- cypherpunks-legacy - lists.cpunks.org

Would Netscape take money for 'exported' copies?
by Arun Mehta 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 22:13 23/07/96 -0400, Anonymous Remail Service wrote: >As I have said before, European & other foreign users, who get the strong- >crypto version should pay Netscape what they owe Netscape, to keep the ITAR >as the issue, and not piracy. Yes, but could/would Netscape even take our money? Wouldn't that be complicity (IA obviously NAL)? I'd imagine they'd just return the money, and tell us to please destroy our copies of the software. Arun Mehta Phone +91-11-6841172, 6849103 amehta(a)cpsr.org http://www.cerfnet.com/~amehta/ finger amehta(a)cerfnet.com for public key

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Re: Parsing John Youn (Re: OPS_nuk)
by jya＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Jul 25, 1996 03:46:19, 'tcmay(a)got.net (Timothy C. May)' wrote: >P.S. John Young does an invaluable service in forwarding items and making them >available at his site, but I find parsing his text into something >understandable a real chore. Too bad when style gets in the way of substance, >unless, of course, ones aspires to Joycehood. Tim, pity the moot transcriber a-choring (spit). It's a grind (pus) forwarding other's fishwrap (buggers), hardly able to contain one's gibbering idiocy (pee) counterreaction to the new's gratuitous fatuity (dookie). Usually, though, one's bowel-rumblings (Bic lits) pass unnosed in the c'punk parfumerie.

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Re: Digital Watermarks for copy protection in recent Billbo
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:54 PM 7/24/96, Alex F wrote: >> >Yes, but concievably if (whoever would be incharge, FBI?) *could*, >> >under law do this, even if they are wrong. It is a lot harder to >> >prove that they intentionally harrassed *you* than it is for them to >> >say that they were following leads and show evidence. Yes, this may >> >> To go to trial, an indictment would be needed. How likely is this? > >The likelyness is irrelevant to the point. Possibility is relevant. >Probability is not. "Likeliness" is _always_ relevent when discussing law. I am not a lawyer, but I've virtually certain that "receiving stolen property" laws involve terms like "knowingly" and/or "conspiracy." That is, "scienter." While "ignorance of the law is no excuse" is certainly true in many cases, the law comprehends the reality that certain actions are not crimes if no knowledge of a criminal act was involved. (Sorry if this is not phrased more clearly.) Thus, the guy who buys a bicycle that later turns out to have been stolen, will usually lose the bicycle, but is not knowingly receiving stolen property and hence is guilty of no crime. And no DA will charge him; the courts and jails are already clogged up enough. Of course, if he _knew_ the bicycle was stolen (e.g., he "placed an order" to have one stolen, a market which actually exists in some places, usually for cars), then "scienter" has been met, and perhaps "conspiracy," and so prosecution is more likely. I maintain that this "wiggle factor" in the law is not something to get worried about ("But they _could_ arrest me for buying a book stolen 10 years ago! We've got to do something!) and is, in fact, essential in any justice system. There just is no "automated" or "formal" system, and probably/hopefully never will be. --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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Schelling Points, Rights, and Game Theory--Part II
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

