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COL_oss
by jya＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

7-27-96. FiTi: "Colossus faces rebirth into a world of dispute." The man behind the resurrection of Colossus is Tony Sale, a computer expert and former MI5 operative who once worked for Peter Wright of "Spycatcher" fame. Its reconstruction, now in its final weeks, is not merely an act of homage to the mathematical supermen of Bletchley who hastened the Allied victory over the Nazis. Neither is it just a triumph over the official secrecy in which the machine was cloaked until a few years ago. It is a working demonstration of Sale's contention that Colossus was the world's first computer. So sophisticated was the machine intelligence at Bletchley Park that the very existence of Colossus was not revealed until 1970, according to Tony Sale. After the war the government ordered 10 Colossi to be broken up -- some say as part of an intelligence deal with the Americans. Gripped by a desire to assert the claims of Colossus, the former MI5 man asked GCHQ to reinstate his security clearance so he could work on the project. The parts could be found in any British telephone exchange up to the 1970s. Yet it took until 1992 to get all the electronics declassified. Only last November was Sale allowed to demonstrate the machine's ability to break the Lorenz wheel settings. Even today members of the public are forbidden to operate Colossus: some of its codebreaking algorithms are still, it seems, a secret. ----- http://jya.com/coloss.txt (15 kb) COL_oss

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[REPOST] The Net and Terrorism
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

[I sent this out on 29 June 1996. In light of recent events, the comments about "soft targets" seem worth mentioning again. I doubt my comment, "A few airliners will shot down by Soviet surface-to-air missiles. This is unsurprising." will get me any visits from the FBI, as this is the consensus of folks far more expert than I. Likewise, my closing coment, "avoid crowded downtown areas," was just common sense, not a tip-off to the Atlanta bombing.] There have been many recent reports linking the Net and anonymous remailers, pseudonyms, and (of course) strong crypto to various possible and actual terrorist events, with an emphasis on the "possible." (If the Net is linked to _actual_ terrorist incidents, little is being disclosed publically as of yet.) Recent comments by John Deutch, William Perry, and Louis Freeh make reference to the growing danger of the Net. And the "Russian mafia" is playing a major role in this debate; I won't recap the various articles in major magazines about arms sales from the former Soviet Army, the reports that an entire paramilitary unit of the KGB is now working for the Russian mafia, and the obvious corruption of the entire former Soviet system (I'm not saying it wasn't corrupt before, just that now the paymasters have changed). Can anything be done? To stop the likely effects of lots more surface-to-air missiles, lots more nerve gas available on the black market, and so on? In a word, "no." I've been thinking about this a lot, reading the various articles, and pondering the implications. The plain fact is that the modern world is one of great "liquidity," and the vast amount of arms built up by the U.S.S.R. (thanks in large part to responding to a similar build-up in the U.S., without taking any sides...) are now "leaking out" in increasing numbers. (The leakage is quite similar to that seen in the 1975-79 period, when thousands of tons of armaments abandoned by the U.S. in Viet Nam were sold around the world. Except, of course, that the the Soviet weapons include some interesting new things.) Not even a police state can stop armaments from being diverted in situations such as faced in the former U.S.S.R. (For those not familiar with the conditions, read up on it. The combination of former command economy, secret police, selling off of industry to highest bidders, lack of a conventional industrial base...all of this makes it nearly unavoidable that much of the former state industry is now controlled by black marketeers and former Party apparatchniks....after all, who else would have the money to buy these former State industries?) In fact, a former police state does not change its stripes. The names and paymasters change a bit, but the organism lives on. (One need only look at the police states of Central and South America and their platitudes about the "Drug War" to understand the realities of such markets.) Unbreakable crypto will of course be used. This is unsurprising. A few airliners will shot down by Soviet surface-to-air missiles. This is unsurprising. I expect a city or two to get nuked in the next decade or so. (Haifa or Tel Aviv would be my leading candidates.) To me, this is unsurprising. My personal solution dovetails with other perceived threat responses: avoid living in or near major cities and take reasonable measures to cope with moderate economic or physical crises. (No, I am not a "survivalist," just mentally and physically prepared to deal with a major earthquake, economic dislocation, or terrorist incident in San Jose, which is 30 miles north of me.) FBI Director Louis Freeh and the TLA spooks are already sounding the alarm about the "Four Horsemen." Sen. Sam Nunn is calling for measures to ensure that cyberspace is "secured" and that the Net is not used to further chemical and biological terrorism. The point is that even a police state cannot stop the consequences of the increased "degrees of freedom" the modern world (and the Net) provides. In fact, police states tend to make the scale of the corruption even greater, as the Soviet and Latin American examples show. (I could of course get into the examples of arms dealings in Iran-Contra, the CIA's role in covert arms supply, etc., but this should be self-evident to all.) An Australian radio journalist asked me if the Net could make possible new types of terrorism, and could allow terrorists to plot crimes in new ways. He seemed surprised when I said "Of course" and then proceeded to give some examples of how the Net can be used to undermine governments (what those governments of course refer to as "terrorism," even when it is mostly not). I'm not advocating such "terrorism," by the way, merely telling it like it is. Arguing that the Net cannot and will not be used in such ways is naive and ultimately counterproductive. It is more accurate and useful to point out that the increased role of terrorism is due to many factors, including prominently the vast amount of armaments in the world, the role of police states which have benefitted from these build-ups in the military-industrial complex, the expansion of "virtual communities" around the world, and, crucially, the expanded number of degrees of freedom in transportation, communication, banking, and other such Information Age channels. Keep your head down, avoid crowded downtown areas, prepare for moderate disruptions, and reject arguments that an American Police State will do anything to stop terrorism. (Remember, terrorism is just warfare carried on by other means, with apolgies to Von Clausewitz.) --Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Re: ALL OF YOU ARE CRIMIN
by pjn＠nworks.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> At 09:33 PM 7/26/96 -0700, anonymous-remailer(a)shell.portal.com wrote: >I AM NOT GOING TO TOLERATE EXISTENCE OF A MEDIUM FOR CRIMINAL HACKERS >AND MUNITIONS SMUGGLERS. I WILL COMPLAIN TO THE FBI IMMEDIATELY SO THAT THEY >CAN TRACK YOU DOWN AND CLOSE THIS LIST. > Damnit Sen. Exxon! We told you not to use the computer!! :) P.J. pjn(a)nworks.com ... "The future of robotics" Ä by Cy Borg and Anne Droid ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.20 [NR]

