December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Pasting in From:
by Anonymous 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

no(a)no.spam (®Old Crab®) wrote: > >Andy Dustman wrote on Sun, 30 Nov 1997 14:03:39 -0500: > > > >>So, I propose a compromise: What if I enable pasting of From:, but if a > >>From: header is pasted in, a short disclaimer is added to the beginning of > >>the body of the message. Would that mess anyone up? I think this would be > >>sufficient to avoid most problems with "forging". > > > >Can't put the disclaimer in a Comments: header? > > Why make a test ??? > Put the disclaimer *every_time*. > People who want to authenticate their nym account have the thing > signed by the nym-server... > That if you consider that it is not *obvious* to everybody > that the "From:" from a remailer might be fake... > That BTW *any* "From:", from remailer or from anywhere; > might be fake... > Only PGP or such allows to be easily sure of the sender..... That's absolutely correct. That disclaimer should be implicit with EVERY post. Attaching it to anonymous posts, while technically correct, gives the false implication that posts without such disclaimers should be presumed to be genuine. That's a dangerous assumption. Anyone who wants to post an article with a phony From: address can do it far easier with a throwaway ISP account and news posting software that can be configured with an arbitrary From: address than going to the trouble of doing it through a remailer. Could it be that the enemies of privacy and freedom, if they can't ban anonymous posting altogether (at least not right now), would like to make sure that anonymous posts are stigmatized with the cyber equivalent of a yellow star? If some control freaks are to be believed, the only people who post anonymously are either "abusers", "cowards", or otherwise have sinister motives for not promiscuously broadcasting their names and addresses worldwide with every post. My theory is that what really galls them is that the precursor to the U.S. Constitution which guarantees freedom of speech (including anonymous speech) was the ANONYMOUSLY PUBLISHED "Federalist Papers", and they want to make sure it doesn't happen again. <g> > That *everybody* knows that should be controlled > when one getting a Usenet licenceá :-)) Don't give the Usenet control freaks any ideas! <g>

