December 2004 - cypherpunks-legacy

Tor 0.0.9 is imminent (fwd from arma@mit.edu)
by Eugen Leitl 11 Dec '04

11 Dec '04

----- Forwarded message from Roger Dingledine <arma(a)mit.edu> -----

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Re: punkly current events
by Major Variola (ret) 11 Dec '04

11 Dec '04

At 01:19 PM 12/10/04 -0600, J.A. Terranson wrote: >I disagree. Except for the early days, spammers have been little more >than a low volume nuisance on Mix. What killed mix was it's complexity - >Joe Blow can't figure out how to use it, and new reops have a hell of a >time getting a node running (with pingers and other required tools). > >Take away complexity, and Mix *could* flourish - in spite of the fedz. I agree, with the additional constraint that mix functionality piggyback with a more popular feature. Most folks won't install even the most benign, easy to use mixer; but include a mix server in a jazzy IM or next-gen napster program, and you get deployed.

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Half baked troll
by R.W. (Bob) Erickson 11 Dec '04

11 Dec '04

The need for a coherent framework to hang our speculations on is obvious. The impossibility of any consensus based prototype is pure politics. We need a way out, and that way is to take a lesson from the theory of evolution. The lucky semantic construction is tested in practice by a virtual swarm of users. If a given notion doesnt hold together the pieces of it still populate the thoughtscape with a free radical chemistry. Agreeing to disagree is insufficient, Critical thought can reveal common folding lines if we accept the notion that whats seperates people are their individual stances, we are on the edge of something interesting. Its my premiss that people are extrodinarily clever at making things fit. We do see that individual pairs of people can find a bridge to understanding, even between radically different world view. We just have never found a way to generalise such mutual understandings. I posit the existence of a net path whereby all people could come to know their commonality. Not saying the path is accessable, but as long as we are unable to free ourselves from ideology, whats wrong with one that builds on our best?

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TSA groping
by Major Variola (ret) 11 Dec '04

11 Dec '04

At 04:50 PM 12/10/04 -0500, R.A. Hettinga wrote: >The change is minor and TSA officials say they have no plans to rescind >pat-down procedures that require screeners to touch passengers' chest and >groin areas while checking for weapons or explosives. Nevertheless, it >represents an attempt by the TSA to improve its image among travelers. I flew monthly for several years after 2001. I was never touched. Should I be surprised to find a goon touching me that way, I would not be able to stop certain reflexes involving ballistic application of elbows and knees. I am surprised this has not happened or perhaps it is not reported.

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No End To His Imagination
by R.A. Hettinga 11 Dec '04

