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Raytheon as Big Brother, Inc.
by Adam Shostack 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

(Excerpted & paraphrased from todays (22 July 1994) Boston Globe:) Raytheon won an 800 billion dollar, six year contract with the government of Brazil to provide monitoring of the Amazon vs. drug & mineral smugglers. System will employ telecomm, satelite imagery, ground & air based monitoring to monitor an area more than 1/2 the size of the US. System will use unspecified defense converted technologies. System will reduce deforestation & wildlife destruction, combat illegal mining & drug trafficing, protect indigenous tribes, *monitor traffic*, stengthen border controls. Team members include IBM/Brasil, INFRANAV, a Brasilian militray contracter, MacDonald Dettwiler (hmmm) of canada, and others. The article fawns about how nice it will be for Raytheon not to go out of buisness. Raytheon has been having difficulty recently, since the Army decided to go with a longer range anti-missile system, bypassing future Patriot missile purchases. "If Brazil wins the world Cup, the government will be able to pass the most repressive legislation ever, and no one will care." -- Pele -- Adam Shostack adam(a)bwh.harvard.edu Politics. From the greek "poly," meaning many, and ticks, a small, annoying bloodsucker.

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Re: Voice/Fax Checks
by Hal 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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Re: Double DES calculations
by norm＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 09:05 1994/07/22 -0700, Hal wrote: >I missed the start of this double-des thread due to system problems and >being gone, and I've never been able to pick up the main point since. It >sounds like some kind of meet-in-the-middle attack is being discussed. >It is true that with current technology MITM generally seems more costly >in terms of space than time. However, I have seen references to techniques >which shift this tradeoff some, costing more time and less space. Un- >fortunately, I can't remember where I saw them! ... There may be more than one way that MITM (meet in the middle) may be used to attack Double block cyphers. I assume the following attack. You know some block of plain-text P and corresponding cypher text C. You believe that C = E(k, E(j, P)) where E(k, p) is the encypherment of p with key k. D(k, E(k, p)) = p. You need to find keys k and j. Classic MITM is to produce a file A with records: <k, E(k, P)> for each k, and file B with records <j, D(j, C)> for each j. Sort both A and B on the second field. Pass over the sorted files looking for a record from file A whose second field is the same as a record in file B. To substantially shorten the ammount of tape used by a factor 2^n at the expense of evaluating C and D 2^n more often do the following: For m from 0 to 2^n-1 Do Produce file A with records: <k, E(k, P)> for each k where (the right n bits of E(k, P)) = m. (discarding other records) Produce file B with records <j, D(j, C)> for each j where (the right n bits of D(j, C)) = m Sort files A and B on second field. Pass over files looking for records from A that match records from b in the second field. Enddo. This is still a daunting job and evaluating its magnitide requires several assumptions. The most obvious is the cost of evaluating C and D. Next is the cost of reading and writing tape.

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Det./tmp/Nym on Netcom
by whitaker＠dpair.csd.sgi.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Noon 25 July 1994 Prepended disclaimer: I do not speak for Netcom or SGI. I have spoken to Bryant at Netcom's operations center in San Jose, California, and he has asked me to pass along the following to the Cypherpunks list and anyone else concerned with L. Detweiler and system user accounts: nym(a)netcom.com tmp(a)netcom.com Both of these accounts have been suspended. The "nym" account was suspended as of late last week. Although it is not Netcom's policy to give out account user information which includes names, addresses, and other such personal data, Bryant was at liberty to say that the user accounts "tmp" and "nym" were the same person. I approve of this company policy, by the way. The accounts department at Netcom has been made aware by Bryant that trouble has been generated by the singular person writing checks in payment of both the "nym" and "tmp" accounts, and has been told not to accept any new orders from anyone suspected to be the same person. Particular attention is being paid to orders made from the Denver area. Bryant has asked me to add that Netcom's way of handling such trouble is strictly complaint-driven. If you have a complaint about a particular user, your best bet is to call Netcom. Bryant can be reached directly at Netcom by calling 408-983-1510. [bcc: Bryant at Netcom (not email address; call phone)] Appended disclaimer: I do not speak for Netcom or SGI. -- Russell Earl Whitaker whitaker(a)csd.sgi.com Silicon Graphics Inc. Technical Assistance Center / Centre D'Assistance Technique / Tekunikaru Ashisutansu Sentaa Mountain View CA (415) 390-2250 ================================================================ #include <std_disclaimer.h>

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Re: GUT and P=NP
by jamesd＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

James A. Donald writes: > > The new operator is a unitary transformation on a single bit. Mike McNally writes > Ok, great. So why is it that a description of a process to be > followed by a quantum copmputer in order to produce some desired > result not an algorithm just because it involves this operator? Obviously one could choose to call these algorithms if one wished, but such a name, if adopted, will obfuscate the fact that such things have very different properties, capabilities, and limitations to conventional algorithms. In particular the results of conventional complexity theory obviously are largely irrelevant to quantum complexity theory, which is why I made my original statement that the development of quantum computers with capabilities that are impossible for conventional computers cannot falsify existing complexity theory and existing complexity theory cannot "disprove" the alleged capabilities of quantum computers. Very likely the name will be adopted but with a qualifier "quantum algorithm". In the event that quantum computers become common (which I do not expect to happen for thirty years or so) I expect the phrase "quantum algorithm" will be replaced by something shorter, so that we have one word for algorithms, and another word for quantum algorithms. We have wandered seriously off topic, and I will make future replies in private email. -- --------------------------------------------------------------------- We have the right to defend ourselves and our property, because of the kind of animals that we James A. Donald are. True law derives from this right, not from the arbitrary power of the omnipotent state. jamesd(a)netcom.com

