- cypherpunks-legacy - lists.cpunks.org

Voice Encryption May Draw U.S. Scrutiny
by Eugen Leitl 22 May '06

22 May '06

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/22/technology/22privacy.html?_r=2&oref=login… agewanted=print May 22, 2006 Voice Encryption May Draw U.S. Scrutiny By JOHN MARKOFF SAN FRANCISCO, May 21 b Philip R. Zimmermann wants to protect online privacy. Who could object to that? He has found out once already. Trained as a computer scientist, he developed a program in 1991 called Pretty Good Privacy, or PGP, for scrambling and unscrambling e-mail messages. It won a following among privacy rights advocates and human rights groups working overseas b and a three-year federal criminal investigation into whether he had violated export restrictions on cryptographic software. The case was dropped in 1996, and Mr. Zimmermann, who lives in Menlo Park, Calif., started PGP Inc. to sell his software commercially. Now he is again inviting government scrutiny. On Sunday, he released a free Windows software program, Zfone, that encrypts a computer-to-computer voice conversation so both parties can be confident that no one is listening in. It became available earlier this year to Macintosh and Linux users of the system known as voice-over-Internet protocol, or VoIP. What sets Zfone apart from comparable systems is that it does not require a web of computers to hold the keys, or long numbers, used in most encryption schemes. Instead, it performs the key exchange inside the digital voice channel while the call is being set up, so no third party has the keys. Zfone's introduction comes as reports continue to emerge about the government's electronic surveillance efforts. A lawsuit by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy rights group, contends that AT&T has given the National Security Agency real-time access to Internet communications. In the wake of 9/11, there were calls for the government to institute new barriers to cryptography, to avoid its use in communications by enemies of the United States. Easily accessible cryptography for Internet calling may intensify that debate. "I'm afraid it will put front and center an issue that had been resolved in the individual's favor in the 1990's," said James X. Dempsey, policy director for the Center for Democracy and Technology, a Washington-based public policy group. The Federal Communications Commission has begun adopting regulations that would force Internet service providers and VoIP companies to adopt the technology that permits law enforcement officials to monitor conventional telephone calls. But for now, at least, F.C.C. regulation exempts programs that operate directly between computers, not through a hub. "From the F.C.C.'s perspective you can't regulate point-to-point communications, which I think will let Phil off the hook," said Marc Rotenberg, director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, an advocacy group in Washington. Zfone may face more of a challenge in Europe, where the British government is preparing to give the police the legal authority to compel both organizations and individuals to disclose encryption keys. But Mr. Zimmermann, 52, does not see those fearing government surveillance b or trying to evade it b as the primary market. The next phase of the Internet's spyware epidemic, he contends, will be software designed to eavesdrop on Internet telephone calls made by corporate users. "They will have entire digital jukeboxes of covertly acquired telephone conversations, and suddenly someone in Eastern Europe is going to be very wealthy," he said. While Mr. Zimmerman is giving away his software so far, his goal is to attract VoIP software and hardware developers to license his technology and embed it in their products. Zfone can automatically encrypt any call between users of freely available VoIP software programs like X-Lite, Gizmo or SJphone. It can be downloaded at www.philzimmermann.com. The system does not work with Skype, the VoIP system acquired by eBay, which uses its own encryption scheme. But at a conference last week in Cyprus, German officials said they had technology for intercepting and decrypting Skype phone calls, according to Anthony M. Rutkowski, vice president for regulatory affairs and standards for VeriSign, a company that offers security for Internet and phone operations. Mr. Zimmermann said he had not yet tested Zfone's compatibility with Vonage, another popular VoIP service. Mr. Zimmermann contends that the nation is better off with strong cryptography. Indeed, Zfone can be considered an asset, he said, because it allows people to have secret conversations without hiding their Internet protocol addresses, which could be traceable geographically. Those observed having a secured conversation could come under suspicion, of course. But for that reason, he argued, sophisticated criminals or terrorists are unlikely to use the technology. "I'm sympathetic to the needs of the intelligence community to catch the bad guys," he said. "I specifically protect the content the criminals want, while simultaneously not interfering with the traffic analysis that the N.S.A. is trying to do. You could make the case that I'm being socially responsible." -- Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE [demime 1.01d removed an attachment of type application/pgp-signature which had a name of signature.asc]

1 0

[perry@piermont.com: Government using call records to go after reporter's sources.]
by Eugen Leitl 22 May '06

22 May '06

----- Forwarded message from "Perry E. Metzger" <perry(a)piermont.com> -----

2 1

Your mortagee approval
by Leticia Gilmore 22 May '06

22 May '06

1 0

peertech quorum public offset 0000000 / janus wireless dc14 challenge
by coderman 22 May '06

