December 2004 - cypherpunks-legacy

Police given computer spy powers
by Anonymous Sender 15 Dec '04

15 Dec '04

Police given computer spy powers http://smh.com.au/news/National/Police-given-computer-spy-powers/2004/12/12… ("smhguy/pass" to access) By Rob O'Neill December 13, 2004 Federal and state police now have the power to use computer spyware to gather evidence in a broad range of investigations after legal changes last week. The Surveillance Devices Act allows police to obtain a warrant to use software surveillance technologies, including systems that track and log keystrokes on a computer keyboard. The law applies to the Australian Federal Police and to state police investigating Commonwealth offences. Critics have called the law rushed and imbalanced, saying police will be able to secretly install software to monitor email, online chats, word processor and spreadsheets entries and even bank personal identification numbers and passwords. Irene Graham, executive director of watchdog Electronic Frontiers Australia, said the law went too far in allowing police surveillance. "The legislation has been passed without the proper scrutiny and the ALP is too afraid to stick to their guns and oppose it," she said. Ms Graham also believed the act could override parts of the Telecommunications Interception Act, which tightly regulated telecommunications monitoring. AdvertisementAdvertisement A spokesperson for the federal Attorney-General, Philip Ruddock, denied this, saying the act specifically said it should not be read to override the Telecommunications Interception Act. The spokesperson said there were protections in the legislation, including reporting to Parliament and allowing reviews by the Ombudsman. In addition to redefining the kinds of surveillance devices that can be used, the Surveillance Devices Act allows surveillance for offences far less serious than those allowed under the Telecommunications Interception Act. Warrants to intercept telecommunications can only be obtained to investigate offences carrying a maximum jail term of seven years or more. However, Surveillance Devices Act warrants can be obtained for offences carrying a maximum sentence of three years. Ms Graham said the three-year benchmark was too low and the act went too far in setting out circumstances in which police could use surveillance devices. A warrant could be obtained under the act if an officer had reasonable grounds to suspect an offence had been or might be committed and a surveillance device was necessary to obtain evidence. They can also be obtained in child recovery cases. The act also has secrecy provisions making it an offence to publish information on an application for, or the existence of, a surveillance warrant. The Government said the act would consolidate and modernise the law. Mr Ruddock said the power of Commonwealth law enforcement using surveillance devices lagged behind what technology made possible and what was permitted in other jurisdictions. However, Electronic Frontiers is concerned that key-logging software can even record words written and then deleted or changed and thoughts that are not intended for communication.

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Re: Insurrectionist covers
by Steve Thompson 15 Dec '04

15 Dec '04

--- Justin Guyett <justin(a)soze.net> wrote: > On 2004-12-11T08:10:27-0500, Steve Thompson wrote: > > [snip] > > This is what happens when one picks up ideas from people who present > them > > second-hand (or at even greater distances from their origin) and who > do > > not make proper footnotes. > > That's just a symptom of the problem that there's no clear line past > which ideas must be cited. How infrequently do you have to see an idea > in print, and how novel must it be, before a citation is appropriate? Depends, I suppose, on a number of factors. > Ideas are a continuum. Plagiarism is an artificial notion constructed > as a result of the need to measure individuals' progress in higher > education, as well as to protect intellectual property (which didn't > really exist before the invention of the printing press). People used > to have scribes copy books. They were treated as tomes of knowledge, > not as property. Now that they are property, people have more books > than ever before, and are reading them less carefully than ever before. Well, previously there was more importance put towards knowledge, and less on making money with same. Today the emphasis is somewhat different. > Even Dawkins and Hobbes picked up ideas and used them without explicit > citation. Hobbes didn't arrive at his conception of the State of Nature > in a void. He got those ideas in reaction against Greek history, > Descartes, and several other people. Everybody does that, or at least those who create knowledge either as a process of study and synthesis, or as a result of original research. Some ideas are prevalent to the extent that it is obvious as to their origin. Ideally, someone who presents an idea as his or her own will take some pains to indicate the fact, and will distinguish their sources by way of appropriate references. > Which brings up an interesting thought relating to entropy. Does it > matter whether a prior author breaks up a subject into N pieces, proving > N-1 pieces unworkable but leaving the "last" unaddressed? Someone who Now you're talking about SLAC. > takes those ideas and writes a defense of the "last" piece might be > copying the prior author's ideas, even though they were not written > anywhere. Intellectual property and ideas are often traceable directly, > but sometimes they are not. Requiring citations for ideas often results > in incorrect citations or citations to secondary or tertiary (or worse) > sources. Theft of IP is a complicated endeavour these days. > Hijacking that thought a bit, lack of citations is one of my pet peeves. Me too. > Nobody makes proper footnotes or citations these days; it's particularly > noticeable in quote collections. There are fake quotes from the > founders floating around, as well as fake quotes from Marcus Aurelius > ("Times are bad; children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is > writing a book.") as well as from all sorts of other historical figures. Opinion: It seems there is a new trend towards guild-like protection of scientific and scientific-like diciplines. People who like the idea of guilds are working towards making participation contingent upon membership. Membership may eventually only be granted to individuals who submit to arbitrary rules. And note that I am not referring to ethical restrictions in this instance. Ethics -- good ones that dicate a minimum of racism and like discrimination, for instance -- are becoming somehwat rare. Regards, Steve ______________________________________________________________________ Post your free ad now! http://personals.yahoo.ca