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Re: Digital Signatures
by Anonymous 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Monty Cantsin writes: > You can't see it up here, but this is a signed message using a > protocol which is modestly titled "Cantsin Protocol No. 1". > Suggestions for improvement are most welcome. A very interesting idea! Please consider the following suggestions if you like, or feel free to ignore them. One problem with signatures which have no indication at the top is that two passes over the data are necessary: the first to scan and find the start-of-signature indicator, and another to go back and calculate the hash. Signatures such as S/MIME and PGP have enough information at the top of the signed message to allow one pass processing. > The first line is "16A5942B6EED349ECF4594C784DFD177 [Cantsin Protocol > No. 1]". The hexadecimal number was chosen randomly and is the > indicator that this is a Cantsin Protocol No. 1 signature. The number > was chosen randomly and it is somewhat unlikely that anybody else will > accidently choose it. You might want to think about what happens if the document itself contains (maliciously, or perhaps because it is talking about your signatures) the string in question (as yours does and this one does as well). This could throw off an automated signature checker. > The second line in the signature is an SHA1 hash of the public key. > The hash is computed on the concatenation of the hexadecimal ASCII > forms of p, g, and y respectively. There should be no leading zeros. > (Remember to leave off the newline!) Presumably you could use the key hash to look up the key to use for verifying the message. This has a mild denial of service attack. Someone else could create a key with different boundaries between p, g, and y but which would create the same string as this concatenation, and therefore the same hash. If you left the "p: ", "g: ", and "y: " in place it would prevent this. PGP's key fingerprints have had the same problem. > The fourth line contains an offset and a length to specify the area of > the text which is signed. The offset is relative to the signature > itself. That is, the first character of the Cantsin Protocol No. 1 > code is at position 0. As signatures are usually appended, the offset > will usually be the additive inverse of the length. It is intriguing that this can be used to sign a subset of the text. Presumably there could be multiple signature blocks each of which signed different subsets, possibly with different keys. One problem is that it is not obvious to the human reader what part of the text is signed. A nice effect with PGP and S/MIME signatures is that even readers who don't have the tools can have some slight confidence in signatures, because other readers will often report it when signatures don't verify. With a signature that only covers a portion of the text, people might assume that if there are no reports of failure, more of the text is signed than is the case. This is not a technical problem but is a social phenomenon which may not interact well with this signature format. You need to specify a canonical line ending format. Based on the count values in your document, it appears that you are counting line terminators as being one character long. Your count value of 1CB9 corresponds to decimal 7353, there are exactly 7353 characters from the first character of your message body to the beginning of your signature magic number, if line ends are one character. The specific characters for line endings need to be specified as well for the hash to be calculated consistently. Your hash appears to be calculated with LF as the line ending (although the hash program is broken, see below). Probably CR/LF would be preferable for the line endings as that is a widely used internet standard as well as being common on windows. > You also need to be able to compute SHA1 hashes. I've been using > something called "sha1file" which, I believe, originated at Adam > Back's web site. That program has a bug. The routine SHA1_update in the file sha1.c is missing a line: while ( ctx->mlen == 64 ) { convert_to_bigendian( (word32*)ctx->M, 64 ); SHA1_transform( ctx ); use = min( 64, data_len ); memcpy( ctx->M, data, use ); ctx->mlen = use; data_len -= use; *** data += use; *** MISSING *** } Correcting this will make your hashes be correct. > El Gamal is simple enough that the signature on this message can be > checked using standard Unix tools such as dc version 1.1. Let's say M > is the SHA1 hash of the message. It is checked by verifying the truth > of this equation: (y^a * a^b) mod p = g^M mod p. El Gamal is a rather lengthy signature, although the verification equation is relatively simple. DSS has a shorter signature. If you report not r,s, but rather r,w where w is the inverse of s mod q, then the verification is: r = g^(M*w) * y^(r*w) mod p mod q. It's not really much more complicated. There are some subtleties to choosing El Gamal keys, but with the 2048 bit values you have chosen you are pretty safe. You want to make sure that the generator g doesn't generate a small subgroup; to do this you need to look at the factors of p-1. Your p-1 has several small prime factors: 0x2^3, 0x3, 0x6b, 0x16f, 0x1f79b, 0x3533a1eb3. Beyond that is a 1978 bit composite which I can't factor. Chances are very high that a random g will generate a group of size which is a multiple of a large prime factor of this large composite value, so it is strong, although not quite 2048 bits strong. Also, you can't really justify using 2048 bit keys when your hash is only 160 bits. The hash becomes the weak link for keys beyond about 1024 bits, and unless you use a stronger hash your key strength is misleading. This is why DSS is only specified up to 1024 bits. -- A hasher to be named later --

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Re: Pasting in From:
by Bill Stewart 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>> : So, I propose a compromise: What if I enable pasting of From:, >> : but if a From: header is pasted in, a short disclaimer is a >> : added to the beginning of the body of the message. >> : Would that mess anyone up? I think this would be >> : sufficient to avoid most problems with "forging". News and email are two separate cases. For news, there's almost no reason for a poster who wants his real name and address in a message to use an anonymous remailer; maybe something like posting with your Juno email on the message rather than your work email. But you can put your real email address in the message body if you want to do that, so not having that feature in a remailer is no restriction on the legitimate user. There are lots of reasons to forge someone else's name :-) So if the remailers don't support From: pasting, it's no loss. Similarly, for Reply-To: and Sender: and Path: and Received: and maybe a few other occasionally-forged header fields. Adding a disclaimer to the beginning of the message is no problem; adding it to the headers is useless, since almost nobody reads them, especially the kind of shoot-from-the-hip flamers you want to avoid. For email, perhaps you don't want the address to be visible during the first few hops in an encrypted remailer path, but you do still want one of your addresses to be there for the recipient. Again, you can put it in the message body yourself. There's a little less risk of pasting in headers on mail to individuals, but forged mail to mailing lists and mail2news relays is still a problem, and you definitely can't expect remailers to recognize mailing lists. There are also minor problems, like forging the From: address on mail to president(a)whitehouse.gov, which are better avoided this way even if you do also add disclaimers. Thanks! Bill Bill Stewart, stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com Regular Key PGP Fingerprint D454 E202 CBC8 40BF 3C85 B884 0ABE 4639