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CEB 7 - its alive! Cypherpunks' Electronic Book.
by Gary Jeffers 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

CEB 7 CYPHERPUNKS' ELECTRONIC BOOK - its still alive! Not long ago someone sent me private email volunteering a workstation to handle the CEB. I have stupidly lost the post. After several hours of hunting thru my unindexed Cypherpunk archives - no luck. Will that person please email me again with CEB in the header? Also, I have a very well qualified volunteer to do the editing of CEB. Hopefully, he may know how to program it as well. I am going to maintain a list of people with different skills who would like to work on the CEB. Anybody would would like to help please post either to me or to Cypherpunks with CEB in the header. Also, would the people who have archieved Cypherpunks' lists please respond as well. PUSH EM BACK! PUSH EM BACK! WWWAAAYYY BBBAAACCCK! BBBEEEAAATTTT STATE! Yours Truly, Gary Jeffers

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comments by Ron Rivest on Government crypto policy
by Hal Abelson 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

These are some thoughts by Ron Rivest on government crypto policy and the recent statement on Clipper. I'm forwarding them to this list with Ron's permission. -- Hal Abelson ****************************** The original intent of Clipper was to make available government (i.e., NSA) crypto technology (i.e., SKIPJACK) in a way that could not be exploited by criminals or foreign nationals. NIST and NSA wanted to help out by making some of their technology available to US industry, but wanted to do so in a way that didn't hurt other US government operations (intelligence, law enforcement). Key-escrowed clipper is the result. This is what Brent Morris and Mark Unkerholtz of NSA said in a public lecture at MIT in spring '94. They stressed the point that their main goal was not to catch crooks or do foreign intelligence better, but only to help out in a way that was not hurtful to these other operations. They didn't really expect that Clipper would catch a lot of crooks. (As is widely believed, any sensible crook will avoid using Clipper equipment.) The goal is to get their technology out, and a secondary requirement is that it be done in a way that doesn't hurt their other operations. Note that the above position is entirely consistent with an entirely voluntary use of other cryptographic techniques by industry. Trying to force industry to use Clipper, or to use key-escrowed techniques, would be equivalent to an assertion that the primary goal IS to assist law enforcement and foreign intelligence in their operations, and is thus contrary to the above position. I now concerned that the administration's recent announcement represents a serious revision of the above position. Probably the reasoning for NIST and NSA is going something like this: -- Congress (and parts of industry) wants the government to propose crypto standards. -- NIST, the FBI, and the NSA can't push forward with a standard that is non-escrowed, because their jobs are on the line if any significant use of government standards is made by "bad guys". -- They propose Skipjack/Clipper, which attempts to be "helpful" (it has a new algorithm) in a way that doesn't hurt (key escrow). But then, we have -- Significant opposition to escrowed standards by almost everyone except Dorothy Denning. Also, opposition to secret algorithms in standards. So, what do they do? -- Announce that they are reconsidering their policy on Clipper, while keeping their commitment to escrowed crypto standards. Invite proposals from industry for escrowed crypto standards suitable for software. The crypto algorithms could be public, etc. At this point, we have lost the only real contribution of the original proposal (the secret Skipjack algorithm is shelved), and the role of the government is now back just to trying to set some sort of standard. That is, they are no longer contributing technology, but only acting as a standard-setting body. However, the fixation on escrow techniques persists; no bureaucrat wants to have his job on the line for helping some "bad guy" that someday chooses to use the US crypto standard. But at this point, we have a government position that doesn't hang together. (The original position made more sense, although it didn't result in a reasonable policy.) Without government technical contributions to protect (e.g. Skipjack), the only motivations for preserving key-escrow are (1) protecting the jobs of the policy-makers should some fairly visible bad guy use government standard crypto someday, or (2) a reversal of the original policy: catching crooks and assisting foreign intelligence are now elevated from secondary constraints (due to reason (1)) to a primary goal. But it is well-recognized that catching crooks and assisting foreign intelligence in such a manner requires the *mandatory* use of an escrowed standard. Without legal requirements to do so, most manufacturers won't bother with the escrow capability. Moreover, with an adoption of public crypto standards, anyone (e.g. foreign businesses) would be free to produce their own non-escrowed implementations of the adopted crypto algorithms, and sell them in the US. It has been well argued that key escrow technology is not an effective or cost-effective means of law enforcement, etc. I think that mandating the use of key escrow technology would be unacceptable to most of the country (viz the current debate, which is running 1000 to 1 against even voluntary key escrow standards), too expensive, and too much sticky tar spread on our nascent information highway. I think everyone realizes that mandating key escrow is not desirable or realistic. Thus, we have a situation where there are four apparent choices left: (1) No government-approved crypto standards. (2) Government-approved public crypto standards with key-escrow mandatory for government use and voluntary elsewhere. (3) Government-approved public crypto standards with key-escrow voluntary for all users. (4) Government-approved public crypto standards with no key escrow. The other choices, involving secret algorithms, are not viable. I also think that (1) is not viable, although one might suspect that many government actions (and non-actions) were really directed at that goal. This leaves (2)--(4). Policy (2) makes no sense. Given the freedom to easily use the standard algorithms in non-escrowed manners (since they are public); policy (2) is not effective for law-enforcement, etc. It has considerable cost, and no justification other than the attempt of the policy-makers to try to do something that pretends not to hurt other government activities. Policy (3) might be workable. There is no mandated use of escrowed technology (even for government purchases) but manufacturers and users may voluntarily implement escrowing capabilities if they wish. Government agencies (NIST, the FBI, and the NSA) may develop and publish escrowing techniques, and support and encourage escrowing activities, as long as escrowing is not required by standards, government purchases, or routine export control policy. (I haven't mentioned export control policy before, but think that it falls in the same general category as requiring escrow for government purchases---it is an attempt to affect the (foreign) market by limiting what (US) manufacturers can do, rather than by affecting what products are offered through government purchasing power. In both cases, the government's power to affect the market is limited by the activities of other manufacturers and purchasers. Export control in support of specific policies against hostile countries (e.g., Libya?) is, in my opinion, not unreasonable, but telling our information highway manufacturers they can't export crypto is like telling our automobile manufacturers that they can export cars, but only if they contain no bolts, fasteners, or opaque trunk lids: for crypto is the "nuts and bolts" of an information system -- it links together separate components in a secure manner, and is also the means of protecting your information goods from prying eyes.) Finally, there is policy (4) -- no escrowing at all. This is, in the end, the most workable. It makes explicit that trying to achieve law-enforcement and foreign intelligence objectives by affecting government crypto standards is misguided and ultimately, harmful. Comments appreciated.... Cheers, Ron --TAB24284.775191964/cygnus.com--