22 May '06

peertech quorum public: http://public.peertech.org/ janus wireless dc14 challenge: http://public.peertech.org/dc14/ taking 5x longer than expected but making progress... feedback on temporal key binding appreciated. more to come in the next week or so. ---cut--- Peertech Quorum 18-may-2006 , offset 0000000 fb4c4864-2807fdd8-9a109cff-e1040055-01cba6eb-82f3925e-973b936a-47d38301 alias: public.peertech.org 70.104.254.121 10.10.10.10 172.16.13.77 192.168.1.242 feed:7ba3:c779:e5f5:cc1a:8bc7:5fe1:ed08/16 About Us "Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding." ~ Justice Louis Brandeis We believe in personal and social responsibility. We write code to empower individuals and develop community. Do not misuse this software to facilitate or conceal harm against others; these efforts are given to you freely and in good faith. Recent developments and other news can be found in the peertech status log. Quorum communication and development is explained in the peertech quorum introduction. . . . Current Quorum Key Using digital keys and signatures for the inexperienced. * peertech.pubkey.txt SHA2-512 digest of current peertech.pubkey.txt at offset 0000000: B533C5F6 C306C60D 9723CC0D 6298692F F207160B 4DE29A09 30A752F2 8B03906D 41B0B080 C07B3FFF D53A6B8D 4FA1D33D E35483E7 DC7733BE 32F3D08F 815A5502 ---end-cut--- ---peertech.pubkey.txt for offset 0000000--- -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.3rc2 (GNU/Linux) mQILBERo6QcBEADGsg4E7uR0EohrCQHvJNKCJZriejblitX4MDRs7B6oOBXoSPmg pTCEZwj1FbiDfKYqwG5sc7y48Y77pyEdFIVQqmLoIq0W0pcRDoHyECzHOW6enWOx JSFQArskItC0P1mulvy4SCuhQ8aFA/V4MQw+yjj3AkGz5M42TSU2ZUmNPWQtUUqI xYVRefgjYV2hWP3ACP0K43zFsZHMC3a0co9gA3kaAsioSjRLP3dEEfsQw1Flqy3P P2g0BnsefHPsQfOegyry1aF1sAtUqXBlyWv7mbjJ8781JRyRRyPWDTPyRzsnbv89 OK2v7ZZ3qyHTULG/B8cEiAF7Sd3sK2dyJjMu0JiWF0nm+yRjNiM2vhH/zgs10v2I qsO9oQF+KsISZKcUDd2Whhx94Q1HmEeEjUSliHDpHIuA7tux4I2eXUH2OeqXRbbJ EWLw7DmdgF6IHZlCq1VGSeJ5M7vWEq/fXxNfVs2B08b8q+QPLN0gL2uKKHBWDLC8 8E7PiXES5dxwAeIRB1LIrAK4yWni4E7EKMG8/nnglWiCvUA56ZIdWKwFJrb+X7Hj CDbMrLansY7FnU2+Fpe2h499WkLFk1FCRREFdohZULWEguH2rTXiGZ6SIScNNgkd hbvM5GKV1ldBG7/nwCNR+NeoWApR4RKalmQaI23zCW2sjVKRa1fumjBnlwAGKbSK UGVlcnRlY2ggUXVvcnVtIChQZWVydGVjaCBRdW9ydW0gU2lnbmF0dXJlIEtleSAt IGZiNGM0ODY0LTI4MDdmZGQ4LTlhMTA5Y2ZmLWUxMDQwMDU1LTAxY2JhNmViLTgy ZjM5MjVlLTk3M2I5MzZhLTQ3ZDM4MzAxKSA8cm9vdEBsb2NhbGhvc3Q+iQI1BBMB AgAfBQJEaOkHAhsDBgsJCAcDAgQVAggDAxYCAQIeAQIXgAAKCRA/o2lG9t2JbBD8 D/wLyXRzBf9rTZk/oSL3JTo1eCu4mbUyxJEydyS6UkIGCZMBDTBF9CXTE1pkCAM5 sG/Oe95KmDWCM9Vwivzbzj2ZLZu7klK6jWdW2F5sSCRltdwMpSUk46Mi1ezyUTM3 45gzZVmQBi2PT9V2dGLbXxwX9XhSftTr9HYs4aZbvz/ppm7xRgMlb/4kvrtq1pYH JFAIEHwYQhnOpQunnK9bIbjae/0DjauBUaH+CngDGAKW90tfh1bpvfPe8NoL0Bqf kYkPi2tk4+E1ojG665vhgPZeydBzkrIyHV7JJfGbrXnn6vCBTqPPZ615VFWU5hRa obaY4sXiY2QDdxWcdgCHrpNPO4WfOlNhGGPyzE/CSRqkImUdcSXxirCe+7hCFWtu BVF398DkeUCnOCr79RAoXNjdEtJjeaiRMObZFVS+4akkmytlpDUofm5lkKsKTEjH 3MBSpymVAOQtiu4I2Fgfx3DNT8wMu9s+jTL2moynVWz/4rV/w0Sgg5D0LEYkNDta 4dWE/vXNnexU+3oGq4XRomBZhBSZJrfmR3jeG03b2wW1Tq/x65LUWMqYjpAs/hPp QsWtRUo5JFjKROWiSYs+0KnTDzUvz8TSWdp+xfotf36JEIJaI2to0b6vf9vBhJsA xEB4nwJdtwcc1wUAXJWhycBE9BU24GfEBPK13mAsfXTg7Q== =e8TV -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- ---end-cut---

1 0