As promised in Part I, here is more on the application of Schelling points to the discussion of "rights" (property rights, rights of parents to tell their children what to do, etc.). We saw that Schelling points, as developed by Richard Schelling and others, are essentially "lower entropy" points. (In fact, I suspect there are formulations which involve so-called "maxiumum entropy" methods which would reproduce the theory of Schelling points; Cover and Thomas hint at this in their "Information Theory" book.) How does this apply to rights? Let us take as an example the contentious issue of "parent's rights," "children's rights," and societal issues involving schooling, child abuse, indoctrination into the body politic, citizenship, etc. * Viewpoint #1: Parents have absolute control of what their minor (under some age, usually 18 and/or resident in their homes) children read, watch on t.v., listen to on the radio, etc. They can control the comings and goings of their minor children, whom they may associate with, etc. * Viewpoint #2: Children, even minor children, have certain basic rights to access to information, access to t.v., radio, music, and books. Even access to crypto! * Viewpoint #3: The State and/or Community has an interest in the upbringing of a child and may take steps to direct the education and exposure to information of children, even in contravention of the wishes of parents. There are of course various shadings of these viewpoints. And examples can be found to defend each of these viewpoints, and also to attack them. (For example, what of the Christian Scientist who lets his 5-year-old die of an easily-curable disease because he believes injections are unGodly? What of the 10-year-old who is taught in public schools how to use condoms (or how to clean dirty needles), in contravention of the wishes of the parent?) Cutting to the chase, I submit that nearly all societies have "evolved" an approach that says: -- "While I may think you are raising your child in a way different from how I would raise him, I cannot take over the raising of your child, and I cannot be in your house/tent/cave/yurt at all times, or even at _any_times, so I will basically not interfere unless something really egregious happens." This is a "Schelling point" in the same way that territorial boundaries develop and are mutually adhered to, for the most part. The _costs_ of extending beyond the Schelling point boundaries is deemed to be too high, and the boundary persists. (Boundaries may jump around, as conditions change. And wars still exist to try to imbalance or move the boundaries. Nothing says the Schelling points are fixed in stone, only that the points are not completely random, and that there is a kind of order out of the chaos.) This is summarized in the most important of all Schelling points: "Live and let live." In the absence of a direct threat to one's self or family, and in the absence of other compelling evidence of a need to intervene, much energy and grief is saved by not trying to intervene in the lives of others. (I believe many of the themes we talk about, here and in libertarian circles, come together in this way. The view of John Rawls, that "justice" is that which an ensemble of people of people would pick, even if they did not what station in life they would be born into, closely fits with this Schelling point model.) ObCrypto Sidebar: The "fair" method for dividing a pie between two people is well-known: "You cut, I choose." This *game theory* result is central to many cryptographic protocols (though it may not always be apparent at first). And the protocol can be extended to 3 parties, and proabably to N. Research is ongoing on this, including Cypherpunk Robin Hanson's work at Caltech. My essay here is not a formal, footnoted proof of my claims, naturally. But I believe my claims to be basically correct, and to offer insights into the debate about "rights"...certainly a Schelling point or evolutionary game theory interpretation of what we call "rights" is superior to an appeal-to-God or "natural rights" interpretation. To get back to the issue of children's rights: I will not expend my energies and risk my life to forcibly gain entry to my neighbor's "castle" to make sure his 7-year-old son is able to view "Power Rangers" when his "rights" to do so are denied by his father. Nor will I pay for cops, Child Protective Services, and a powerful bureaucracy to enforce these "rights." Nor will I demand that this parent send his child to the church I deem most appropriate, nor the school I deem most appropriate, etc. That is, "practical and economic" issues lead me to the conclusion that parents basically can tell their minor children what to do, and that only truly egregious cases, such as clear cases of severe beatings, warrant the interference by the State. The same applies to cryptography. While there are dangers with any technology, including cryptographers, most societies have eventually evolved a system in which one is secure in one's home and papers. Orwell's vision of video cameras in all homes (actually, only of the elites, as the "proles" were unmonitored) has not come to pass, and even in nominally totalitarian states like the U.S.S.R. and P.R.C. there was considerable privacy in the home, at least after the worst of the terrors in the 1930-70 period. (I am not endorsing these states, naturally, just noting that even these states had to recognize the Schelling points of (mostly) not trying to send cops into private