- cypherpunks-legacy - lists.cpunks.org

ping
by donb＠netcom.com 27 Nov '92

27 Nov '92

This is a test. I am seeing mail rejected due to mail spool full @ newschool.

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(fwd) 8052-Based Crypto Engine
by tcmay＠netcom.com 27 Nov '92

27 Nov '92

I just found this is sci.crypt. It may be useful for the "crypto dongle" folks. --Tim May Newsgroups: sci.crypt,comp.arch Subject: 8052-Based Crypto Engine From: mmm(a)cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson) Date: 27 Nov 92 06:50:33 GMT Here is the text from a press release which landed on my desk yesterday: A new microcontroller from Philips Semiconductors-Signetics designed for use in smart-card applications is the first to incorporate an on-chip arithmetic unit optimized to calculate public-key cryptography algorithms widely used in commercial transactions. The 83C852 CMOS microcontroller can be embedded in plastic smart cards and provides 2K bytes of on-chip EEPROM for program and data storage accessed under control of the unit's CPU. "The new microcontroller removes the barrier to smart-card use in applications where data security is a concern," said Thomas Brenner, product manager. "There is strong interest in using smart cards, for example, in medical insurance or remote banking transactions. But in such applications a high level of data security is indispensable," he said. "Likewise the need for secure access codes is a primary consideration for customer-card use in the Pay TV and cellular phone markets." The on-chip arithmetic unit running in parallel with the CPU can complete a 512-byte calculation in less than 1.5 seconds versus more than a minute to do the calculation in software. This high-speed performance makes it feasible to use highly secure and complex public-key cryptography algorithms in everyday transactions. Asymmetric, public-key cryptography uses one key to encrypt and another to decrypt so that only one of the keys need be kept secret. The other can be freely distributed. The method is thus highly applicable to commercial transactions. The 83C852 microcontroller is based on the industry-standard 8-bit 80C51 processor core and uses the same instruction set. The circuit incorporates 6 Kbytes of ROM and 256 bytes of RAM in addition to the 2 Kbytes of EEPROM. The EEPROM provides automatic hardware error correction for single-bit errors in any of the stored data bytes. After customer software is loaded, electronic fuses in the array can be blown to limit access to processor fetch commands. The address bus is mixed to provide further protection against fraudulent access and optical scanning, and a low-frequency detection circuit can guard against external tampering. The new processor operates from a single 5-volt supply at clock frequencies up to 6 MHz (1 microsecond instruction cycle). All voltages required during programming or erasure of the EEPROM are generated on chip. Nonvolatile data retention is for ten years and the circuit offers an infinite number of read cycles. The microcontroller includes a power-on/off reset circuit, and idle and power-down modes. The microcontrollers can be ordered as a wafer, die on foil or in SO-28 small-outline packages. The SO package is available for smart-card readers and can function as an embedded security module in systems such as restricted access computers. Wafer and die-on-foil versions of the 83C852 smart card microcontroller are available now at a unit price of $5.10 and $5.20 respectively in 10,000 quantites. Units in SO-28 packages will be available in first quarter 1993 priced at $6.85 in the same quantities. CONTACT: Thomas Brenner (408) 991-3552 He's with Philips-Signetics. I have no affiliation with them, so don't contact me about this part. If you call Tom, be sure to tell him you heard about the chip from MARK THORSON on USENET. If enough people do this, maybe they'll give me a free development system. (On the other hand maybe they'll tell me "Please don't post any more of our press releases on Usenet." :-) -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | PGP Public Key: by arrangement.

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Re: Returned mail: User unknown
by cordones＠IMAGE.CS.NYU.EDU 27 Nov '92

27 Nov '92

So..any courageous Cypherpunk that can post those papers or tell us what to look for in a library? (anonymous post, whatever). ----------- El Zorro.