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Nuclear Physics Study Group
by Anonymous 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Lucky Green <shamrock(a)cypherpunks.to>: > On a completely unrelated note, is there some interest in starting up a > "Cypherpunks Nuclear Physics Study Group"? I recently finished reading > "The Curve of Binding Energy". Fascinating book. Is this really unrelated or does it represent growing ambition by the cypherpunks shooting club ? Will you be asking for anonymous donations of SNM ? I could be interested, but not in the manner of the above 2 sentences. A Nym To Be Generated Later

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Re: Pasting in From:
by Anonymous 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

nobody(a)REPLAY.COM (Anonymous) wrote: > > From: Andy Dustman <andy(a)neptune.chem.uga.edu> > > Newsgroups: alt.privacy.anon-server > > Subject: Pasting in From: > > Date: Sunday, November 30, 1997 8:03 PM > > [ ... ] > > > So, I propose a compromise: What if I enable pasting of From:, but if a > > From: header is pasted in, a short disclaimer is added to the beginning > of > > the body of the message. Would that mess anyone up? I think this would be > > sufficient to avoid most problems with "forging". > > What are the advantages of pasting a From: above pasting a Reply-To: ? For one thing, many newsreaders list messages by From: and Subject: line. By putting in a distinctive From: line, your posts will be identifiable without readers having to download and read each message body. By pasting in a From: header, an anonymous poster can thus make his posts recognizeable. Pasting in a Reply-To doesn't accomplish the same thing. In essence, pasting enables one to adopt a non-replyable pseudonym. Why burden the 'nym servers if the poster doesn't want e-mail replies to his posts? The alternative suggestion of posting from a replyable 'nym address does not really address the issue. If one wants to post with a From: address of "santaclaus(a)northpole.gov", why should a remailer make that any more difficult than doing it from a non-anonymous ISP? (If "jolly ol' St. Nick" is worried about his e-mail address being forged, he can always request source blocking.)

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Hubba hubba
by bureau42 Anonymous Remailer 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I'm siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing'in in the raaaaaaaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn... The yellow raiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin from Vulis' pisssssssssssssssssssss...

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"Faulty Filters" report; anti-rating free speech alliance
by Declan McCullagh 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

[From December 1 EPIC Alert --Declan] ======================================================================= [2] EPIC Report Slams Internet Content Filters ======================================================================= EPIC today released a report that finds that "family-friendly" search engines typically block access to 99 percent of the material on the Internet that would be appropriate for young people. The report was released just prior to a White House summit that will examine the use of content filters and rating systems for the Internet. EPIC's study was based on a side-by-side comparison of an unfiltered Internet search engine (AtltaVista) with a filtered search engine. According to Net Shepherd, Inc., its Family Search retrieval service screens out material that is "inappropriate and/or objectionable for average user families." EPIC tested both search engines using such search phrases as the "American Red Cross," the "National Aquarium," and "Thomas Edison." The study found that the filtered search engine typically blocked access to 99 percent of the documents containing those phrases when compared with results returned by AltaVista. The EPIC report, "Faulty Filters," includes a survey of 100 search phrases in four categories -- schools; charitable and political organizations; educational and artistic groups; and concepts that might be of interest to young people. Marc Rotenberg, Director of EPIC, said, "We found that as information on popular topics became more widely available on the Internet, the filtered search engine was likely to block an even higher percentage. We further found that the search engine did not seem to restrict sensitive topics for young people any more than it restricted matters of general interest. Even with the very severe blocking criteria employed, we noted that some material which parents might consider to be objectionable was still provided by the software." The report was released at a press conference held at the National Press Club. EPIC said that it was joining with several other organizations to establish the Internet Free Expression Alliance (IFEA) to address the free speech implications of Internet rating and filtering proposals (see item below). The text of the "Faulty Filters" Report is available at: http://www2.epic.org/reports/filter_report.html ======================================================================= [2] Groups Establish Internet Free Expression Alliance ======================================================================= EPIC today announced that it is joining with 20 other organizations to establish the Internet Free Expression Alliance (IFEA). The new coalition will address the free speech implications of Internet rating and filtering proposals and promote the open exchange of information on the Internet. The formation of IFEA comes one day before the opening of an Administration-sponsored summit on Internet issues. President Clinton is on record as supporting the widespread use of content ratings and filtering techniques to create a "family-friendly Internet." At an earlier summit meeting last July, the President said that it "must be our objective" to ensure that the labeling of Internet content "will become standard practice." As detailed in the report EPIC released today, such rating and filtering systems can block access to a vast amount of valuable information; according to the EPIC report, 99 percent of all online material is typically filtered out by a new "family-friendly" Internet search engine. In a statement released at IFEA's inaugural press conference at the National Press Club, EPIC Legal Counsel David Sobel said, "It is troubling that the White House has so readily embraced an approach that has the potential to destroy the Internet as an educational resource." EPIC was a plaintiff in the historic ACLU v. Reno litigation, which led to last summer's landmark Supreme Court decision striking down the Communications Decency Act (CDA). Many other organizations that joined the CDA challenge are involved in the creation of IFEA. Alliance members include the American Civil Liberties Union, American Society of Newspaper Editors, Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the National Coalition Against Censorship, the National Writers Union and the Society of Professional Journalists. For information on IFEA can be found at: http://www.ifea.net [...]