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[i2p] weekly status notes [dec 14] (fwd from jrandom@i2p.net)
by Eugen Leitl 15 Dec '04

15 Dec '04

----- Forwarded message from jrandom <jrandom(a)i2p.net> -----

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Gait advances in emerging biometrics
by Sunder 14 Dec '04

14 Dec '04

Original URL: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/12/14/alt_biometrics/ Gait advances in emerging biometrics By John Leyden (john.leyden at theregister.co.uk) Published Tuesday 14th December 2004 15:07 GMT "Great Juno comes; I know her by her gait." William Shakespeare, The Tempest Retinal scans, finger printing or facial recognition get most of the publicity but researchers across the world are quietly labouring away at alternative types of biometrics. Recognition by the way someone walk (their gait), the shape of their ears, the rhythm they make when they tap and the involuntary response of ears to sounds all have the potential to raise the stock of biometric techniques. According to Professor Mark Nixon, of the Image Speech and Recognition Research Group at the University of Southampton, each has unique advantages which makes them worth exploring. <SNIP> ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. /|\ \|/ :They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country /\|/\ <--*-->:and our people, and neither do we." -G. W. Bush, 2004.08.05 \/|\/ /|\ : \|/ + v + : War is Peace, freedom is slavery, Bush is President. -------------------------------------------------------------------------

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punkly current events
by Major Variola (ret) 14 Dec '04

14 Dec '04

Someone should have commented here, so I will, that some judges (earning hanging) basically said that anonymity is not a right. This in the context of mask-wearing in public. If the Klan doesn't have a right to wear pillowcases what makes you think mixmaster will survive?

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Toshiba shows practical quantum cryptography
by R.A. Hettinga 13 Dec '04

