim: Something wonderful is about to happen. Tim: No it isn`t, I thought of anonymous digital assasination contracts first, now everyone calls it AP, and you get all the publicity (Tim reaches for his .45). Declan: Calm down, I`m sure it isn`t that simple. Tim: Yes it is, lets nuke D.C. Dimitri: Tim May blows small children, and is an anti semetic bigot. Graham-John Bullers: I think we should all send Vulis back 10 copies of this Truthmonger: Nuke Ottowa too. Kent Crispin: Nuking anywhere is just an adolescent fantasy Vladimir Z Nuri: I agree Tim May: No it isn`t, go away Kent. Paul Bradley: Yes indeed, nuke London as well. Ray Arachelian: There should be a law against this, surely it`s an infringement of privacy! Dimitri: Ray Arachelian is a dandruff covered censorous purebred sovok forger. Se7en: Lets hack their servers and erase all the kiddie porn. Truthmonger: I propose 3 minutes of silence for Tim McVeigh Dimitri: Ah, so you are trying to censor us then, Truthmonger is really Chris Lewis, who is also really Richard Depew. ObTruthMongerFodder: Tim McVeigh is a murderous cocksucker Hallam-Baker: AP is a murder and censorship scheme. Tim May: I thought of this and wrote an essay on it back in `78 when most of you were still in high school, I probably posted it once, trawl the archives and you shall be enligtened. Jerry K U-Ramos: Break this, because we are so confident in the strenth of our cipher we are giving you a week to cryptanalyse it, if you can`t, it must be unbreakable. Tim May: This offer of a prize for cryptanaysis is highly suspect, I am now placing rifles in strategic positions, lock and load. I remember a similar offer back in `64, before most of you were born, (mumble, mumble, mumble)... Toto: I`m sure the NSA have something to do with it, or is that the CIA, the FBI, the DEA ??? I don`t remember, but it`s some scary TLA composed entirely of men in long black coats. Kent Crispin: Lets be realistic about it, you are all obsessed with assasination. Vladimir Z Nuri: I agree (In a post only 3 seconds later than Kents original one, I wonder how that could happen? ;-)) Declan: None of you understand, I have to attend dinner parties, like the one with Steve and Bill the other night, to get information for my articles. Tim May: I thought of this back in `84 too, I concluded that people should read what I say more carefully, and you *might* sell out in future. Jim Bell: Something wonderful is about to happen Tim May: Jim, you are killfiled for being a loon. Declan: Right, I`m sorry but we appear to have run out of time, we`ll have to go home. Dimitri: So you are trying to censor us then. Declan McCullagh is a cocksucker Tim starts packing the several dozen rifles he brought with him back into boxes. Everyone gets in their cars to go home, except Tim May who brought his tank with him. THE END

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Re: [?????] PGP 5.0 Freeware is available from ???
by William H. Geiger III 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- In <3.0.2.32.19970618192907.007707dc(a)popd.ix.netcom.com>, on 06/18/97 at 07:29 PM, Bill Stewart <stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com> said: >5) Does US law have any say over whether you can import it from > the Nederlands to Turkey? (Not really...) Shhhhhhh... don't tell the State Dept. They think they have a say in what the rest of the world does. Ofcource seeing how many governments cave in to these little fasists bastards it's no wonder they think that they rule the world. - -- - --------------------------------------------------------------- William H. Geiger III http://www.amaranth.com/~whgiii Geiger Consulting Cooking With Warp 4.0 Author of E-Secure - PGP Front End for MR/2 Ice PGP & MR/2 the only way for secure e-mail. OS/2 PGP 2.6.3a at: http://www.amaranth.com/~whgiii/pgpmr2.html - --------------------------------------------------------------- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3a Charset: cp850 Comment: Registered_User_E-Secure_v1.1b1_ES000000 iQCVAwUBM6iwCI9Co1n+aLhhAQGa0QP+IaAeYwvUQtVVOC9pKw7n1gYSsZcm9KVE vVcuxiC9E1DU4EAwkbzpUlFweJiVucyaolt92fV1mamb9uBLk68ucg02cjhuXi92 LG4fJb4II9bhSWVxiKNbRrkJkTma/5lNCJaU+wOl28S9TFYfgIVd3JERmCf3nQYX ZdhTf51uet8= =acVF -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: [?????] PGP 5.0 Freeware is available from ???
by William H. Geiger III 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- In <3.0.2.32.19970618192907.007707dc(a)popd.ix.netcom.com>, on 06/18/97 at 07:29 PM, Bill Stewart <stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com> said: >5) Does US law have any say over whether you can import it from > the Nederlands to Turkey? (Not really...) Shhhhhhh... don't tell the State Dept. They think they have a say in what the rest of the world does. Ofcource seeing how many governments cave in to these little fasists bastards it's no wonder they think that they rule the world. - -- - --------------------------------------------------------------- William H. Geiger III http://www.amaranth.com/~whgiii Geiger Consulting Cooking With Warp 4.0 Author of E-Secure - PGP Front End for MR/2 Ice PGP & MR/2 the only way for secure e-mail. OS/2 PGP 2.6.3a at: http://www.amaranth.com/~whgiii/pgpmr2.html - --------------------------------------------------------------- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3a Charset: cp850 Comment: Registered_User_E-Secure_v1.1b1_ES000000 iQCVAwUBM6ivdY9Co1n+aLhhAQE7NgQAu5zF1HbjYE1ce7Q5bH1bzSw8h6uewcwM v9An7rEKQXQgdF0IPtxKEfr3rkRzF2CmMe/+Gizuz+umLiIfCl9SwLflb0nXgwdx Ftd3NRWQF52sTsS9PhCfs8/4Y7vZA+YjKo8fHHKK0c51px+3eoLHeyDMJCzJvPCM iTU5/3ei+RA= =CoLC -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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index.html
by Jim Choate 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