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Re: GUT and P=NP
by jamesd＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> James A. Donald writes: > > One can reduce all classical operations to "and", "or", and "not" > > operations on bits. Quantum computers include an additional > > operation that cannot be so reduced. > Mike McNally writes > Could you break the suspense and let us know what this special new > operator is? The new operator is a unitary transformation on a single bit. Note that I am using the word "unitary" in the sense of quantum physics, not in the sense of C language syntax (That is unitary, not unary) Actually this a three dimensional continuous class of transformations. Because it is continuous, quantum computers tend to rapidly lose precision. Just as any classical physical system can be simulated in polynomial time by a Turing machine using only the operations of boolian arithmetic, in the same way any quantum physical system can be simulated in polynomial time using only the operations of boolian arithmetic plus unitary transformations on individual bits. Of course actually building a quantum computer using only these operations would be rather silly. In practice one would need to use unitary three bit operations for reasons of efficiency. -- --------------------------------------------------------------------- We have the right to defend ourselves and our property, because of the kind of animals that we James A. Donald are. True law derives from this right, not from the arbitrary power of the omnipotent state. jamesd(a)netcom.com

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Re: "Key Escrow" --- the very idea
by frissell＠panix.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 09:55 PM 7/21/94 -0400, Rick Busdiecker wrote: >One problem with what you've said is that the fourth amendment is not >phrased in the sense in which you refer to it. Specifically, it >proscribes unreasonable searches and seizures. It does not require >the people to actively facilitate the government in `reasonable' >searches and seizures. Important point to note about the Bill of Rights. It was designed to restrict the guvment not the peepul. DCF "Finally a Third Amendment violation after all these years of waiting -- Note that the DTI will require that you provide appropriate technologies to the FBI, NSA and Military Intelligence (aka "soldiers") to spy on your electronic activities for the good of the State. Once you build a house in a VR community, the only way that the Feds can spy on you is to adopt VR "personalities" and live in that community and in everyone's houses so they can see what's happening behind every "door." After all, you can't find out what's happening in a VR environment by reading a printout. Under the DTI you will have to support them in these "personalities." Thus you will be forced to quarter them in your houses in peacetime. Third Amendment violation. Question -- if you "kill" a Fed in a VR environment, is it a crime?"

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e$ : NetBank legality
by Hal 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I'm curious about the legality of NetBank in the context of our earlier discussions about demand deposits and Chaum cash. These people will take your money and give you electronic tokens, and they will take the tokens and give you cash (minus 20%). Does this sound legal? Are they a bank? I wonder what their tax liabilities are. Sales tax on selling the tokens? Is this a barter system? If so, they're supposed to get SS#'s and such. Maybe you have to give that information if you sign up as a vendor, but legally I'd think ordinary users would have to be reported to the IRS as well, and it doesn't sound like they're doing that. This whole thing sounds pretty questionable legally. It will be interesting to see how it comes out. Hal

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