December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

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by Anonymous 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> > (Furthermore, most remailer structures still can't erase some other security > > concerns -- > > 1: remailers acutally can be hacked or physically compromised > > 2: clients really can be screwed > > 3: etc. > > > > To help solve the first, you'd want a two-box setup doing remailing, with the > > security-critical stuff loaded on a box not directly connected to the Net with > > something 140-1ish to make tampering harder, a secure OS, etc. -- or, of > > course, you can scrap all that to get really big remailer count. > > As long as you do not see the box and do not control its manufacture, > I see no reason why you should have ny more trust in it. Well, you shouldn't have complete trust -- a tamper-resistant net could be compromised, too -- but there's a good reason to have more trust in it than in the existing one. More on that after a parenthetical remark. (This brings up the "hardware web-of-trust" issue; you can set up such a web with trusted spot-checkers and statistical/cryptographic means of assuring the user that the box works as advertised, if your threat model demands it. There's more about it in the "Beyond Class (A1)" section of the Orange Book, although the section's use to Cypherpunk types is limited because it's written without any thought to, say, doing things cheaply or having a decentralized setup.) The tamper-resistance simply means that if the mailer was set up secure, it's not going to become compromised. Instead of having to trust that one of the remailer operators is currently honest and has always done all the necessary homework to ensure the system was safe, you have to trust that this entity was honest and diligent when the remailer was set up (unless, of course, you think the tamper-resistance was circumvented); if the operator is bribed after the remailer's set up and the public key is published, there's no way to suddenly and invisibly make messages traceable, as there is in a "normal" Mixmaster remailer. (This is because, given the normal assumptions about crypto strength, it takes the remailer's private key to process a Mixmaster-like packet and that key is generated by and stays within the tamper-resistant box) My predictions about the biggest attacks on a tamper-resistant remailer net: 1: traffic analysis. Until the net structure is overhauled, this will always be possible. 2: propagation and exploitation of faulty server software. Related to the whole web-of-trust issue. 3: direct attacks on specific clients. Again, no web of trust. 4: creation of bad remailers and attempts to shut down good ones. More messages could be traced in a world with 6 good and 47 bad remailers than in one with 9 good and 3 bad. 5: direct attacks on new remailers 6: attempts to make an operator feign a catastrophe and set up a new, compromised remailer. Users, however, would know that the new key not signed by an old one means that they must now trust that the remailer was not compromised before the publication of the new key. 7: attacks on tamper resistance ... n: attacks on crypto n+1: etc.

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pgp disk
by HyperReal-Anon 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>At 03:05 AM 12/5/98 +0100, Anonymous wrote about some new product: >>If the source code isn't available, don't trust it. That's a good general >>rule. > > >Where is the source for pgpfone? Good question. That's why I wouldn't use it either. (I haven't had reason to use it, so 'll take Anonymous's word that source isn't available.) If people want to release software like this, they need a better argument for its security than "Trust us, it's secure." Considering that there is no net loss when developers of such a product release source code so that people can look it over and compile it themselves, I don't have any reason to trust such software. Aren't McAfee and PGP Inc. members of KRAP and promoting Big Brother Inside? I've lost track.

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No Subject
by Anonymous 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Sorry for all the questions but I've been away from crypto for a while and I'm looking for the best encryption program for exchanging email between Unix and Windows folks. I hope these questions are appropriate here. What do people generally think about S/MIME ? Is it well designed (strong and extendable) ? Is it convenient because its available in the popular email clients ? Is the most annoying thing about it that you have to pay for the keys ? Is there a way to self-sign keys ? SSLeay ? Are most people still using PGP ? If IDEA and MD5 (and PGP2.6.2) are not strong enough anymore, what are the Unix folks using ? Does the source for PGP5/6 compile to any target besides Windoze ? Thanks