11 Dec '04

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 <http://www.investors.com/editorial/lands.asp?view=1> Today in Investor's Business Daily stock analysis and business news Leaders & Success No End To His Imagination BY KEN SPENCER BROWN INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY Imagination should have no limits. And for Alan Turing, it didn't. By refusing to envision only what was strictly practical, he expanded the bounds of what was possible. Blending his command of mathematics with boundless imagination, he pioneered the notion of a thinking machine and paved the way for the computer age. By the time he died at age 42, Turing had become a renowned British mathematician, logician, cryptographer and war hero. Later, Turing's most advanced ideas became a foundation for computer science with the dawning of the digital age he'd envisioned. If things like software code, cryptography and artificial intelligence leave you scratching your head, just imagine wrestling with those concepts decades before the invention of the computer. Turing (1912-54) wasn't an outstanding student. But as a child, his focus was already keen, and he loved to experiment. In her 1959 biography of her son, "Alan M. Turing," Sara Turing recalled that some of Turing's grade-school inventions included a typewriter and a camera. His math skills quickly showed themselves, though the young Turing drew complaints from teachers for his messiness and penchant for neglecting the basics as he dived ahead into more advanced topics. As a house master put it in 1927, Turing was "trying to build a roof before he has laid the foundations." Actually, Turing figured that as he already understood basic concepts, it was little use wasting time on them when he could home in on more complex ideas. He was thinking beyond the educational system - and it would become key to his future breakthroughs. Early Inspiration Despite his shyness and occasional social awkwardness, friends knew Turing as an avid runner and rower, and fiercely loyal. Normally gentle in speech, Turing would defend his friends' views intensely when they were challenged. They often inspired him, too. The death of a close schoolmate in February 1930 sparked Turing's first published thoughts in metaphysics. In letters to the friend's mother, Turing pondered the connection between the human mind and the brain. These ideas sparked his thinking on artificial intelligence, which tries to model the human brain and the thought process. Turing failed to win a scholarship to his first-choice school, Trinity College, because of his erratic academic performance. But he didn't let that hold him back. Turing quickly made a name for himself at King's College in Cambridge, his second choice, on a math scholarship. He studied hard, striving to excel in each class. In 1935, at age 22, he received a fellowship there - a remarkable achievement for one so young. Still, he stayed his usual humble self. On his first night as a fellow, Turing's mother recalled that her son was happier that he'd beaten the school's provost at rummy, not that he was a fellow at 22. And though entitled to dine at the school's "high table," some complained that he seemed to prefer the company of other undergraduates. In her biography, Sara Turing says this was a sign her son simply didn't want to flaunt his new privileges. This isn't to say he held himself in low esteem. On the contrary, Turing was confident in his work, certain that he'd win academic prizes for several papers he submitted over the years. Invariably, he did. Even so, Turing insisted on giving others proper credit in collaborative projects, often downplaying his own contributions. This was one of many thoughtful traits that won Turing friends. On May 28, 1936, he submitted a paper titled "On Computable Numbers, With an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem." Designed to solve a 400-year-old logic problem, Turing described the functions of a machine that could solve any problem stated as a mathematical algorithm. Now known as a Turing machine, the theoretical device was the first to conceive of a general-use device that could store data and instructions and be programmed for lots of different math problems. Turing's attempts to build such a machine failed, but many of his ideas helped create the electronic computer. He wasn't living in a theoretical world, however; Turing searched for practical applications for his work. He put some of his ideas to use during World War II, when he helped crack secret codes used by the German air force. Turing's "bombe" machine sped up the decryption process through an electro-mechanical process of elimination. Cracking the Enigma codes used by the German navy proved tougher. But Turing loved a challenge. In 1936 - 11 years before the invention of the transistor and more than two decades before the integrated circuit - he envisioned his Turing machine as a mechanical device. This made it too slow for practical use. His exposure to the military's electronic calculators pulled his earlier ideas within reach. In 1946, Turing got the OK from England's National Physical Laboratory to create an electronic version of the Turing Machine, now dubbed the Automatic Computing Engine or ACE. It aimed to rival a planned U.S. system called the Electronic Discrete Variable Automatic Computer. As biographer Andrew Hodges notes in "Alan Turing: the Enigma," Turing's ACE was a radical break from the electronic calculators of the time. It could be set up for all sorts of calculations, making it far more useful than existing machines. "He had created something quite original and something all of his own," Hodges wrote. "He had invented the art of computer programming." The machine was never built, but Turing's ideas played a big role in other early computers, including one built in 1948 that proved his basic ideas. Yet Turing continued imagining what the still-crude technology could do. Ahead Of His Time In 1950, he published the seminal essay "Computing Machinery and Intelligence" in the journal Mind. Here, he proposed the question "Can machines think?" He didn't believe there was an answer, but suggested that computers would someday be able to fool humans into believing they could think. He proposed what is now called the "Turing Test," an experiment to see whether people could tell human from machine in a typewritten chat. The test is still used today in artificial intelligence experiments. In the paper, Turing also was one of the first to suggest that computers would someday triumph over humans at chess. Again, he was way ahead of his time. A computer didn't beat a human until 1958, playing against a secretary who'd learned how to play the game only an hour before. Computers wouldn't become decent chess players until 1962, and wouldn't beat the best players in a regular game until 1997. That's when IBM's Deep Blue machine defeated champion Garry Kasparov. Despite his work in artificial intelligence, Turing was no robot. He had a deep concern for other people. When colleagues went through difficult periods, Turing helped them in their research to ease their schedule, or lent a sympathetic ear. Compassion, he believed, was as important as innovation. And technology, in Turing's eyes, was no substitute for humanity. - -- - ----------------- 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' -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 1336 iQA/AwUBQbsGecPxH8jf3ohaEQKAPgCdFGTYtszj39ZiduKm5xWk7RWB2YkAoJXF bj3bnlYXVovnri8SV5UA1PWf =bK0h -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Mixmaster is dead, long live wardriving
by Major Variola (ret) 11 Dec '04