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Re: Pasting in From:
by Robert A. Costner 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

It seems to me that the purpose of a remailer is to strip the headers, including the FROM header, not to put in fake headers. Until someone can explain it to me, I'd consider the idea of adding a FROM header to anonymous mail to be asinine. Best I can tell, the only reasonable good purpose for this is to create a persistent nym identity without a reply to capability. Well, remailer software cannot support everything I suppose. (Even if Cracker may apparently support this) I would think the best way to put in a persistent nym capability would be to database the PGP key id's along with the persistent identity. Then the remailer could produce lines like From: "Monty Cantsin" <anon(a)anon.efga.org> Persistent identities would be created by sending a signed PGP message that includes both the PGP public key and the persistent identity. Since the identity server would not database email addresses, only PGP key id's, and only work for signed messages, there should be no problem with people worrying about the remailer being compromised. This also keeps someone from stealing another's reputation capital. -- Robert Costner Phone: (770) 512-8746 Electronic Frontiers Georgia mailto:pooh@efga.org http://www.efga.org/ run PGP 5.0 for my public key

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Big Brother Is Watching ATMs
by Jonathan Wienke 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 I just heard that a bank card company has just released a program for using photos of the iris in people's eyes as a biometric ID to replace people's PIN codes for ATM / credit cards. What I found really interesting is how they plan to implement it. As people use the ATM, they are photographed. (Every ATM has a security camera.) Over time, as people use the ATM, the security camera images are composited to produce a high-quality image of their irises, which is coded and placed in their account information. Once this is accomplished, when a card is inserted into the ATM and the security camera gets an iris image that matches the account sufficiently closely, the user can conduct transactions without entering the PIN code. People affected by this will merely receive a letter that under certain circumstances, entering the PIN is no longer necessary, but this is not a security problem. This scenario may not be a security problem, but it certainly poses a privacy problem. Given the frequency that the average Joe Sixpack uses the ATM, it is only a matter of time before the government mandates a nationwide eyeprint ID database to catch ATM and credit card theives, money launderers, tax cheats, and other undesirables. Perhaps the eyeprint could even replace or supplement the SSN as the unique taxpayer ID key for tax and other purposes. Of course, given the fact that ATMs have had cameras from the start, this theoretical eyeprint database could already be under construction. How's that for paranoia? >:-( Of course, there are a few ways to beat this, such as mirror sunglasses, (which would only be useful while alternative credentials to eyeprint ID are still available) and contact lenses, (which would have to be carefully oriented so that the same side of the lens was always up, or the fact that you are wearing contacts and are therefore a Suspicious Person would become obvious to the system) and of course intraocular implants of various types. Of course if the implant's power-on LED gives your eyes a constant Satanic red glow, you may be flagged as a Suspicious Person anyway. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGP for Business Security 5.5 iQA/AwUBNIJMc8JF0kXqpw3MEQJEiACdH+0zupstOe2EK3nO+xkF6nY4SOsAnAuO d/cf2DBRj3tiSUHgBaQHOgq9 =LxX3 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- Jonathan Wienke PGP Key Fingerprints: 7484 2FB7 7588 ACD1 3A8F 778A 7407 2928 3312 6597 8258 9A9E D9FA 4878 C245 D245 EAA7 0DCC "If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains set lightly upon you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." -- Samuel Adams "Stupidity is the one arena of of human achievement where most people fulfill their potential." -- Jonathan Wienke Never sign a contract that contains the phrase "first-born child." RSA export-o-matic: print pack"C*",split/\D+/,`echo "16iII*o\U@{$/=$z;[(pop,pop,unpack"H*",<> )]}\EsMsKsN0[lN*1lK[d2%Sa2/d0<X+d*lMLa^*lN%0]dsXx++lMlN/dsM0<J]dsJxp"|dc`