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(fwd) Markus Kuhn on eternity
by Adam Back 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Markus Kuhn (on ukcrypto) discussing his PhD project: the design of an eternity file system with a distributed administration function system controlled via a cryptographically enforced digital constitution. Comments to follow. Adam ====================================================================== To: ukcrypto(a)maillist.ox.ac.uk Subject: Re: intangible definitions are hard to pin down Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1998 16:28:21 +0000 From: Markus Kuhn <Markus.Kuhn(a)cl.cam.ac.uk> Ben Laurie wrote on 1998-11-19 12:22 UTC: > Ross Anderson wrote: > > It will get worse. One of my students is developing a file system that > > can be spread over a WAN, so that for example you can force all file > > modifications in directory foo to be backed up automatially using a > > kind of RCS at a server in America. Useful stuff - real businesses are > > much more interested in backup and disaster recovery than they are in > > crypto (and spend a couple of orders of magnitude more money). But how > > does this sort of system interact with export control? > > Cool - is this going to be open source? Of course. > Presumably, even though, as you > say, businesses are less interested in crypto, it will, nevertheless, > use crypto for data protection and user authentication? Of course. The main research aspect of this project is the joint administration of such distributed archives. For spam protection, you still need people who decide, which files are allowed on the distributed server infrastructure, and which are not. This administration is so far the weak link in the Eternity Service concept, because whoever decides that something is not spam takes over some responsibility for the content, and is therefore subject to legal power of national powers. The distributed administration in my system will be controlled via a sort of cryptographically enforced digital constitution (written in a tiny special purpose functional programming language) that determines administrative rights in a freely configurable way for a distributed server architecture (allowing elections, votes, vetoes, impeachment, updates to the constitution, etc.). This way, no single person will be responsible for the maintenance of such international software repositories, but a (usually international) group of democratically controlled volunteers does this. This way, US people can easily contribute to the administration of such distributed archives without having to share any legal responsibility for the fact that the archive also contains export controlled software, because the majority of administrators and not some single citizen alone has decided which files are allowed to use server space. The goal of this project is of course not primarily to by-pass export controls. It will hopefully advance the state-of-the-art of how we use the Internet to distribute information to a point where classical export control laws and national control of Internet content in general are led completely ad absurdum, without enabling at the same time the wide distribution and robust long-term storage of commonly considered despicable material such as child pornography, instructions for building weapons of mass destruction, or unwanted commercial advertising. In fact, by providing easy to configure governmental mechanisms comparable to those national governments are based on for software repositories, we distribute the responsibility in a cryptographically enforced way over the thousands or millions of users of such archives, effectively bypassing any control of national governments, without the negative aspects of complete anarchy (spam). To avoid misunderstandings: the ultimate idea is not to just by-pass national laws, but to offer a productive and democratic alternative technical means for controlling online resources, because the classical options of either national legislation and complete anarchy both have serious problems. Markus (Ross' student, who tries to get a PhD for developing a theoretical foundation and practical implementation of global-scale jointly administrated file spaces) -- Markus G. Kuhn, Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge, UK Email: mkuhn at acm.org, WWW: <http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/>

