- cypherpunks-legacy - lists.cpunks.org

Re: V-chips, CC, and Motorcycle Helmets
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:36 AM 2/13/96 -0800, jim bell wrote: > >You mention the issue of Rushdie, as if it is some sort of refutation of my >idea. Quite the contrary; I think it actually supports me. > >How so?, you ask? Well, let's consider any potential assassin who might be >interested in this "contract." Aside from the obvious moral issues involved >here (Rushdie has, presumably, done nothing to warrant his death), the truth >is that such a potential assassin would see a number of problems that would >strongly dissuade him from attempting to kill Rushdie. > >1. There is no way he could be assured that he could collect the award >anonymously. His name would certainly "get out," and then he would be >subject not merely to "the law," but also anybody who wanted revenge for >Rushdie's death. > >2. There is no way he could be assured that he would actually receive the >award. (How would he prove HE did it?) > >3. That's because there is no way he would enforce this "contract" should >the offerer refuse to pay. These points would not affect a devout Iranian Muslem. To him the death warent has already been issued by legitimate authority. It is not even clear that money would be his princple motivator. I must respectifully disagree with Jim in this case. I believe that Rushdie has not been hit because the protection he enjoys is sufficent to repel the potential assassins. Note that he has an advantage over the US president (who probably has as many potential assassins) in that he does not need to make public appearences. Adding money to the pot will attract rational (and amoral) people who will then make a determination based on (1) profit, and (2) risk, which includes getting caught or killed. It seems to me that Secret Service levels of protection can protect a public figure against even Assassination Politics. Bill

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Re: What can the judge do to me?
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 10:21 AM 4/15/96 -0700, Hal wrote: >From: Black Unicorn <unicorn(a)schloss.li> > >> The key to limiting the ability of a court to summarily enter contempt >> sanctions has always been the classification of the sanctions. >> "Criminal" sanctions, may entitle the witness to a trial by jury. >> [...] >> "Civil" sanctions do >> not require such protections and can be imposed on the spot and >> without review. > >I didn't understand what distinguishes civil and criminal sanctions. Is >it the nature of the proceedings, whether it is a civil or criminal case >that is before the judge? Or is it the nature of the contempt charge >itself, where not doing what the judge wants, in broad terms, is civil >contempt? And in that case, what would be criminal contempt? He may answer those questions, but I don't think he'll dare answer the question about if there is a constituional justification for a difference between "civil" and "criminal" in most things the government's courts do. My impression is that the "civil" classification is often simply used to dilute or eliminate the various constitutional protections that the government hasn't yet dared to remove from areas it calls "criminal." Too bad we won't get a straight answer... We also won't get a straight answer about the constitutional justification for "contempt of court" penalties at all! The Constitution defines the powers of government; it does not restrict those of the people. The idea that a judge can punish someone, especially someone not present in court, is bizarre. It is even more odd when such punishment appears to exceed what the government is allowed to do absent any kind of jury decision and conviction. If you're willing to accept NON-Constitutional "justifications," I'm sure you'll get plenty of that. The only hint of a Constitutional obligation to testify comes from an amendment which states that defendants have a right to compel testimony favorable to them; it does not say that prosecution has the right to compel testimony from a third party that incriminates a defendant. If his response is, "Oh, but we've ALWAYS done it that way!", you need to remember that until the American Civil war, slavery was legal in southern states, and until 1920 women weren't allowed to vote, and until 1955 "separate but equal" was the law of the land, until 1972 or so the death penalty was constitutional...and then it wasn't...and then it was again...and so on. Government is never willing to admit it's wrong until it's good and ready. That doesn't mean we can't express our own opinions "prematurely." I'd sure like to hear the "why" behind this stuff, but I won't... Sigh.