13 Dec '04

<http://www.zdnet.co.uk/print/?TYPE=story&AT=39181033-39020357t-10000013c> Toshiba shows practical quantum cryptography Rupert Goodwins ZDNet UK December 13, 2004, 18:15 GMT Toshiba Research Europe demonstrated last week what it claims is the world's first reliable automated quantum cryptography system and run it continuously for over a week. The system, which relies on single photons to transmit an untappable key over standard optical fibres, is capable of delivering thousands of keys a second and can be effective over distances of more than 100km. Although no price or launch date has been set yet, Toshiba is already in talks with a number of telcos and end users in preparation for commercialisation of the technology -- which offers the possibility of significantly more secure networking. "We're talking to a number of potential end users at the minute," Dr Andrew Shields, group leader of Toshiba's Cambridge-based Quantum Information Group told ZDNet UK. "We're planning to do some trials in the City of London next year, and are targeting users in the financial sector. We've also had some interest from telcos, including MCI with whom we've been running the installed fibre tests." The system works by transmitting a long stream of photons modulated to represent ones and zeros, most of which are lost along the way. These photons can be modulated in one of two ways through two different kinds of polarisation, but according to Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle it is impossible to know both the kind of polarisation and the data represented by the photon. The receiver has to assume one to get the other, which it will frequently get wrong. The receiver picks up and attempts to decode a few out of those that make it, and reports back to the sender which ones it received and decoded thus making up a key that both ends know. Any interceptor can't know what the value of those photons is, because by reading them in transit it will destroy them, and it can't replace them after reading them because it can never know their exact details. Although Toshiba has been developing special hardware to create and analyse single photon transactions by quantum dots -- effectively artificial atoms integrated with control circuitry -- the current cryptographic equipment uses standard parts, including Peltier-effect cooled detectors operating at very low noise levels. The next generation of equipment is expected to use this new technology. Toshiba is also looking at ways to increase the range of the systems beyond the limitations of a single fibre -- because a photon can't be intercepted and retransmitted, it's not possible for the technology to incorporate repeaters to overcome the losses in multiple segments. However, says Shields, there is a possibility that repeaters may be created using quantum teleportation -- a new and still experimental effect where the quantum state of a particle can be transmitted across distances without it needing to be fully measured. Toshiba Research Europe Ltd is part of the European SECOQC project, which is working towards the development of a global network for secure communication using quantum technology. -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah(a)ibuc.com> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

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Acoustic Keyboard Eavesdropping
by Sunder 13 Dec '04

13 Dec '04

Not new news, but interesting anyway. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/12/magazine/12ACOUSTIC.html (bugmenot's your uncle) Acoustic Keyboard Eavesdropping By STEPHEN MIHM Published: December 12, 2004 When it comes to computer security, do you have faith in firewalls? Think passwords will protect you? Not so fast: it is now possible to eavesdrop on a typist's keystrokes and, by exploiting minute variations in the sounds made by different keys, distinguish and decipher what is being typed. <SNIP> This means that firewalls and passwords will amount to nothing if someone manages to bug a room and record the cacophony of keystrokes. Asonov managed to pull off this feat with readily available recording equipment at a short distance. Even as far away as 50 feet, and with significant background noise, he was able to replicate his success using a parabolic microphone. He also anticipated an obvious practical objection: how does a would-be eavesdropper get into a building and spend enough time to ''train'' a computer program to recognize the keystrokes of a particular keyboard? Not a problem: it seems that keyboards of the same make and model sound sufficiently alike -- regardless of who is typing -- that a computer trained on one keyboard can be unleashed on another. <SNIP> ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. /|\ \|/ :They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country /\|/\ <--*-->:and our people, and neither do we." -G. W. Bush, 2004.08.05 \/|\/ /|\ : \|/ + v + : War is Peace, freedom is slavery, Bush is President. -------------------------------------------------------------------------

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[osint] Armed Jews Week
by R.A. Hettinga 13 Dec '04