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Wei Dei's "b-money" protocol
by Adam Back 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Wei Dei recently announced (on cypherpunks) his "b-money, a new protocol for monetary exchange and contract enforcement for pseudonyms". Below is the text of his proposal. Comments to follow. Adam ====================================================================== http://www.eskimo.com/~weidai/bmoney.txt ====================================================================== I am fascinated by Tim May's crypto-anarchy. Unlike the communities traditionally associated with the word "anarchy", in a crypto-anarchy the government is not temporarily destroyed but permanently forbidden and permanently unnecessary. It's a community where the threat of violence is impotent because violence is impossible, and violence is impossible because its participants cannot be linked to their true names or physical locations. Until now it's not clear, even theoretically, how such a community could operate. A community is defined by the cooperation of its participants, and efficient cooperation requires a medium of exchange (money) and a way to enforce contracts. Traditionally these services have been provided by the government or government sponsored institutions and only to legal entities. In this article I describe a protocol by which these services can be provided to and by untraceable entities. I will actually describe two protocols. The first one is impractical, because it makes heavy use of a synchronous and unjammable anonymous broadcast channel. However it will motivate the second, more practical protocol. In both cases I will assume the existence of an untraceable network, where senders and receivers are identified only by digital pseudonyms (i.e. public keys) and every messages is signed by its sender and encrypted to its receiver. In the first protocol, every participant maintains a (seperate) database of how much money belongs to each pseudonym. These accounts collectively define the ownership of money, and how these accounts are updated is the subject of this protocol. 1. The creation of money. Anyone can create money by broadcasting the solution to a previously unsolved computational problem. The only conditions are that it must be easy to determine how much computing effort it took to solve the problem and the solution must otherwise have no value, either practical or intellectual. The number of monetary units created is equal to the cost of the computing effort in terms of a standard basket of commodities. For example if a problem takes 100 hours to solve on the computer that solves it most economically, and it takes 3 standard baskets to purchase 100 hours of computing time on that computer on the open market, then upon the broadcast of the solution to that problem everyone credits the broadcaster's account by 3 units. 2. The transfer of money. If Alice (owner of pseudonym K_A) wishes to transfer X units of money to Bob (owner of pseudonym K_B), she broadcasts the message "I give X units of money to K_B" signed by K_A. Upon the broadcast of this message, everyone debits K_A's account by X units and credits K_B's account by X units, unless this would create a negative balance in K_A's account in which case the message is ignored. 3. The effecting of contracts. A valid contract must include a maximum reparation in case of default for each participant party to it. It should also include a party who will perform arbitration should there be a dispute. All parties to a contract including the arbitrator must broadcast their signatures of it before it becomes effective. Upon the broadcast of the contract and all signatures, every participant debits the account of each party by the amount of his maximum reparation and credits a special account identified by a secure hash of the contract by the sum the maximum reparations. The contract becomes effective if the debits succeed for every party without producing a negative balance, otherwise the contract is ignored and the accounts are rolled back. A sample contract might look like this: K_A agrees to send K_B the solution to problem P before 0:0:0 1/1/2000. K_B agrees to pay K_A 100 MU (monetary units) before 0:0:0 1/1/2000. K_C agrees to perform arbitration in case of dispute. K_A agrees to pay a maximum of 1000 MU in case of default. K_B agrees to pay a maximum of 200 MU in case of default. K_C agrees to pay a maximum of 500 MU in case of default. 4. The conclusion of contracts. If a contract concludes without dispute, each party broadcasts a signed message "The contract with SHA-1 hash H concludes without reparations." or possibly "The contract with SHA-1 hash H concludes with the following reparations: ..." Upon the broadcast of all signatures, every participant credits the account of each party by the amount of his maximum reparation, removes the contract account, then credits or debits the account of each party according to the reparation schedule if there is one. 5. The enforcement of contracts. If the parties to a contract cannot agree on an appropriate conclusion even with the help of the arbitrator, each party broadcasts a suggested reparation/fine schedule and any arguments or evidence in his favor. Each participant makes a determination as to the actual reparations and/or fines, and modifies his accounts accordingly. In the second protocol, the accounts of who has how much money are kept by a subset of the participants (called servers from now on) instead of everyone. These servers are linked by a Usenet-style broadcast channel. The format of transaction messages broadcasted on this channel remain the same as in the first protocol, but the affected participants of each transaction should verify that the message has been received and successfully processed by a randomly selected subset of the servers. Since the servers must be trusted to a degree, some mechanism is needed to keep them honest. Each server is required to deposit a certain amount of money in a special account to be used as potential fines or rewards for proof of misconduct. Also, each server must periodically publish and commit to its current money creation and money ownership databases. Each participant should verify that his own account balances are correct and that the sum of the account balances is not greater than the total amount of money created. This prevents the servers, even in total collusion, from permanently and costlessly expanding the money supply. New servers can also use the published databases to synchronize with existing servers. The protocol proposed in this article allows untraceable pseudonymous entities to cooperate with each other more efficiently, by providing them with a medium of exchange and a method of enforcing contracts. The protocol can probably be made more efficient and secure, but I hope this is a step toward making crypto-anarchy a practical as well as theoretical possibility. ======================================================================