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Re: Cypherpunks vs. Coderpunks
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: Leslie Todd Masco <cactus(a)hks.net> >My concern is that the two lists will become more disjoint than they >already are. I believe that the content of Cypherpunks is enhanced by having >the programmers present, just as the coders benefit from the guidance of >seeing the possibilities opened by their endeavors. >The remailers network is the most obvious example of the benefits of this >synergy. I'd hate to see us lose later rewards that could otherwise be reaped. I would agree about this. However, hopefully some of the pure-coding stuff (such as the timing of sun speeds or whatever thread) can be moved to coderpunks for the sake of those on here who aren't interested... and who are also the least likely to have an easy filter to use. -Allen

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DSN Tech.
by privsoft＠ix.netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Is anyone famillar with the balck-box by Dr. Aaron Freidman of DSN Technologies? I am trying to get info on it and other products from DSN Tech. thnx privsoft(a)ix.netcom.com Steve "The CDA Sucks!"

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Re: V-chips, CC, and Motorcycle Helmets
by Bill Stewart 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>> One thing the V-Chip gives us is the argument: Now that parents have the >> ability to control what their children watch, the government should turn >> responsibility over to them and butt out. Unfortunately course it doesn't; we still "need" the government to control sex and indecency on TV, plus to enforce the "voluntary" rating standards and make sure TV companies attach them to their programs. Sigh. #-- # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com / billstewart(a)attmail.com +1-415-442-2215 # http://www.idiom.com/~wcs Pager +1-408-787-1281

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Re: OCR and Machine Readable Text
by Alan Olsen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:06 PM 1/2/97 -0800, Bill Stewart wrote: >It's really embarassing to have to pay salaries of "public employees" >who can't come up with better arguments than the paper/magnetic/OCR nonsense >but don't have the guts to stop trying and admit they've wrong. >Does the President still make $200K/year salary? You'd think he'd either >read what he signs or tell his employees to only ask him to sign >at least half-way credible stuff. The old regulations used to pretend that >foreigners were too dumb to implement computer programs from algorithms; >now they're pretending that foreigners are too dumb to type.* >People used to say we have the best politicians money can buy, >but you ought to be able to buy better politicians than that. Or beter excuses. >At 10:31 AM 12/30/96 -0800, Tim May wrote: >>And not only is OCR able these days to handle general fonts easily enough, >>but almost all printed code is in fixed-width fonts, i.e., non-proportional >>fonts. This makes OCR easy. > >The basic difference between "easily OCRed source code" and "not easily >OCRed source code" is pretty much limited to two things >1) Half-decent print quality (black on white in Courier at 300dpi should do....) > As Tim says, this stuff is child's play. Back when OCRs were > $10,000 machines with cutting-edge 68010 processors, > reading Courier was pretty easy but it helped to put in checksums; > these days you don't really need that. (It also didn't like > wet-process 240-dpi laser printing or faxes, but modern OCR software > can generally deal with good-quality faxes and >2) Bound pages vs. loose pages (printing with perforated pages > or selling the source code in loose-leaf might count as an > "attractive nuisance" :-), but a band-saw can solve that problem > for the OCR user unless it's printed on Tyvek or something silly :-) Even an exacto-knife would work. For proportional fonts it depends on how nasty the kerning gets and the shape of the characters. (And a san serif font without too many kerning pairs should go though fine.) The technology for this has progressed quite a bit in the last few years. Next thing you know, OCR software will be export controlled as well. (Or they will require something silly, like having all code samples in caligraphy fonts.) >In the Karn case, the Feds made the silly argument that the >floppy disk version had the files neatly separated, while the >paper version split files between pages and had page numbers at the >bottoms of the pages that weren't part of the source code. >Even the $10K 68010 wonderbox could handle page headers/footers and margins, >and modern software can do decent translations into different >word processor formats. And even if it didn't, just selecting and deleting the margin areas would not be all that difficult. (Ooohhh... A couple of extra hours is really going to slow someone down.) >>For just the amount of money we've spent (in our consulting fees) on >>discussing just this issue of OCRing, the entire content of the MIT PGP >>source code book AND Schneier's AC could have been manually inputted by >>Barbadans or Botswanas, or probably even by Europeans. I used to work for a company that would transfer entire archives of medical journals. Much of it we would just OCR. Some of it we would send off shore. The OCR software was about 95% reliable and this was over 5 years ago. (And we were using 286 boxes for much of the OCR work. Not a heavy technoligical investment.) I am sure that things have improved a great deal since then. (My new scanner included OCR software. I will have to run a test and report the findings. >There's one German university that OCRed the MIT PGP source code book. >The PGP folks passed out copies of their new 3.0 Pre-Alpha and an update >at a recent Cypherpunks meeting. See >http://www.pgp.com/newsroom/sourcebook.cgi >for ordering informaiton. It's been donated to some local libraries, >such as San Jose CA, and I hope they'll send it to the Library of Congress >and various non-US university and other public libraries - the recent >rules change clarifying that it's ok to export source code should make >this much easier. The page listed does not contain order information. Do you know costs and/or order info? >[* OK, it's not really possible to type or proofread perl code accurately :-) Yeah, just look at what happened with John Orwant's _Perl 5 interactive Course_. The book is being recalled due to all the typographical errors from the pubisher. Reading some Perl code is also quite impossible. (For the reasons behind this, i recommend Charlie Stross's article on the tpoic on page 36 of _The Perl Journal_ #4.) >More to the point, OCRs aren't always real good about `backquotes' and other >little blotchy marks that some languages use, and even humans don't always >get them right.] Many character sets are not very good at displaying "little used" characters clearly. (Some of the cheaper fonts do not even include them.) Backticks are a special problem. The latest Camel book has all sorts of problems with hard to recognise backticks. BTW, there is an article on Perl and randomness in The Perl Journal #4 by John Orwant. Pretty basic for most Cypherpunks, but good reading none the less... --- | If you're not part of the solution, You're part of the precipitate. | |"The moral PGP Diffie taught Zimmermann unites all| Disclaimer: | | mankind free in one-key-steganography-privacy!" | Ignore the man | |`finger -l alano(a)teleport.com` for PGP 2.6.2 key | behind the keyboard.| | http://www.ctrl-alt-del.com/~alan/ |alan(a)ctrl-alt-del.com|

