- cypherpunks-legacy - lists.cpunks.org

Fact checking
by Tim Benham 28 Apr '04

28 Apr '04

> Date: Tue, 27 Apr 2004 11:06:50 -0400 > From: "Tyler Durden" <camera_lumina(a)hotmail.com> > Subject: Re: Fact checking > > >How do you start motivating a lazy and apathetic public to learn about > >their > >candidates, and vote? Door-to-door campaigns? Talks at the local > > library? Grocery store posters? > > Well, imagine if we could buy votes...I'd bet we could scrounge up a few > hundred thousand votes for the price of a few vials of crack. Then imagine > we 'elect' bin Laden as a Senator or something with these votes. > > I bet people would start voting after that. If they don't, offer them two vials of crack! More benefits of the vote buying scheme are being discovered daily. Maybe it could be trialled at a local level in the US. You could get it started with one of those proposition thingies you have over there. It shouldn't be difficult - how much would it cost to get someone to sign a petition? cheers, Tim

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Paying for drinks with wave <br> of the hand
by R. A. Hettinga 28 Apr '04

28 Apr '04

<http://worldnetdaily.com/news/printer-friendly.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38038> WorldNetDaily Wednesday, April 14, 2004 YOUR PAPERS, PLEASE ... Paying for drinks with wave of the hand Club-goers in Spain get implanted chips for ID, payment purposes Posted: April 14, 2004 5:00 p.m. Eastern By Sherrie Gossett Being recognized has never been easier for VIP patrons of the Baja Beach Club in Barcelona, Spain. Like a scene out of a science-fiction movie, all it takes is a syringe-injected microchip implant for the beautiful men and women of the nightclub scene to breeze past a "reader" that recognizes their identity, credit balance and even automatically opens doors to exclusive areas of the club for them. They can buy drinks and food with a wave of their hand and don't need to worry about losing a credit card or wallet. "By simply passing by our reader, the Baja Beach Club will know who you are and what your credit balance is," Conrad K. Chase explains. Chase is director of the Baja Beach Club in Barcelona. "From the moment of their implantation they will also have free entry and access to the VIP area," he said. In the popular club, which boasts a dance floor that can accommodate 3,000, streamlined services and convenience matter to Chase's VIP customers. Baja Beach Clubs International is the first firm to employ the "VeriPay System," developed by Applied Digital's VeriChip Corporation and announced at an international conference in Paris last year. The company touts this application of the chip implant as an advance over credit cards and smart cards, which, absent biometrics and appropriate safeguard technologies, are subject to theft resulting in identity fraud. Palm Beach-based Applied Digital Solutions (NASDAQ:ADSXD) unveiled the original VeriChip immediately after the 9-11 tragedy. Similar to pet identification chips, the VeriChip is a syringe-injectable radio frequency identification microchip that can be read from a few feet away by either a hand-held scanner or by the implantee walking through a "portal" scanner. Information can be wirelessly written to the chip, which contains a unique 10-digit identification number. Media seized on the novelty factor of the chip implant, driving it to worldwide headlines in 2001. Last year, Art Kranzley, senior vice president at MasterCard, speculated on possible future electronic payment media: "We're certainly looking at designs like key fobs. It could be in a pen or a pair of earrings. Ultimately, it could be embedded in anything q someday, maybe even under the skin." Chase calls the chip implant the wave of the future. The nightclub director has been implanted along with stars from the Spanish version of the TV show "Big Brother." "I know many people who want to be implanted," he said. "Actually, almost everybody has piercings, tattoos or silicone." Will the implant only be of use at the Baja? "The objective of this technology is to bring an ID system to a global level that will destroy the need to carry ID documents and credit cards," Chase said. During a recent American radio interview, Chase said the CEO of VeriChip, Dr. Keith Bolton, had told him that the company's goal was to market the VeriChip as a global implantable identification system. With only 900 people implanted worldwide, though, the global mandate isn't exactly around the corner, and current applications are extremely limited. Chase added, "The VeriChip that we implant at Baja will not only be for the Baja, but is also useful for whatever other enterprise that makes use of this technology." He also alluded to plans for FN Herstal, which manufactures Browning and Smith and Wesson firearms, to develop an implant-firearm system that would make a firearm functional only to the individual implanted with its corresponding microchip. A scanner in the gun would be designed to recognize the owner. Chase's mention of the FN Herstal-Verichip partnership came a full week before it's formal announcement by Applied Digital yesterday. Chase believes all gun owners should be required to have a microchip implanted in their hand to be able to own a gun. While yesterday's Associated Press story on the prototype is primarily from the angle of police usage, WND reported two years ago that from the he outset of the company's acquisition of its "Digital Angel" implant patent q said to be GPS trackable q Applied touted the implant as a potential universal method of gun control. Chase also claimed that the VeriChip company had told him that the Italian government was preparing to implant government workers. "We are the only company today offering human implantable ID technology," said Scott R. Silverman, chairman and chief executive officer of Applied Digital Solutions. "We believe the market opportunity for this technology is substantial, and high-profile successes such as in Spain will serve as catalysts for broader adoption." Since 1999, the Applied Digital Solutions has boasted that it also has a GPS-trackable chip in the works, but four years later the device has yet to come to market. Some mechanical engineers contend such a device requires substantial antenna length and that creating a self-contained unit in the space of a tiny chip is virtually impossible. In addition, questions of accuracy of new GPS consumer items have been raised by the press. A previous Wall Street Journal "road test" of different manufacturers' GPS watches and devices for children had some kids tracked to the Sahara Desert, rather than New York City where they were. Despite the kinks that may need to be worked out, security of loved ones and personal property remains one of the chief marketing focuses of personal GPS devices and RFID chip firms. Meanwhile, in Barcelona the VeriChip is gaining a following of enthusiastic "early adopters." "Everyone embraced the electronic payment application," Chase said. "My customers like the fact that they do not have to carry a credit card or ID card with them. With the VeriPay system, they no longer have to worry about their credit cards getting lost or stolen." -- ----------------- 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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Arrested for webmastering
by Major Variola (ret.) 28 Apr '04