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The NSA Backs Down!!
by karn＠qualcomm.com 27 Nov '92

27 Nov '92

r a AM-DeclassifiedCodes 11-26 0287 ^AM-Declassified Codes,0266< ^Government Reverses Itself, Declassifies Studies On Secret Codes< SAN FRANCISCO (AP) _ The National Security Agency has reversed itself and declassified two cryptography texts it previously had insisted were secret even though they were available in public libraries. The announcement Wednesday came as a result of a lawsuit filed under the Freedom of Information Act by a Silicon Valley computer scientist who believes private companies should have more access to secret code technology. The analyst, John Gilmore, asked the spy agency to declassify the 50-year-old studies on encryption _ the science of designing codes. The U.S. Department of Justice recently had threatened to prosecute Gilmore under a 1950s espionage law if he distributed copies of the texts. In court papers, an NSA official said disclosure of the information could seriously damage national security. The agency is in charge of protecting U.S. codes and cracking foreign ones. Gilmore is a board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation of Cambridge, Mass. The organization believes now-secret encryption technology is necessary for private companies to make modern computer and telephone systems secure from tampering. ``Why shouldn't an American citizen be able to go to the library and teach himself about encryption?'' asked Michael Godwin, a staff counsel at the foundation. Gilmore said he found copies of the once-declassified studies, made secret again by the Reagan administration, in public libraries. They presently are used as texts in military classes. He said he plans to distribute 20 or 30 copies to other libraries. The studies are about 1,000 pages long. AP-DS-11-26-92 1837EST<

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Mac PGP report and Rander progress
by crunch＠netcom.com 27 Nov '92

27 Nov '92

Mac PGP effort: After talking with Phil Zimmerman, we decided to break the MacPGP effort into two teams. A short term team as it currently stands now, with the origional members, and a long term team to change PGP into a set of C Libraries that can be used with ANY platform or API. The short term team consists of its current members who are doing current work on the Mac implementation. Next week, perhaps on Wednesday Evening at 7 pm, we will be setting up a conference call to talk about all of the details, and introduce each other. My role in this currently will be that of Email coordinator between the Mac PGP effort and the other platforms. It is obviously clear that there is still a lot of mis-trust that people have in me. I guess it's still very hard to ditch that "Once a criminal- always a criminal" attitude. Phil Karn says: >John Draper was proposing to manufacture rs232 random number >generators -- would you buy a used random number from this man? This is EXACTLY my point. So I WILL be publishing the schematic and I expect the Rander box will be put through it's paces. I have simplified the circuit immensly, and even eliminated the AD converter, but not sure the design works, but want to run the design by a few other HW types before I "breadboard" it. I think I got it down to 3 chips including the UART. Two CMOS chips, a Latch and a gate I'm using as a comparitor, and the UART plus a noise source. Gack!! All these years I try and ELIMINATE noise, and now I am LOOKING for noise. By biasing one of the gates, into the linear mode, it doubles as the amplifier for the noise source. I've gone eligantly simple with the design, I just hope it works. Perhaps this circuit can be integrated into Yanek's Dongle. Phil K. writes: >>My thinking is to limit the external "dongle" to the one function that >>is truly sensitive and worthy of special protection: RSA secret key >>operations. Eric Hughes replies: >Phil's comment are right on. There is a need for you secret keys >to be easily and physically relocatable. The Obvious, cheapest, but perhaps not the best way, is to keep your key on a floppie. More later ....

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Re: chip verification ( Was: Tollhouse Cookies :-)
by George A. Gleason 26 Nov '92

26 Nov '92

John Gilmore points out that in hardware, "proving anything becomes very slippery..." Seems to me that we can establish degrees of confidence, in much the same way as pertains to social sciences research: probabilities that a given result is accurate. So for instance, we could say that a device made with parts purchased randomly for cash over the counter at a number of different suppliers, might have a lower probability of compromise than one made with parts mail-ordered from the same large supplier to the producer's workshop every time. Over time it may be possible to quantify the measure of confidence. -gg.