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Crypto++ 2.0 beta
by Wei Dai 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I'm about to release version 2.0 of Crypto++, and I am looking for people to do some beta testing on it. I'm especially interested in testing for compatibility with different compilers/OSs. If you are interested, please e-mail me stating that you are a US or Canadian citizen or permanent resident living in US or Canada and that you will not export the software. Wei Dai Here's the readme for Crypto++ if you don't know what it is. Crypto++: a C++ Class Library of Cryptographic Primitives Version 2.0 beta 2/13/1996 This library includes: MD5, SHS, HAVAL, DES, IDEA, WAKE, 3-WAY, TEA, SAFER, Blowfish, Diamond2, Diamond2 Lite, Sapphire, Luby-Rackoff, MDC, various modes (CFB, CBC, OFB, counter), DH, DSA, ElGamal, LUC, Rabin, BlumGoldwasser, elliptic curve cryptosystems, BBS, gzip compression, Shamir's secret sharing scheme, Rabin's information dispersal scheme, and zero-knowledge prover and verifier for graph isomorphism. There are also various miscellanous modules such as base 64 coding and 32-bit CRC. RSA and RC5 are noticeably absent. I am still talking to RSA DSI about adding them back into Crypto++. I hope version 2.1 will include them. Crypto++ has been compiled and tested with Borland C++ 4.5, MSVC 4.0, and G++ 2.7.2 on MS-DOS, Windows NT, and a variety of Unix machines. You are welcome to use it for any purpose without paying me, but see license.txt for the fine print. Some short instructions to compile this library: (you probably need to modify this to suit your environment) -- if want to use this library with RSAREF, then 1. get a copy of RSAREF 2. untar or unzip it into a directory below this one 3. type "gcc -c -I. *.c" (in the rsaref/source directory) to compile RSAREF 4. edit config.h 5. type "g++ -c -Irsaref/source -I. *.cpp" to compile this library 6. type "g++ *.o rsaref/source/*.o -lstdc++ -lm" to link the test driver 7. type "a.out" to run the test driver -- if you DON'T want to use this library with RSAREF, then 1. edit config.h (make sure to comment out #define USE_RSAREF) 2. type "g++ -c *.cpp" to compile this library 3. type "g++ *.o -lstdc++ -lm" to link the test driver 4. type "a.out" to run the test driver Finally, a note on object ownership: If a constructor for A takes a pointer to an object B (except primitive types such as int and char), then A owns B and will delete B at A's destruction. If a constructor for A takes a reference to an object B, then the caller retains ownership of B and should not destroy it until A no longer needs it. Good luck, and feel free to e-mail me at weidai(a)eskimo.com if you have any problems. Also, check http://www.eskimo.com/~weidai/cryptlib.html for updates and new versions. Wei Dai History 1.0 - First public release. Withdrawn at the request of RSA DSI. - Has a big bug in the RSA key generation code. 1.1 - Removed RSA, RC4, RC5 - Disabled calls to RSAREF's non-public functions - Minor bugs fixed 2.0 - a completely new, faster multiprecision integer class - added HAVAL, 3-WAY, TEA, SAFER, LUC, Rabin, BlumGoldwasser, Elliptic Curve algorithms - added the Lucas strong probable primality test - ElGamal encryption and signature schemes modified to avoid weaknesses - Diamond changed to Diamond2 because of key schedule weakness - fixed bug in WAKE key setup - lots of miscellaneous optimizations