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RE: What was the quid pro quo for Wassenaar countries?
by Vivek Vaidya 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>John Gilmore may be right, but remember folks that in Europe we have >this thing the Greeks invented called democracy. One of the ideas of >democracy is that decisions are not made in secret closed meetings. Would you really call the EU protocols a democracy? rule by the unelected technocrats? And Europes history of not making decisions in secret closed meetings is hardly commendable. Excepting perhaps the swiss. >The interpretation of the US ambassador appears to be based on the >assumption that the governmental proceedures of democratic countries >are like those of his home country. In fact European governments >cannot make law simply by telling the national police force to >arrest folk who engage in particular behaviour. Now my understanding of european law is, of course, limited. But in France wasn't there that case of some rapper been arrested for insulting the police? And in Germany you can strip the constitutional rights of citizens who engage in treasonous behaviour ( could this include cryptography? if connected with neo-nazis almost certainly right? ) >The system of checks and balances may be described in the US >constitution but it is entrenched in the European polity. The UK >does not have a national police force precisely to stop Hooverism. > >Even directives of the European Commission do not have legal force >until the national parliaments enact legislation to implement the >directive. What about those airline accords where the EU took its member states to court over cabotage agreements. I'm sure there are ways to sneak these things through. >One should also remember that the government of the Netherlands has agreed >to control the sale and use of narcotics. If their efforts to control >cryptography are as dilligent we have nothing to worry about. > >In addition under the single European act the entire country of Europe is >one export zone for crypto control purposes. I fail to see that stopping >Brits from exporting crypto to the US changes the equation a great deal. > > >There once was an English king called Canute who attempted to demonstrate >to his courtiers that he was fallible and could not order the tide to >turn. Perhaps Clinton's courtiers need to learn that they suffer the same >limmitation. I'm afraid that that may not be the point. The primary objective of the arms control laws ( which are the ones being used as references in this case ) is to prevent advanced weapons technology from spreading to the third world. Now Europe, America, Japan, and other first world countries are all capable of developing high level crypto indiginously. The less advanced countries on the earth are forced to import it from these countries. What the passage of this law will do is prevent this export ( example: the Netherlands, as you pointed out has not cracked down on its internal narcotics trade. However it doesn't permit exporting narcotics. Similarly this agreement will probably freeze exports of high level crypto by all the signatory countries, in the same way that america no longer permits high level crypto exports. ) The end result being the NSA should able to read India and Chinas communications without irritations. Vivek Vaidya ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

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DoJ investigates CIA [CNN]
by Jim Choate 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Forwarded message: > X-within-URL: http://www.cnn.com/US/9812/05/cia.hughes.ap/ > JUSTICE INVESTIGATING CIA FOR POSSIBLE CRIMINAL VIOLATIONS > > CIA Graphic December 5, 1998 > Web posted at: 1:38 p.m. EST (1838 GMT) > > WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Justice Department is conducting an > obstruction-of-justice investigation of CIA officials who passed along > to a satellite contractor sensitive information about a Senate > investigation into technology transfers to China. > > Government officials reached late Friday said the criminal > investigation centers on information passed by the intelligence agency > to Hughes Electronics Corp., maker of both commercial and spy > satellite systems. > > At issue is whether that information compromised a Senate Intelligence > Committee investigation into allegations that Hughes and other U.S. > companies violated federal export laws by sharing restricted > technology with China as part of commercial satellite export deals. [text deleted] ____________________________________________________________________ If I can put in one word what has always infuriated me in any person, any group, any movement, or any nation, it is: bullying Howard Zinn The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage(a)ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------

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(eternity) democracy is a bad idea on the net too! (fwd)
by Jim Choate 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Forwarded message: > Date: Sat, 5 Dec 1998 20:26:51 GMT > From: Adam Back <aba(a)dcs.ex.ac.uk> > Subject: (eternity) democracy is a bad idea on the net too! > Markus Kuhn wrote: > > The main research aspect of this project is the joint administration of > > such distributed archives. For spam protection, you still need people > > who decide, which files are allowed on the distributed server > > infrastructure, and which are not. > > I think a better deciding factor of which files remain and which don't > is hard, anonymous ecash. Allow the author, or server to charge for > storage, and charge for access. Allow readers to contribute ecash to > the continued existance of a data. Throw the lot together and let > profit maximisation sort the rest out. There is some window for abuse in this method. It allows a well endowed entity to bias the information available. There is also the question of data degredation, in the sense of worth, over time versus the archival/historical worth of the data. Two major negatives to a free-market approach that are never discussed. ____________________________________________________________________ If I can put in one word what has always infuriated me in any person, any group, any movement, or any nation, it is: bullying Howard Zinn The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage(a)ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------

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17 Dec '03

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eternity using politics rather than economics
by Ryan Lackey 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

When I was working on Eternity DDS stuff, I basically came to the same conclusion as Adam -- without anonymous bearer cash, you can't do a workable eternity implementation. It's an open question whether you could issue bearer cash backed in Eternity-units. That was my original plan, but it seems you would still want to have gold-units to trade for Eternity units. The problems of guaranteeing quality of service in exchange for Eternity units are complicated but tractable, but having a separate scheme for auditing performance. Where I think "political" schemes would be particularly beneficial is in sharing administrative control over a virtual corporation, etc. While those who believe Coase would believe corporations will devolve into individuals or even autonomous agents, it might be a worthwhile tool during the transition. As far as I can tell, having a good Eternity implementation is still blocked on getting a reasonable electronic cash system. There are some people in Anguilla...

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