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V Chips in PCs -- comments filed with the FCC
by Declan McCullagh 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

A bunch of other groups filed comments last week, generally opposing a requirement for Vchips in computers, but the ACLU's is the only one I have in electronic form. An excerpt: Any FCC efforts to restrict content online, directly or indirectly, through a forced rating scheme would violate the First Amendment. It would also have the effect of turning what the Supreme Court call the most participatory medium into a bland and homogenized medium that provides access to only self-rated or censored speech. More info: http://cgi.pathfinder.com/netly/opinion/0,1042,1528,00.html -Declan ================ Subject: Fwd: fcc comments v-chip Date: Tue, 25 Nov 1997 12:49:29 -0500 (EST) From: PRIVACLU(a)aol.com To: declan(a)well.com Before the FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION Washington, DC 20554 ________________________________ In the Matter of ET Docket No. 97-206 Technical Requirements to Enable Blocking of Video Programming Based on Program Ratings _______________________________ COMMENTS OF THE AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION Introduction The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is a nonpartisan organization of more than 250,000 members nationwide dedicated to defending the principles of liberty and equality embodied in the Bill of Rights. For nearly a century, the ACLU has sought to preserve and strengthen the First Amendment as a bulwark against all forms of governmental censorship. The ACLU has previously submitted extensive comments to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in opposition to government-prescribed ratings systems for television programming that single out sex, violence, or other controversial subjects on television because we believe they infringe the fundamental principles of free expression. We adhere to our prior views. We respectfully submit these comments on the different issues raised by the FCC's proposal for emerging technology and urge the Commission to refrain from entering into the censorship business. In particular, the ACLU urges the Commission not to expand the application of the proposed rules to include any and all equipment capable of displaying or receiving video programming, including personal computers and Digital Television (DTV), Multi-point Distribution Systems, Direct Broadcasting Systems (DBS) and other emerging technologies. The ACLU believes that Congress has not directed the FCC to mandate the inclusion of the V-Chip in these emerging technologies. Furthermore, such an expansive reading of the Telecommunications Act would run afoul of the First Amendment protections accorded to speech on interactive media, such as the Internet, as a result of the landmark Supreme Court decision Reno v. ACLU. 117 S.Ct. 2329 (1997). Finally, we urge the FCC to abstain from prohibiting distribution services from deleting or modifying ratings information from television programming as a violation of the First Amendment. I. THE FCC IS NOT REQUIRED TO MANDATE INCLUSION OF BLOCKING TECHNOLOGY IN PERSONAL COMPUTERS CAPABLE OF RECEIVING VIDEO PROGRAMMING UNDER THE 1996 TELECOMMUNICATIONS ACT. Section 551(c) of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 ("the Act"), the Parental Choice in Television Programming, directs the FCC to "require in the case of an apparatus designed to receive television signals ... that have a picture screen 13 inches or greater in size (measured diagonally), that such apparatus be equipped with a feature designed to enable viewers to block display of all programs with a common rating...". Section 551 (e)(2) requires the Commission to consult with the television manufacturing industry to find an effective date for inclusion of the V-chip in televisions. In contrast, with regard to technologies like the Internet, Congress directed the FCC in section 552(d)(4)(A) of the Act to determine the availability of alternative blocking technology that enables parents to block programming based on identifying programs without ratings. Although the language of the Act addresses the need for traditional television manufacturers to comply with the provision at issue, the Commission's current Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) calls for expansion of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, to mandate inclusion of blocking devices in all technology capable of displaying broadcast video programming, even in apparatus that is not primarily designed for television viewing. Specifically, the NPRM includes a requirement for personal computer manufacturers to include V-chip technology. Paragraph 22 of the NPRM, states in pertinent part: "In addition, personal computer systems, which are not traditionally thought of as television receivers, are already being sold with the capability to view television and other video programming. Section 551(c) of the Telecommunications Act makes it clear that the program blocking requirements were intended to apply to any "apparatus designed to receive signals" that has a picture screen of 13 inches or larger. Accordingly, we believe that the program blocking requirements we are proposing should apply to any television receiver meeting the screen size requirements, regardless of whether it is designed to receive video programming that is distributed only