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Re: Public vs. Private Munitions
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 7:24 PM 7/27/96, Erle Greer wrote: > Theoretically, the government should only be have the resources to >control commercially-available, public encryption systems. Who is to stop While I'm not exactly sure what you mean by a "commercially-available, public encryption system," I think your point is incorrect. (My confusion is that a commercially-available system is not necessarily a "public" system, if by public one means public domain. If one means "published specifications," still not the case. Confusing.) Howver, the government cannot step in and "control" a commercially-available product, by even the most liberal interpretations of the commerce clause. "Tim's Pretty Flaky Snakeoil System," for example. I can announce it, sell it, and the government is powerless to "control" it. (Even if it were "public.") If by "public" you mean an NBS or NIST standard, like DES, then I suppose the government can in some sense "control" it. (Even this is iffy, IMO, as I know of no rules saying DES implementations must be approved by NIST or anyone else.) >anyone from designing their own cryptosystem for personal use? If the >government intercepted a transmission from this private cryptosystem, and >could not decrypt it, would they assume that it must be considered >munitions? Similarly, anyone could send uniformly-formatted random garble >that could also be considered munitions, or at least waste the governments >processing time. Most of the cryptosystems are not under the "control" of the government, even by the standards of your first definition. Period. RSA is not a government-controlled system, though it is both "commercially-available" AND "public" (in that the spec and algorithm are clearly published). And the talk about "personal use" is misleading, IMO. It suggests that government can and should regulate use for "business purposes" but not personal uses. I disagree with this distinction. > Why are we so worried about government regulation? Can't we just >devise our own cryptosystems and just don't sell them or make them publicly >available? You mean the way public key systems in general and RSA in particular were invented and devised by non-government folks? --Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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"privatizing" phones?
by pjn＠nworks.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

In> have buttons to "privatize" you conversations. These In> were on no-cord models. Does anyone have any idea Hmmm... To Privatize a cordless phone, one would have to turn it off. P.J. pjn(a)nworks.com ... Save the whales...harpoon a politican! ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.20 [NR]

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HACKER REPORT
by pjn＠nworks.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

In> Just saw part I of a two-part series on "hackers" being broadcast In> by a local San Francisco TV station. Nothing horrible, in my In> opinion. The adroitly sidestepped the hacker/cracker distinction In> by saying the "hacker" has come to mean..." and then gave the In> negative, intrusive definition. <<SNIP>> In> Tomorrow's show should be more interesting (and possibly much In> more sensationalistic). Part II is "The Hacker Underground." In> Oooh, scary! Christ. They are almost taking this chapter-for-chapter out of The Hacker Crackdown... P.J. pjn(a)nworks.com ... Descartes of Borg - "I assimilate, therefore I am." ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.20 [NR]