CNN logo US navbar Infoseek/Big Yellow Pathfinder/Warner Bros Main banner Start your retirement planning using Portrait Planning. Click Here. rule REPUTED MOBSTER'S ADMISSION MAY CAUSE CASE TO CRUMBLE Mercurio June 18, 1997 Web posted at: 9:47 p.m. EDT (0147 GMT) BOSTON (CNN) -- The trial of reputed mob boss Frank "Cadillac" Salemme was thrown into disarray Wednesday when mob journeyman Angelo "Sonny" Mercurio told a U.S. District Court he had been an informant for the FBI. The dramatic admission came after federal Judge Mark Wolf asked Mercurio if he had been an informant for the FBI in 1989 -- the same year his pals were being wiretapped by the agency. Mercurio, who is serving time in Georgia for marijuana possession, faced a jail sentence for contempt if he did not answer the question. _______________________________________________________________ PEG TYRE's report as seen on CNN VXtreme logo VXtreme Streaming Video _______________________________________________________________ "Yes," he replied in a loud and clear voice. His disclosure could threaten the government's case against Salemme, the reputed head of the New England Mafia, and four other reputed mobsters. Mercurio's answer raises questions about whether the Justice Department misled a federal judge to get a wiretap that helped lead to the conviction of other organized crime figures. Judges will not grant wiretaps if they know authorities haveinvestigative alternatives, such as informers. "It is an important part of a mosaic that we're going to build to argue that there has been outrageous government misconduct in this case and ask for a retrial," defense attorney John Mitchell said. Salemme's lawyers say they'll ask that the wiretaps be thrown out. If the judge agrees, the case against Salemme, as well as mobsters already convicted on wiretap evidence, could be in jeopardy. Judge says government's credibility is at stake The government's case against Salemme hinges on a wiretap recording of a ceremonial induction into the Patriarca crime family in Medford, Massachusetts, in 1989. The wiretap information led to convictions against Salemme's alleged predecessor, Raymond "Junior" Patriarca, and several others. Mercurio's admission proved the FBI lied in sworn statements they used to get permission for the tap. Agents claimed they needed the electronic surveillance of the induction, when instead they had Mercurio on the inside to help them. Scarpa "The entire premise and entire foundation of the tap may well be rotten, and the tape will be suppressed," defense attorney Anthony Cardinale said. It also potentially undermines 20 major mob convictions in New England. "I think FBI agents have gotten the message from the courts and from Congress that in organized crime cases, anything goes," criminal defense attorney Gerald Shargel said. Wolf said he will continue to press to see if the FBI obtained other wire taps by providing false information. At issue he says is the credibility of the government in the eyes of its federal judges. Correspondent Peg Tyre contributed to this report rule Read the next US story: * Negotiators optimistic about tobacco talks - June 18, 1997 Related stories: * CNN - Federal jury convicts 12 suspected Mexican Mafia members - May 30, 1997 * CNN - Mob bosses took a beating last year - Jan. 3, 1997 Related sites: * US Mafia, Short History & Key Players + Patriarca, Raymond L.S. * CSS Organized Crime Menu * Gangsters! * The New Mafia Order A history of the mafia from Mother Jones Magazine * GANG LAND: The Jerry Capeci Web Page Search for related CNN stories: ________________________________________ ______ [Help] Tip: You can restrict your search to the title of a document. Infoseek grfk Example: title:New Year's Resolutions rule Message Boards Sound off on our message boards Tell us what you think! You said it... [INLINE] Start your retirement planning using Portrait Planning. Click Here. rule To the top © 1997 Cable News Network, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Terms under which this service is provided to you.

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Re: CDT Policy Post 3.08 - Senate Committee Approves Key-RecoveryCrypto Bill
by Declan McCullagh 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>Date: Thu, 19 Jun 1997 16:47:49 -0400 >To: fight-censorship(a)vorlon.mit.edu >From: Declan McCullagh <declan(a)well.com> >Subject: Re: CDT Policy Post 3.08 - Senate Committee Approves Key-Recovery >Crypto Bill >Cc: >Bcc: >X-Attachments: > >At 13:45 -0400 6/19/97, Jonah Seiger wrote: >> >>Senator Conrad Burns' (R-MT) effort to block the McCain-Kerrey bill was >>defeated by a vote of 12 - 8. The 8 Senators who voted with Burns deserve >>a great deal of credit for standing up for the Net. > >Perhaps your definition of "standing up for the Net" is different from mine. > >The eight senators who "deserve a great deal of credit" voted for a bill >that would have codified into law a 56-bit limit on encryption exports and >would have sparked the development of a national key recovery >infrastructure. > >Burns' ProCODE II "effort" would have permitted only the export of up to >56-bit crypto products without key escrow. Products of any strength *with* >key escrow could be exported freely. > >ProCODE II would also create an Information Security Board composed of the >Commerce Secretary, and representatives of the NSA, CIA, FBI, and White >House. > >Maybe it's just me, but I don't need my elected representatives "standing >up" for me by passing these kinds of bills... > >-Declan > > >

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