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Re: Re:
by lunaslide＠loop.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

}>sovereign n. 1. A person, governing body, etc., in whom the >supreme power }>or authority is vested.< adj. 1. Exercising or possessing supreme }>authority or jurisdiction. 2. Independent, and free from external }>authority or influence: a sovereign state. } }Yup. } }>This is not what our government is. } }The United States is a sovereign nation. Do you dispute that ? The }constitution is a binding agreement between the government and its citizens }that determines how that sovereignty will be exercised, the elements in which }the nation will not interfere with citizens, and the duties which it will }carry out. No, but I do dispute that the _U.S. Government_ is sovereign. I'm not going to write why all over again, since you seem to have convieniently snipped the rest of my post, rather than answer it. You are commiting a straw man fallacy. I didn't say that the nation isn't soveriegn, I said that the government is not sovereign. Yes, there is a difference. }The three branches of the government were set up to ensure that "supreme }power" would never rest with a single entity, yet taken together they do have }that power. The three branches are a system of checks and balances to counter the the immergence of one sovereign pwoer. See, it is actually built into the constution that the govt cannot be sovereign! }Congress and the Senate are the legally empowered representatives of the }people. In that they do have the "power of the people" to make decisions }on what is right and what is wrong within limits. That too is defined in }the constitution. The Congress is the Senate and the House, and they are given specific powers by the people to govern themselves in relation to the job in Article 1, Sections 1-7 and to govern the people in Article 1, Sections 8-10. The powers given are very specific in nature and involve mostly limited legislative powers and taxing abilities. The President is given his rights and duties to govern the people in Article 2, Sections 2 and 3 and they include the power to command the army and navy, give pardons, make treaties and appoint people to positions as Judges, Ambassadors and the like. He has the duty to give a State of the Union address from "time to time" to inform and ask for recomendation and consideration on matters ofhis choosing. He also has the right to conviene both houses of congress to discuss matters. In Article one, he is also given the power of the veto. The Judicial branch, and particularly the Supreme Court, is given the power to rule on matters concerning the court involving laws and disputes. They have the power to refute laws and the duty to adhere to the principles of the constitution. The people have the right to dissent and may petition the govt for a redress of grievances as dictated by Amendment one. If they are not given satisfaction, they still have the right to free speech and press so that they may share their dissent with one another and affect the outcome of the next election. The Fourth Amendment, of course, protects the "...right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures..." Clearly the govt cannot be sovereign if this is true. }Take the CDA. I do believe that it is unconstitutional but that Congress/ }Saxplayer had the *right* to pass the law just as the Supreme Court has the }right to declare it to have been outside the power of the Congress to do so }(which I expect). Somehow it works. But ultimately it is the people who decide, and the people are not one with the government. The people have influence over the government, therefore the government cannot be sovereign. The first part of the Declaration of Independence indicates that it was never the intent of the founding fathers to create a sovereign government, refuting your nonsensical statement about it being "a given." I ended up restating almost my whole case anyway. But that's ok, cause I'll just keep explaining until you understand it. lunaslide "Prohibition... goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes... A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded." - -- Abraham Lincoln On the meridian of time there is no injustice, only the poetry of motion creating the illusion of truth and drama. Henry Miller ________________________________________________________________ -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: 2.6.2 mQCPAzEX3QEAAAEEAOGQjhnqGH29pO1WDaXs5GFOVPhCBWyYEk9XEwRmscjveWzH AhA6DeOA480zWNqQURyqE2yPmR8WzT+OXYqmeiQiycKyFA41Vs/Ruf+gXXxe7uXS L5BK3K8oKbfoH0D5/TAkMT4r6BprXFQz4pFc3gY2SSaSPElpMjKHaKBsRsyRABEB AAG0HUplZmYgQ29ubiA8bHVuYXNsaWRlQGxvb3AuY29tiQCVAwUQMRffHzKHaKBs RsyRAQGNhwP9E9xEZ9/LCKnhgtnrqgD7pDoXG2pCy8FoyfFjoImGkG+jF1wELXmB Z0mf8F8CgYkys0mif1XeGDMelr1gzlZAm6LgQt4kcvztMW/aRLn18QP+iwltVT/L p8D37mitOjvuk46sWgAChIaPPPIeg/EaYQjQkmlpWKsEYIoTRy+E8mU= =4Gku -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----