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Re: The Four Horsemen Go to the Olympics!
by Alan Olsen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 03:22 AM 7/28/96 -0700, Timothy C. May wrote: >By the way, the airline solution is not too difficult to visualize: > >1. Eliminate checked baggage, or at least require those with checked >baggage to deposit it enough hours in advance to be inspected and to pay >any surcharges for this inspection. (I try to only have carry-on baggage, >and this seems to be a major trend.) > >2. Let the market decide. Airlines could announce their baggage inspection >policy, and customers could decide on the tradeoffs between increased >inspections and higher costs, and greater confidence in security. > >I think I'll repost my "Soft Targets" piece of a few weeks ago, in the >light of TWA 800 and this morning's bomb in Atlanta. Actually, if I wanted to blow up the Portland airport, all I would do is set up a mortar up on the hills overlooking the airport. The entire airport is pretty visible from those hills. There is no way to completely eliminate terrorism. And since the imposition of order tends to promote the escalation of disorder, I expect it to only get worse... And the only people to "win" will be the control freaks. --- Alan Olsen -- alano(a)teleport.com -- Contract Web Design & Instruction `finger -l alano(a)teleport.com` for PGP 2.6.2 key http://www.teleport.com/~alano/ "We had to destroy the Internet in order to save it." - Sen. Exon "Microsoft -- Nothing but NT promises."

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"Soft Targets" as Schelling Points
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The connection should be clear, but in case it is not: many soft targets are Schelling points for terrorist actions. Putting yourself in the mind of a terrorist or militia crazy or whatever, where would you attack? The Olympics, obviously. (And security officials of course see the same Schelling point, hence the unprecedented security measures and presence.) Given that most Olympic events are well-guarded, etc., what's the next target to look at? Crowded public gatherings, where the "message" can still be delivered and where security measures are problematic. There are tens of thousands of such soft targets/Schelling points in an "open society," and it is unreasonable to expect to defend each one of them. (Costly, too.) And if they are so-defended, the attacker moves to other targets. Keep your head down. --Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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WaPo on Crypto-Genie Terrorism
by jya＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The Washington Post, July 27, 1996, p. A22. Speaking in Code on the Internet ... [Editorial] The decibel level has been rising in the argument over how much control the federal government should have over the export of encryption technology. The Senate Commerce Committee held hearings Thursday on a proposal dubbed Pro-CODE (Promotion of Commerce On-line in the Digital Era) that would lift current restrictions on exporting encryption software above a certain level of complexity. The move is opposed strongly by law enforcement and national security authorities, who fear the consequences to their tracking of terrorism or crime if uncrackable cryptography becomes the global standard. But encryption software -- which scrambles a person's computer messages so no one can read them without a key -- also is thought by many in the computer industry to be the missing piece that's preventing customers from a full-scale move to the Internet for banking and other confidential transactions, rather than, as now, worrying about the security of their data. They also see it as a market in which the United States maintains a comfortable lead, one that is threatened if domestic encryption makers can't sell their products elsewhere. The makers argue that foreign encryption software will rush in to fill the gap, doing nothing about the uncrackability problem -- indeed, making it worse. The administration in turn is pursuing a wider international agreement to maintain controls on cryptology export by all the industrialized nations and has been putting pressure on its colleagues in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which will rule on the matter in a Paris meeting in September. Administration officials, including FBI chief Louis Freeh, have been pushing for an alternative policy of "voluntary key escrow" -- encryption makers would deposit a key to the code with a neutral third body before exporting the products and could then have access to the codes only by court order, as happens now with wiretapping. Mr. Freeh, testifying at Thursday's hearing in favor of an optional key escrow plan, noted that the point is not to prevent all copies of uncrackable code from going abroad -- that's clearly impossible -- but to prevent such high-level code from becoming the international standard, with architecture and transmission channels all unreadable to world authorities. To software companies and Internet users who have been clamoring for the right to encrypt as securely as possible, Mr. Freeh and others argue, "the genie is not yet out of the bottle" on "robust," meaning uncrackable, encryption. It's far from obvious to anyone that an optional escrow plan really can prevent the growth of inaccessible transmissions by international terrorists or criminals. Encryption, if widely used, could conceivably ease some privacy problems concerning who gets to see personal and financial data on individuals -- though such data usually are vulnerable to being dug out of storage rather than intercepted in transmission. But neither is it clear that the encryption enthusiasts' desire for free development should take precedence over the tracking of terrorism. At the very least, Congress should be exceedingly cautious about getting out ahead of administration concerns on controls that, once lifted, are hardly reversible. -----

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Re: Olympic bombing
by Wayne H. Allen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 17:41 96.07.27 +0200, Mike van der Merwe wrote: >I can just see the FBI screaming "we need weaker encryption to combat >terrosism on US soil" with nasty effects -- it seems all to many people, >lawmakers included, will be only to happy to sacrifice their privacy that >the FBI can better combat these terrorist acts (which could *of course* >could been prevented had only the FBI been able to read their encrypted >mail...) > >Somehow I got the feeling watching CNN that the FBI was given a shitload >of ammo. Call me cynical but the Reichstag fire comes to mind... The phrase "Get a life" comes to mind. Wayne H.Allen whallen(a)capitalnet.com Pgp key at www.capitalnet.com/~whallen

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