13 Dec '04

--- begin forwarded text To: "Bruce Tefft" <btefft(a)community-research.com> Thread-Index: AcTf1qSOh7x08m1TSIC4MNZclyU3mgADr4Rg From: "Bruce Tefft" <btefft(a)community-research.com> Mailing-List: list osint(a)yahoogroups.com; contact osint-owner(a)yahoogroups.com Delivered-To: mailing list osint(a)yahoogroups.com Date: Sat, 11 Dec 2004 21:19:58 -0500 Subject: [osint] Armed Jews Week Reply-To: osint(a)yahoogroups.com http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6662217/ Armed Jews Week Guest blogging for Glenn this week is Dave Kopel, Research Director at the Independence Institute, and co-author of several articles with Glenn. . December 10, 2004 | 11:51 AM ET Tonight is the fourth night of Armed Jews Week, or as it is more popularly known, Hanukkah. Hanukkah is an eight-day celebration of the Jewish revolution against Syria in the second century B.C. The Syrian government (a remnant of Alexander the Great's empire) attempted to wipe out the Jewish religion by forcing the Jews to conform to Greek culture. Some of them refused, and a tiny militia, led by Judah the Maccabee ("the hammer") began a guerilla war. The Jewish militia grew in force, and repeatedly destroyed much larger Syrian armies which were sent to smash the revolution. Syria's King Antiochus decided that the Jewish people were so much trouble that he would just get rid of them entirely-slaughtering as many as necessary, and selling all the rest into slavery. But his wicked plans failed, and after years of war, the Jews won their independence. During the years of Syrian tyranny, Syrian officers enjoyed the droit du seigneur-the authority to deflower virgin Jewish brides on their wedding nights, before they could join their husbands. So some stories which Jewish families retell at Hanukkah, such as the Book of Judith,extol brave Jewish women who went to the tent of enemy officers who were expecting sex-but who instead met their deaths as the hands of lone Jewish women. During centuries of oppression in Christian and Moslem lands, many Jews adopted attitudes of passivity and helplessness. Those attitudes began to change in the late nineteenth century, with the growth of the Zionist movement. Zionists believed that Jews had become disconnected from the physical world. That the Jews had no homeland was the most extreme manifestation of the disconnection, but the disconnect could be seen on many levels. Often pale and weak, Jewish boys were easy targets for bullies. Usually passive and timid, Jewish communities were easy targets for mobs. The root cause of Jewish physical weakness and of disrespect by gentiles was the Jewish lack of self-respect. The Zionists set out to restore a Jewish homeland, and they recognized that such a project would require a widespread change in Jewish consciousness. So in counties such as Russia and Israel (which was ruled as colony by the Ottoman Empire and then by the British), Zionists organized Jewish self-defense groups. Many of the young Jewish men and women who would lead the resistance to Hitler were members of these Zionist self-defense youth groups in the 1930s in Eastern Europe. Although there is a widespread myth that Jews in the Holocaust were passive, they were actually more active than any other conquered people. In 1942-43, Jews constituted half of all the partisans in Poland. Overall, about thirty thousand Jewish partisans fought in Eastern Europe. There were armed revolts in over forty different ghettos, mostly in Eastern Poland. In other parts of Europe, Jews likewise joined the resistance at much higher rates than the rest of the population. Unlike in Eastern Europe, though, Jews were generally able to participate as individuals in the national resistance, rather than having to fight in separate units. For example, in France, Jews amounted to than one percent of French population, but comprised about 15-20 percent of the French Resistance. In Greece too, Jews were disproportionately involved in the resistance. In Thessaly, a Jewish partisan unit in the mountains was led by the septuagenarian Rabbi Moshe Pesah, who carried his own rifle. The Athenian Jew Jacques Costis led the team which demolished the Gorgopotamos Bridge, thereby breaking the link between the mainland and Peloponnesian Peninsula, and interfering with the delivery of supplies to Rommel's Afrika Korps. One of the great centers of resistance was Vilna, Lithuania, which before the Nazi conquest had been an outstanding center of Jewish learning, compared by some to Jerusalem. Plans for resistance began in January 1942. The Jews' only weapons were smuggled in from nearby German arms factories where the Jews performed slave labor. Hopeful of liberation by the Russian army, many of the Vilna Jews did not support the partisans. Partisan resistance postponed by three weeks the German plans to transport all the inhabitants of the Vilna ghetto to death camps, but the deportation of 40,000 Jews was accomplished by the end of September 1943. A young poet named Abba Kovner led the resistance movement known as the Avengers in the woods around Vilna. His lieutenants, and bedmates, were teenage girls, Vitka Kempner and Ruzka Korczak. The Avengers were the first partisans in Nazi Europe to blow up a German train. Towards the end of the war, the Avengers shepherded huge numbers of Jews to Palestine, in violation