residences to enforce marginally-important rules.) Forceful advocates of children's rights, such as Mike Duvos, will no doubt find many points to use to argue for intervention on behalf of children. And in some case, I would even agree. But the basic principle, the "right" of a man to control his own castle, and the "right" not to have people nosing around inside his home, and the very real economic point that a parent pays for services and good consumed in his house, means that the balance of rights _must_ be in the direction of Viewpoint #1 above. Parents are free to raise their children as they see fit. They feed and clothe them, they talk to them about ideas and beliefs, they control the television set and the radio channel tuned to, and so forth. This is basic reality. To change this basic reality would require intervention from outside. And this is too high a price to pay for illusory gains. (I say "illusory" because I don't think intervention from outside would produce better-educated children, though it might produce more controllable citizen-units.) This essay has concentrated perhaps too much on "parent's vs. children's rights," but this is what sparked my desire to write an essay on Schelling points and why certain so-called rights appear to have evolved. I believe the game-theoretic and evolutionary approaches, mixed in with economics, offer the most solid grounding for the discussion of rights. Comments, as always, are welcome. --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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Shell buys key escrow system from Trusted Info. Systems
by Will Rodger 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Administration officials didn't return calls for comment, but it's clear that the Clinton-Gore team have their first "testbed" for trying out key recovery, or key escrow, proposals. Steven Walker, president of Glenwood, Md.'s Trusted Information Systems Inc., told Inter@ctive Week late last week that TIS will supply his companys Gauntlet Firewall technology, complete with commercial key escrow capabilities, to an a large multinational with headquarters outside the United States. The multinational company will self-escrow, that is handle all encryption keys itself, in cooperation with the British government, sources close to the deal said. Walker declined to name the company, but several Washington-based sources confirmed the buyer is Royal Dutch Shell. The deal represent the first time that a foreign buyer has purchased a US key escrow product without escrowing keys in the US. Indeed, TIS has sold only one other system for export abroad, one which involved communications between the US and the UK with US key escrow. Walker, widely credited with devising the controversial commerical key escrow system now being promoted by the current administration, claimed "there really is an important issue here in finding a balance between the interest of government and those of industry. A policy that says anyone who wants to export strong encryption as long as there is key recovery is an important development." The success of the deal and others like it could figure heavily in the Clinton administration's ability to sell it its latest proposals on commercial key escrow; a recent report from the National Research Council recently warned that such efforts were unproven and required serious examiniation before they could be deployed. Long-time critics of the proposal have, in turn, leveled the same criticisms. Jim Bidzos, President of RSA Data Security Inc. and a long-time foe of administration policy said he doubted the market would rush to purchase products like Trusted Information Systems, but said he was slightly more hopeful for a resolution to the controversy than he had been previously. "Ive said all along that user key escrow is the only thing that makes sense," Bidzos said. Users who hold their own keys "can comply with any regulation in the world - if you want to give your keys to France or whoever you can thats your business. If it's good enough for the CIO, it's good enough for the CIA." Royal Dutch Shell officials said security considerations forbade confirming a sale had been made, but freely admitted to having had talks with TIS. The companys interest key escrow, computer security head Nick Mansfield said, lay principally in getting access to records after keys had been lost, stolen or otherwise disabled. The Gauntlet firewall, nonetheless, encrypts and decrypts messages as they arrive; it does not store messages in encrypted form. "To us its not a matter of going along with key escrow, its a matter of doing business," Mansfield said. ********* A shorter, slightly less jargon-laden version of this story appeared in the 7/22 issue o fInter@ctive Week. An archived copy should be on our site (http://www.zdnet.com/intweek) by week's end. Will Rodger Washington Bureau Chief Inter@ctive Week -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQEVAwUBMfa2sUcByjT5n+LZAQE4nAf7BA5X2f3LX1KQXXygkYtaGWc6qMgDEFWA cYlQNtVw+KS+h8hNRmpZ4KWaUJS1iwHPfwaS0XqI40gVGyZE2mYBmF6RybAkLKKV zGXEyIlAVxKOz2FsRQ35Tg1VV5Y8NaL+YxK3uUcutLHBK/Vxq7iLcnaqRn2klfYM 6ImSKecHMU2NzaB8JGIIJbAuG7NpGmLj/O4BEP3ccoNeA3NQ1fIAujMyL12gbdPF TUZVUOLsj5eHG1dwqRmSUdsNHcwYoQ6WFX2waIdot0Ia/nph/ERpliVjkccIsKsz q+qDeH0fz3ZoENS/zqUy9ilHwLcAdMoiyQzlm06dZBRf+O9rqpDjKA== =RJjm -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: E-Cash promotion idea
by LKWendel＠aol.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