11 Dec '04

At 07:47 PM 12/9/04 -0800, Joseph Ashwood wrote: >> If the Klan doesn't have >> a right to wear pillowcases what makes you think mixmaster will >> survive? > >Well besides the misinterprettaion of the ruling, which I will ignore, what >makes you think MixMaster isn't already dead? OK, substitute "wardriving email injection when wardriving is otherwise legal" for Mixmastering, albeit the former is less secure since the injection lat/long is known. And you need to use a disposable Wifi card or at least one with a mutable MAC. Or consider a Napster-level popular app which includes mixing or onion routing.

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RE: Blinky Rides Again: RCMP suspect al-Qaida messages
by Trei, Peter 10 Dec '04

10 Dec '04

J.A. Terranson wrote: > (4) I have yet to meet a full dozen people who share my > belief that while stego *may* be in use, if it is, that > use is for one way messages of semaphore-class messages > only. I really do not understand why this view > is poopoo'd by all sides, so I must be pretty dense? For semaphores and codewords, stego isn't needed. Simply agree on a signal - if a post appears in alt.anonymous.messages with the subject "To JAT", the intended recipient has got all the info he needs. Stego is needed only when the message is too complex to have a codeword. Even without software, 'numbers station' type transmissions can be sent anonymously through the net.

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Re: "Word" Of the Subgenius...
by John Kelsey 10 Dec '04

10 Dec '04

>From: Steve Thompson <steve49152(a)yahoo.ca> >Sent: Dec 7, 2004 1:26 PM >To: cypherpunks(a)al-qaeda.net >Subject: Re: "Word" Of the Subgenius... ... >Tim May has probably gotten all strange in the last few years, living in >his remote hilltop home, waiting to see the end that will not come since >the y2k crisis turned out to be nothing more than a financial boondoggle >for the companies that believed all the hype. Maybe, maybe not. The thing I always find interesting and annoying about Tim May's posts is that he's sometimes making really clearly thought out, intelligent points, and other times spewing out nonsense so crazy you can't believe it's coming from the same person. It's also clear he's often yanking peoples' chains, often by saying the most offensive thing he can think of. But once in awhile, even amidst the crazy rantings about useless eaters and ovens, he'll toss out something that shows some deep, coherent thought about some issue in a new and fascinating direction. ... >Steve --John

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[p2p-hackers] Re: Memory and reputation calculation
by Tim Benham 10 Dec '04

10 Dec '04

> From: MULLER Guillaume <muller(a)emse.fr> > Date: Fri, 10 Dec 2004 09:33:39 +0100 > To: p2p-hackers(a)zgp.org > > Hi all, > > Right, I would have cited Dellarocas' papers also because he is the only=20 > one I know that worked on this subject. > > However, IMHO, his claim that size of history doesn't matter is false.=20 > He took this conclusion in very a specific domain that is eBay-like=20 > market-places with very specific assumption (cf. cited paper). > > My idea is that size of history DOES matter. Let's imagine a system=20 > (even eBay-like) where every agent *knows* that the history is a list of=20 > the X last encounters experiences. Then it is easy to see that cheating=20 > 1/X times is a strategy that pays off (particularly in systems where=20 > ratings might be noisy). > > IMHO, the key point with respect to the history is that others should=20 > not be able guess its size. If it has a fixed size, I believe it doesn't=20 > matter if (and only if) other can guess its size (and therefore cannot=20 > use strategy as described above). > > However, I'm sorry I didn't have time to make any experimentations, but=20 > I'd like to hear if anybody has. (1) You'll never eliminate cheating. (2) Making the size of the history file a secret is probably unworkable. Better to make deletion from the history non-deterministic, so the longer a record has been been in the list the more likely it is to get dropped. A potential cheater would never be certain when the incriminating evidence would be gone. If which records were disreputable was known then their lifetime could be extended. cheers, Tim