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Re: Netscrape's Cookies
by David E. Smith 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- At 04:18 PM 2/13/96 +0000, a Deranged Mutant wrote: [re cookies! yum] >I'm curious if anyone knows which sites use/modify it. AFAIK, the only site that uses it is *.netscape.com dave -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQEVAwUBMSEtFjVTwUKWHSsJAQHkJAf9EaG4gSj6zJLLcI6wiT6Qd45yBPL2sxIW M8Vtf95bLgCM7h0BP6jtdUGRG0nMVqbY/Xj+kNYfDHmgZSnuoBrYld9E4bs5puTr aVW6y7UBs3hdqz5dtWh4Gn2nq6/xTkj/t3/DlI/fuakNVnTlN0TeGPj2Alp5x8Z3 mww1gQ0EyymlioPEpyaNqg8vGSVcltDOQRdw+7HZoc2fZ6urvBkDKtHRAtN7PiUG LMafuM+27TiRoKi1kSf0Q1S6EE7QrXoJTnTm6/qAIY1e+kPw/Lg17NhJmIQR0TnT tSzucfxzjrGvFGI2fZL0kr5qAe/k/eqx+xKNXZHJjsNWIG8/WbdiPQ== =dpvR -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- ----- David E. Smith, c/o Southeast Missouri State University 1000 Towers Circle South MS 1210 Cape Girardeau MO 63701 dsmith(a)midwest.net, dsmith(a)alpha.c2.org, PGP 0x961D2B09 (573)339-3814 http://www.midwest.net/scribers/dsmith/ "Reality is only for those lacking in true imagination."

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Re:
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 06:03 AM 2/13/96 GMT, John Lull wrote: >On Mon, 12 Feb 1996 13:41:04 -0500 (EST), Padgett wrote: > >> If it were properly and legally decided that communications >> with anon.penet.fi is against "national interest" then the sovereign has >> not only the "right" but the *duty* to block/monitor such communications. > >Bullpuckey. One could just as legitimately say: > > "If it were properly and legally decided that publication of the > Los Angeles Times is against "national interest" then the sovereign > has not only the "right" but the *duty* to block such publication." "Right on", as they used to say. Padgett's clueless. He'll try to justify ANYTHING.

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