In a message dated 96-07-24 11:30:07 EDT, paul(a)ljl.com (Paul Robichaux) writes: << The Visa stored-value cards now in Atlanta don't do this, but as a simplifying measure most vendors in the Olympic Village (and many within the downtown venue ring) have rounded prices to the nearest US$. The precedent's been set. >> I'm confused. Why can't the Visa Stroed Value program accept exact amount on the card? And if the card runs out of value and is not reloadable, why not just supplement the difference with cash? Regards, Lisa Kops-Wendel

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Re: A Global Village, or the future of porn on the net
by Arun Mehta 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 10:00 24/07/96 +0000, Alex F wrote: > >why is it that Bill(ary) signed an unconstitutional law? I >am referring to the CDA and the telephony bill. ... arguments that I wholeheartedly support deleted.. >Anyway, getting off-topic again. I'll be quiet now :) Let me see if I can bring this back on track. We have some interesting developments that could converge: 1) Legally, the Internet is more or less in the clear as far as indecency is concerned. The moralists will rally again and put through a bill that doesn't so blatantly violate the constitution, but for the time being we're OK. 2) Porn is very, very popular. As a consultant, I often use Netscape from the offices of my clients, and invariably take a peek at the bookmarks. Guess what is pointed to more than anything else. By making a hullaballoo about porn on the net, its enemies may have shot themselves in the foot: it will attract people rather than repel. 3) Porn on the net by and large isn't all that great, so if there is a risk, it is that people might be bored. What you mostly have are stills of nudes on the web and Usenet postings of indifferent quality. 4) the web is changing from static to dynamic through Java and the like. VRML in fact adds a 3-D element. Stir, add some spicy curry, and see if you get: Java classes for males and females corresponding to VRML objects. The class methods might include kissing, hugging, spanking, restraining... A female object might be initialized with Hillary Clinton's face, Evangelista's body... Anyone could now write a script which you could view enacted on your screen, or interact with one another as in MUDs. Why, someone might write a translator that takes a story off alt.sex.whatever and produces an appropriate script. People would only need to download the software and appropriate objects once, then receive emscripts which could be run in total privacy. People should we willing to pay small amounts for use of the classes and objects, as well as for the scripts. Of course, it would only work in our prudish societies if the transactions were totally anonymous. If Digicash payment systems were built-in, that might be a reason for people to start adopting eCash. Of course, this opens up a whole can of worms. For instance, given the violence of many pornographic stories on Usenet, it won't be long before famous personalities routinely get violated in cyberspace. Talk about copyright: do you have the right to prevent someone from doing this to you? I unfortunately lack the bandwidth to find out the extent to which porn on the net is already moving in this direction. However, if you have pointers, I'll go *find* the bandwidth! Where on the net do people discuss such matters? Arun Mehta Phone +91-11-6841172, 6849103 amehta(a)cpsr.org http://www.cerfnet.com/~amehta/ finger amehta(a)cerfnet.com for public key

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Re: Netscape 3.0B US version MD5
by nobody＠c2.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Jeff Weinstein <jsw(a)netscape.com> wrote: > The final version of 3.0 will be available for download well > before Sept 17. That version will not have a timebomb. Even > the timebombed versions will let you connect to our site to > download new versions. Is there a possibility that the US version of Netscape 2.02 for Windows 3.1 will be made available via this mechanism? I run OS/2 in a WinOS/2 session under OS/2 Warp, and the 16 bit version of 2.02 is the latest one that us OS/2 Warp users of Netscape have been able to get working. None of the 3.0 betas will work, for some reason. (If you have a "wish list" there, a native OS/2 version of Netscape would be nice, too! <g>)

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Re: Distributed DES crack
by talon57＠well.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Matt Blaze scribes: >My estimate is that an FPGA-based machine that can do a single DES >key every four months (eight months to exhaust the whole keyspace) >could be built with off-the-shelf stuff for comfortably under $50k >(plus labor, plus software development costs). A prototype board >should cost under $1000 and will help prove the concept and get a >more accurate cost estimate. I expect to build such a prototype >machine myself, and, if it works as I expect, maybe the whole >thing. >-matt If the price is reasonable, I for one would be willing to donate the bucks for a FPGA chip or two to see this get built: -------------------- | Chip donated by | | talon57(a)well.com | -------------------- The very existance of this device in the real world would make our point better than anything I've yet heard. Imagine being at a hearing and having the physical device sitting there before the judges...... Brian

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17 Dec '03

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