of the British blockade. Before the war, Ruzka had belonged to left-wing Zionist youth group called "The Young Guard" (HaShomer HaTza'ir) which trained Jews in self-defense, and taught the older boys how to shoot. Abba was not religious, but he was a fervent Zionist, loving to read the Bible stories of Jewish warriors, and aiming to emulate the Jewish Bible heroes. In the Vilna Ghetto, it was Abba Kovner who first saw that the tightening of the Nazi oppression was not just a temporary imposition by a local German official; it was a step towards the total destruction of the Jews. The only way out, he argued, was "Revolt and armed defense. This is the only way which promises any dignity for our people." Other Jews countered that revolt was hopeless because the Germans were so strong, and that collective reprisals by the Germans would just lead to more Jewish deaths. Ruzka Korczak retorted that the stories of Jewish heroism could not remain only "a part of our ancient history. They must be part of our real life as well." The next generation of Jews must have something to admire. "How good will they be if their entire history is one of slaughter and extermination? We cannot allow that. It must also have heroic struggles, self-defense, war, even death with honor." Vilna was typical, in that the young people were usually the ones who wanted to fight, and the elders usually counseled against causing trouble. Most of the partisan leaders and fighters were young. Niuta Teitelbaum was a beautiful 24-year-old Jewish Polish woman who looked like she was sixteen. Known as "Little Wanda with the Braids," she was an expert smuggler of people and weapons, and instructed women's partisan cells. Her units blew up trains, artillery emplacements, and other German targets. Once, wearing traditional Polish clothing and a kerchief on her hair, she talked her way past a series of Gestapo guards, whispering that she was going to see the SS commander on "private business." Alone with the commander in his office, she drew a revolver, shot him dead, and calmly left the building. Because generation after generation after generation of Jewish families told their children the heroic Hanukkah stories of Judah the Macabbee and Judith, the spirit of freedom and resistance lived in modern heroes such as Abba Kovner and Niuta Teitelbaum. At the annual Passover Seder, Jewish families say: In every generation, each person must look upon himself or herself as if he or she personally had come out of Egypt. As the Book of Exodus says, "You shall tell your children on that day: it is because of what the Eternal One did for me when I went forth from Egypt." For it was not our fathers and mothers alone whom the Holy One redeemed. We too were redeemed along with them. The point has a broader application than just for Jews at Passover. Hanukkah teaches that God's redemption of the Jewish people is a continuing act of history-and so does Jewish armed resistance during the Holocaust. The resistance proved to the world that Jews were active fighters, and not mere passive victims. That resistance (most famously, in the Warsaw Ghetto) was an indispensable step towards the rebirth of the modern state of Israel. The Books of Maccabees and the Book of Judith are part of the Roman Catholic, Episcopalian, and Orthodox Bibles; the stories of resistance to the Nazis are part of the heritage of freedom-loving people everywhere. So as Jewish families light Menorah candles during the eight days of Hanukkah, may people of good will, of all faiths, use the time as an occasion to teach their children about the inspiring Jewish and Gentile men and women who, even in the darkest times, have kept alive the sacred light of freedom. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> $4.98 domain names from Yahoo!. Register anything. http://us.click.yahoo.com/Q7_YsB/neXJAA/yQLSAA/TySplB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> -------------------------- Want to discuss this topic? Head on over to our discussion list, discuss-osint(a)yahoogroups.com. -------------------------- Brooks Isoldi, editor bisoldi(a)intellnet.org http://www.intellnet.org Post message: osint(a)yahoogroups.com Subscribe: osint-subscribe(a)yahoogroups.com Unsubscribe: osint-unsubscribe(a)yahoogroups.com *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. OSINT, as a part of The Intelligence Network, is making it available without profit to OSINT YahooGroups members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of intelligence and law enforcement organizations, their activities, methods, techniques, human rights, civil liberties, social justice and other intelligence related issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. We believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: osint-unsubscribe(a)yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ --- end forwarded text -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah(a)ibuc.com> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

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[osint] Militants and the Latest Mobile Phone Technology
by R.A. Hettinga 13 Dec '04

13 Dec '04

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[osint] Missing uniforms revive 9/11 fears in Canada
by R.A. Hettinga 13 Dec '04

13 Dec '04

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