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chip verification ( Was: Tollhouse Cookies :-)
by Richard Childers 26 Nov '92

26 Nov '92

"The crucial chips could be built under "open inspection" conditions, much like having source code for inspection prior to compilation on one's own--presumably trustworthy--machines. Several such vendors could be used, with independent auditors observing the processing steps throughout. (Merely the threat of a surprise inspection is probably enough to head off obvious attempts to insert hardware trapdoors and the like.) This seems like a solvable problem." It seems to me that an ostensibly digital device with a fixed number of pins could be regarded as a finite state system, and systematically analyzed accordingly, IE, traverse the set of possible combinations of pins and signal levels and verify that it behaves in accord with pub- -lically available specifications. I'm no circuit designer ( yet ), but it seems to me that the microchip might be subject to design to make it conform to such tests, yet still contain additional circuitry which is undocumented. It might also have analog circuitry, I suppose, although I cannot immediately conceive of a use for such a thing. ( Of course, nanotech rears its ugly head, but that sword cuts both ways and, until it manifests, is irrelevant. ) Perhaps a chip could be tested, at the cost of additional time, by a systematic profiling of the finite boundaries of the device as repre- -sented by the combination of pins being stimulated, the combination of pin input voltage levels, and the resulting pin output voltages. If you want to be fanatical, you can also profile the resulting fields. It seems to me that it would be difficult to defy such a systematic profiling. ( I guess one could also test the I:E:R ratios at each of the states to further detect bogus circuitry, as well as borderline products. ) Why quality assurance lines don't do this on a chip-by-chip level now is beyond me. I'll bet the Japanese do now, or are working on it ... -- richard ===== -- richard childers rchilder(a)us.oracle.com 1 415 506 2411 oracle data center -- unix systems & network administration Klein flask for rent. Inquire within.

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Subscription
by jdugger＠reed.edu 26 Nov '92

26 Nov '92

Sorry about the bandwidth waste, but please subscribe me. ------------------------ Jay Dugger jdugger(a)reed.edu ------------------------ PGP Public Key available

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No Subject
by nobody＠alumni.cco.caltech.edu 26 Nov '92

26 Nov '92

This entire business may be pretty simple. If we have anonymity both ways, (where one or neither party knows the others physical location), then who cares about the content of the message? You might as well send it in plain text, Except you need RSA just for the signitures so you know you aren't being spoofed. *RSA signatures ARE money.* Unless money (accouting, proof) is needed, you don't need RSA. What you do need is anonymity. {Of course throwing RSA on top of it with RSA encoded regular keys is a nice touch (no sense in giving anything away.)} ---- Now listen up kiddies, what you are playing with is sedition, conspiricy, and the like. In other words plain old politics. Adding mumbo-jumbo (crypto) technology doesn't change a thing. If you want to do this, it is a simple matter of building a large enough cooperative group. How big? Well bigger than the Hells Angels, Maybe a thousand people. I don't know. Depends on how rough it gets. But the proceedure is just mutual backscratching. We all accept and forward anonymous mail for each other. So long as it is coded, we can deny knowledge of the contents. That can go a long way as long as the basic activity (of forwarding) itself is not proscribed. There have been several suggestions here how this would be done. You send mail to a cooperative site, who forwards it. That same site will receive replies. You collect your mail with specific commands to dump the accumulated contents to some other node. It would be moderately tough to bug one node. A quick second skip would make it almost impossible to track, 3 quick skips to eternity. But the trick is to have a large net of standardized, cooperating sites. There have been suggestions to throw cypher-money into this equation to pay for the operation of the "MIXes" or the operators of the servicing nodes. But that won't work. In a hostile environment money won't buy civil disobedience. It's like you can't pay somebody else to go to war for you. We all have to shoulder part of the risk. We should evolve some standard "remailer/replier daemon" and run them as a common service. It is just our civic duty. The list of cooperating, volunteer sites would be published in a plain text group. You are either on the list or you aren't. Just the presence of such a cypher mob should stop the forces of darkness. -Gilbert

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Cypherpunks List (fwd)
by tcmay＠netcom.com 26 Nov '92