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Complaints About TSA Screenings Skyrocket
by R.A. Hettinga 10 Dec '04

10 Dec '04

<http://online.wsj.com/article_print/0,,SB110247168313594059,00.html> The Wall Street Journal December 8, 2004 Complaints About TSA Screenings Skyrocket By AMY SCHATZ Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL December 8, 2004; Page D4 WASHINGTON -- For months, top Transportation Security Administration officials have pledged to improve customer service at airport checkpoints. It doesn't appear to be working. The number of complaints and comments filed by passengers skyrocketed in October, according to a recent federal report. Almost 700 passengers called, wrote or e-mailed about rude or discourteous service -- more in one month than in the past six months combined. Complaints and comments rose sharply in almost every category, suggesting that the agency's customer-service woes are far broader than widely publicized reports about female passengers complaining about being groped at security checkpoints. TRAVELER FEEDBACK More passengers filed comments about screening in October than the previous three months combined Comments October July to September Customer treatment 690 359 Screening procedures 385 300 Time to clear security 70 62 Handling personal property 809 1,400 Damage claims on handling of luggage* 438 1,108 Total complaints 2,392 3,229 *At security checkpoints Source: DOT Air Travel Consumer Report for July-Oct. The number of "contacts" from the public about inappropriate screeners more than doubled, to 385 complaints from 150 in September, when new procedures were put into place that instruct screeners to touch intimate areas of a passenger's body to ensure no explosives or guns are hidden. More passengers also complained that their personal property was mishandled, with 809 complaints in October, compared with 436 in September. TSA improved in just one area: The number of claims for bags damaged at checkpoints fell slightly to 438. TSA is required by Congress to report figures about its customer service, and those numbers are included in a monthly report about airline on-time data and passenger complaints released by the Department of Transportation. A TSA spokeswoman said the agency's figures include complaints, comments and questions received from the flying public, and don't necessarily suggest customer service is worsening. The sharp increase shows TSA has been effective in telling customers how to contact the agency, said spokeswoman Amy von Walter. "We see this as a positive," she said. "We encourage comments. We want to hear the good and the bad, so we can refine our procedures." TSA declined to release a breakdown of the figures that showed the complaints versus questions or compliments. Not only are the total numbers up, but so is the rate of complaints per passenger. TSA received 1.61 comments for each 100,000 passengers about mishandled property in October, compared with 0.88 the month before. The rate was even worse for passengers concerned about discourteous TSA employees: The agency received 1.38 complaints for each 100,000 passengers about rudeness in October, compared with 0.23 in September and 0.27 in August. TSA says it has responded to some complaints by retraining screeners to be more open about what they are doing and why, particularly during pat-down searches. So far, TSA has no plans to relax its revised pat-down rules that went into effect in late September, allowing full-body searches. TSA is in a bind: Its metal detectors won't catch hidden explosives, but the agency can't afford to replace them. The expensive "puffer" machines can detect the whiff of explosives by shooting puffs of air at passengers as they walk through. The agency also hasn't gotten past the serious privacy issues surrounding its other option: new X-ray technology that clearly slows guns or explosives hidden on a passenger's body, but also produces an image of the passenger, sans clothing, to screeners. A version of that technology is being tested on volunteers at London's Heathrow Airport, but it has been met with mixed customer response. -- ----------------- 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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