28 Apr '04

Computer Student on Trial for Aid to Muslim Web Sites By TIMOTHY EGAN Published: April 27, 2004 OISE, Idaho, April 23 Not long after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, a group of Muslim students led by a Saudi Arabian doctoral candidate held a candlelight vigil in the small college town of Moscow, Idaho, and condemned the attacks as an affront to Islam. Today, that graduate student, Sami Omar al-Hussayen, is on trial in a heavily guarded courtroom here, accused of plotting to aid and to maintain Islamic Web sites that promote jihad. As a Web master to several Islamic organizations, Mr. Hussayen helped to maintain Internet sites with links to groups that praised suicide bombings in Chechnya and in Israel. But he himself does not hold those views, his lawyers said. His role was like that of a technical editor, they said, arguing that he could not be held criminally liable for what others wrote. Civil libertarians say the case poses a landmark test of what people can do or whom they can associate with in the age of terror alerts. It is one of the few times anyone has been prosecuted under language in the antiterrorism law known as the USA Patriot Act, which makes it a crime to provide "expert guidance or assistance" to groups deemed terrorist. "Somebody who fixes a fax machine that is owned by a group that may advocate terrorism could be liable," said David Cole, a Georgetown University law professor who argued against the expert guidance part of the antiterrorism law this year, in a case where it was struck down by a federal judge. <snip> http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/27/national/27BOIS.html?pagewanted=all& ....... Compare to the recent law where editing a paper from a nasty nation would be illegal. The IEEE kissed Ashcroft's ass, other periodicals objected more. ------ Of course there are limits in regards to freedom of speech. They are as follows: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." Everything else is, of course, allowed. -Sunder