through cable television systems, MDS, DBS, or by some other distribution system. These requirements would also apply to any computer that is sold with TV receiver capability and a monitor that has a viewable picture size of 13 inches or larger, as we currently do of closed captioning." (emphasis added) The NPRM broadly states that the rules should apply to any computer "regardless of whether it is designed to receive video programming that is distributed only through cable television systems, [satellite], or by some other distribution system." Under the broadest interpretation the rules could be extended to cover any video programming viewed using a computer. Despite this confusion, the FCC has not publicly offered clarification as to what types of personal computer technology would fall under the purview of the proposed rules. In addition, the NPRM statement that Section 551 (c) of the Act "makes it clear that program blocking requirements were intended to apply to any apparatus" capable of receiving television signals, is plainly contrary to the expressed view of Congress and a conclusion with which the ACLU strongly disagrees. Congress instead suggested in Section 551 (d) (4) et seq., that as new video technology is developed, the Commission determine the availability of less restrictive and more informative alternatives. Thus, Congress did not propose the mandatory inclusion of V-chip technology, but directed the Commission to determine whether other features could be used to provide greater user choice over content. We believe that the rush to embrace the V-chip for traditional televisions has been more damaging to the development of other user friendly tools that do not require the state imposition of a rating and blocking system. Previously submitted comments by the television manufacturing industry also make clear that the FCCs haste in establishing schedules for the inclusion of the V-chip in televisions may result in poorly adapted equipment that may quickly become obsolete. The expansion of V-chip technology into the computer realm makes even less sense. Interactive media is subject to even more rapid change than television and that change increasingly allows for more user choice and control. II. THE FCC MAY NOT REQUIRE COMPUTERS TO INCLUDE CENSORING TECHNOLOGY IF THEY ARE CAPABLE OF RECEIVING VIDEO PROGRAMMING VIA THE INTERNET OR BY OTHER MEANS: Currently, there are at least three ways to view video programming on personal computers. The first model is where video programming can be viewed on "PC-TVs," computers that include built-in television receivers or have an added plug-in circuit board to provided video reception capability. Second, a personal computer user has her Web browser connected to an Internet Service Provider (ISP) with the appropriate enabling technology to permit a multimedia connection to the Internet. With this connection, a user who is on the Web can go to any number of sites to download or view video/audio objects. Until now, the slow speed of Internet dial-up connections has meant that it could take several minutes to view online video clips. However, with new high speed connections, large video files may be downloaded or viewable in a matter or seconds -- making it possible to view video programming online in real time, like television and radio. Webcasting offers access to a much greater number of speakers or content providers than traditional broadcasting. PC-TVs and webcasting have only recently become available, with new models and features being marketed forth daily. Both offer a much greater spectrum of data, including programming information, than is possible by traditional broadcasting and under the current ratings scheme. The potential to offer greater information means does not mean the FCC should expand the reach of its content restriction through the V-chip. Instead, these technologies could offer transmission of program reviews or other detailed information about individual programs. The Commission may not mandate blocking technology for computers with Internet software that provides the ability to view real-time video programs online. Unlike television, the Internet provides inexpensive, user controlled access and not government regulated or licensed access. Video programming displayed online may include traditional broadcast programming, but also includes a variety of authors and producers that have never before had the ability to gain wide distribution. Such an application of the proposed rules not only runs counter to the Telecommunications Act, but represents an assumption of authority by the government over content on the Internet that has already been rejected by the Supreme Court. In the landmark case Reno v. ACLU, the Supreme Court overturned provisions of the Federal Communication Decency Act (CDA) and declared that the Internet is entitled to the highest level of free speech protection. The Court explicitly analogized the Internet to the traditional print media, saying that unlike broadcast media, which has been traditionally considered a more intrusive means of speech that is available to a fewer number of speakers, the virtually unlimited access and potential for speech means that the government requires a compelling reason to restrict lawfully protected speech. As the lead attorneys and plaintiffs in the case, the ACLU successfully argued that the provisions of the CDA that would have made it a crime to communicate anything "indecent" online