26 Nov '92

Cypherpunks, Happy Thanksgiving! I sent the following message to the "Extropians" list, a list centered around discussions of politics, technology, the future, "uploading," transhumanism, and the like. (As with our list, they can be subscribed to with the "-request" form. Several requests for more information about our list prompted me to write this summary piece. Inasmuch as our existence has been publicized in Mondo, on alt.hackers, and in various references in messages, I felt it appropriate to tell them a few things about what the list is about. Our address is at the very end of the article, so there's a minor obstacle for truly casual readers to overcome. I'm forwarding it to you folks because we've had a lot of new subscribers ourselves, and they may like to hear some of this stuff. I apologize to those who are getting this twice. -Tim May Forwarded message: To: Extropians(a)gnu.ai.mit.edu From: tcmay(a)netcom.com (Timothy C. May) Subject: Cypherpunks List Date: Thu, 26 Nov 92 10:51:01 PST The Cypherpunks List -- A Thanksgiving Message I guess it's time to say a few words about the "Cypherpunks" list, which I've referred to several times in the last few months. Eric Hughes, the list administrator and initial organizer of our first meeting, has also mentioned the group in several places, and the latest "Mondo 2000" actually gives the address, so the information's pretty much out by now. We've avoided the "cattle call" form of invitation, where public announcements are made and subscribers flood in. But we also haven't gone to the other extreme of requiring some puzzle to be solved (as with posting to "alt.hackers," which usually requires some hacking of the posting software to "get in.") Cracking a cypher is not a requirement, though some probably think it should be. A few points: * The name "Cypherpunks" started out as a pun by Jude Milhon, an editor at "Mondo 2000," when she said "You guys are just a bunch of cypherpunks!" We initially debated calling our informal group something more staid like "The Cryptography Research Society," partly to protect ourselves by emphasizing the "research" aspects, but the joke name stuck. So, like it or not, it's "Cypherpunks." It turns off some, turns on others. C'est la vie. * Note that we have very little to do with the Gibsonesque vision of punked-out outlaws and virtual reality escapades, though in fact some of our members are active in Bay Area start-up companies doing VR. I would say Vernor Vinge's "True Names" is more descriptive of what we're doing. * About a hundred or so folks are on the list, including some journalists (gulp!), and even some "*.mil" sites (!!). But since what we're doing is strictly "research," we are of course safe. * The focus is on cryptology, anonymous remailers, hardware support, PGP, digital cash, "dining cryptographers" nets, and so on. Too much to recapitulate here. * By focussing on "research" into these areas, we feel we are safe against attack by government agencies. Time will tell. These issues of security, privacy, remailers, digital pseudonyms, etc., are hot topics in the crypto community, and all we are really doing is applying these ideas and doing experiments, the better to learn. (Some of the work on "webs" of trust in PGP systems, on issues with anonymous remailers, and on the development of "digital reputations" lies in uncharted territory, that is, we're doing true research.) * Several Extropians are active on the list, as you may have gathered from cross-posts and comments. * Because many of the early members live in the Bay Area (Northern California, Silicon Valley), we've had three physical meetings so far. John Gilmore, a founder of Cygnus Support, has graciously offered his facilities for our meetings, which typically happen on Saturday afternoons. The schedule gets posted on the list, of course. * Some exciting progress has already been made. Eric Hughes and Hal Finney have implemented a PERL-scripted remailer which provides anonymous forwarding (though the security is only "manual"), and 2-way remailers with digital pseudonyms seem imminent. Integrating PGP into mailers remains a problem, as those of you who use PGP already know, and several of our members are working with the PGP and MacPGP teams. * "Crypto dongles" to attach to RS-232 ports are being pursued by Yanek Martinson (an Extropian as well), George Gleason, John Draper ("Cap'n Crunch"), and others. Lots of enthusiastic debate. * FIDONet users are also involved, including Tom Jennings, the founder of FIDONet, in 1984. This brings an exciting new flavor for most Internetters. * Like the Extropians list, the Cypherpunks list is relatively free from flames and personal attacks. We all realize we're interested in roughly the same goal, even though some are Libertarians (naturally) while others are Socialist, Marxists, and Act Up! activists. (Interestingly, we've never had any real flames on politics. We almost never argue political views. This may of course be alien to readers of the Extropians list! :-} ) * So why isn't the list sent out in encrypted form? A little thought will reveal the uselessness of encrypting a widely distributed list that's essentially open to anyone who sends in a request! Still, there is some talk of encrypting in the future, partly to weed out the casual readers (for whatever reason) and partly to just get the volume of encrypted messages up. If you've read this far, and are really interested in joining the list, send a request to "cypherpunks-request(a)toad.com". This is standard list procedure, of course. But please don't then complain about the list volume! --Tim May -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | PGP Public Key: by arrangement.

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