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DNA tracking
by Major Variola (ret.) 28 Apr '04

28 Apr '04

Rapist being hunted with DNA London, , Apr. 28 (UPI) -- British authorities are using a new DNA technique to catch a serial rapist and burglar, the Times of London reported Wednesday. Known as "ancestral testing," the technique aims to discover the rapist's family background and narrow the number of suspects. DNA samples taken from victims have established the rapist is descended from native Americans, Europeans and sub-Saharan Africans. Those samples also indicate the criminal's family originally came from an island in the Caribbean. Scotland Yard wants police and civilian staff from West Indian backgrounds to provide samples so a DNA map can be created to pinpoint the rapist's origins. Police also are using another DNA technique to check criminal records to see if a relative of the attacker has come to police notice. The perpetrator is responsible for 84 burglaries, four rapes and 27 indecent assaults over 12 years. His sex crimes are against elderly women. http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20040428-100131-6387r.htm

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[IP] Florida town to record all license plate numbers; check drivers (fwd from dave@farber.net)
by Eugen Leitl 28 Apr '04

28 Apr '04

----- Forwarded message from Dave Farber <dave(a)farber.net> -----

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looping
by Riad S. Wahby 28 Apr '04

28 Apr '04

Looping should be fixed now. Sorry y'all; I suck. -- Riad Wahby rsw(a)jfet.org MIT VI-2 M.Eng

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Multiple copies of messages
by Shawn K. Quinn 27 Apr '04

27 Apr '04

Just today, I started getting multiple copies of each message. Am I the only person this is happening to? -- Shawn K. Quinn

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RE: [IP] One Internet provider's view of FBI's CALEA wiretap push
by Trei, Peter 27 Apr '04

27 Apr '04

Tyler Durden wrote: > > "I wonder how quickly one could incinerate a memory card in the field > with high success rate? Destroy the data and the passphrases don't > help." > > Well, what if there were 3 passwords: > > 1) One for Fake data, for amatuers (very few of the MwG will > actually be > smart enough to look beyond this...that's why they have guns) > 2)One for real data...this is what you're hiding > 3) One for plausible real data, BUT when this one's used, it > also destroys > the real data as it opens the plausible real data. > > Of course, some really really smart MwG (or the cool suits > standing behind > them) will be able to detect that data is being destroyed, > but statistically > speaking that will be much rarer. > > -TD Whats your threat model? If the prospective attacker has state-level resources, this will always fail. There are a number of guides online describing how attackers should deal with computer data. One of the most basic is they *never* run the attackees software on the original disk. Step one is always to make a bit-level mirror of the entire hard drive, and work with a copy of that. Step zero is to pull the power, so any shutdown code does not run. Any protective scheme which relies on the attacker inadvertantly activating software is doomed from the start. If you're dealing with a state-level attacker, any scheme involving explosives or incendiaries would get the attackee in as much or more trouble than the original data would. This is a hard problem. I suspect any solution will involve tamper-resistant hardware, which zeroizes itself if not used in the expected mode. Peter Trei

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Infrared flash?
by Thomas Shaddack 27 Apr '04

27 Apr '04

For bright flashes of visible light, xenon flash tubes are the choice. But when I want a really bright flash on about 800-900 nm, what approach is the best? One application is a security camera taking a snapshot without alerting the adversary with a flash. (Could be a good system against black-bag jobs.) Another application, with higher flash frequency, could be a stroboscope throwing the AGC circuits in cameras off-track, Macrovision-style. What would be the best approach? The energies here are more in the range of rotation/vibration changes than electrons jumping up and down between the energy states. How to convert a blast of electrical energy into a shower of near-IR photons?

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[Politech] A criticism of Gmail and a call for encryption everywhere [priv]
by R. A. Hettinga 27 Apr '04

27 Apr '04

--- begin forwarded text

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