violated the First Amendment. The Court rejected the CDA because it was an overbroad means of addressing the government's asserted interest in protecting minors from inappropriate material -- the very same reason offered today by the Commission and Congress in enacting V-Chip regulations. Moreover, the Court explicitly rejected the notion that the government has the authority to regulate constitutionally protected speech online. The Court stated, "the growth of the Internet has been and continues to be phenomenal. As a matter of constitutional tradition, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, we presume that governmental regulation of the content of speech is more likely to interfere with the free exchange of ideas than to encourage it. The interest in encouraging freedom of expression in a democratic society outweighs any theoretical but unproven benefit of censorship." Reno v. ACLU, 117 S.Ct. 2329, -- , (1997). Although the ACLU believes that the same First Amendment values apply to each media, the Court has repeatedly stated that any government regulation of broadcast television is justifiable only because of the intrusiveness of television coupled with the scarcity of the broadcasting transmission spectrum. As the high court stated in Reno v. ACLU, neither of those rationale applies to the Internet. Any FCC efforts to restrict content online, directly or indirectly, through a forced rating scheme would violate the First Amendment. It would also have the effect of turning what the Supreme Court call the most participatory medium into a bland and homogenized medium that provides access to only self-rated or censored speech. IV. THE FCC MAY NOT PROHIBIT OPERATORS THAT DISTRIBUTE VIDEO PROGRAMMING FROM DELETING OR MODIFYING PROGRAM RATINGS CARRIED ON LINE 21 OF VBI. The NPRM states that the FCC proposes to amend its rules to ensure that ratings information is not deleted or modified before transmission by distributors. Put plain, this means that the FCC is selecting which of the "speakers" -- from the programs writers, to its producers, network and local stations has the power to set a rating and requiring all the other speakers to agree with the given rating. But by removing the power for any of these parties to modify ratings, the government also removes any flexibility from its proposed scheme -- it is deciding that national broadcasters make that decision, for all of their writers, producers, directors, affiliates and stations. There is no room for disagreement and there is no choice but for distributors to agree with the designation. Ratings must, by definition be national. Leaving one that might appropriate in Mississippi but that is not in New York. Furthermore, there are serious First Amendment problems with compelling all program distributors from carrying ratings that they find objectionable or that they disagree with are critical. Government required ratings are a form of "forced speech" and diminish any discretion of programming distributors in determining the relevance or appropriateness of the proposed program rating. That is, mandating labels compels private individuals and companies to say things about their creative offerings that they have no wish to say and with which they may disagree. The Supreme Court has made clear that such compelled speech is as much a violation of First Amendment rights as enforced silence. See, e.g., Riley v. National Federation of the Blind, 487 U.S. 781, 797 (1988); Pacific Gas & Electric Co. v. Public Utilities Comm'n, 475 U.S. 1 (1986); Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U.S. 705, 714 (1977). Ratings prescribed by the FCC pursuant to the Act can hardly be defended as an innocuous effort to empower parents by supplying them with neutral information. A truly non-coercive effort to inform parents, rather than censor what the government believes to be "negative" or dangerous ideas, would not rely on the minimal, inevitably misleading information conveyed by a letter or code that can be read by a computer chip. Parents are better served by fuller information (descriptions or reviews) that explains the context in which violent or sexual material is presented, and that enables them to make viewing decisions based on their own values and childrearing philosophies, and the personal maturity levels of their children. Conclusion The ACLU believes that the extension of the V-chip rules is unnecessary and unwise under the Telecommunications Act of 1996. The ACLU believes that the FCC should not hastily embrace or extend plans to incorporate V-chip technology in emerging technologies. The FCC can and must exercise its discretion and consider alternatives such as media literacy, promotion of educational programming and episode reviews. We believe that there are alternatives that would not offend core First Amendment values and accomplish the same purpose. In the final analysis, violence and sex are dramatic, consistent themes in human life and history, and like other controversial subjects, need to be confronted and discussed rather than suppressed, whether through direct censorship laws or through more indirect, convoluted governmental ratings and information blocking systems. Respectfully submitted, _______________________________________ Barry Steinhardt ACLU Associate Director ____________________________________ A. Cassidy Sehgal William J. Brennan Fellow of the ACLU

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