- cypherpunks-legacy - lists.cpunks.org

Re: Using /dev/random for PGP key generation? Be Wary
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 10:56 AM 2/12/96 -0500, rngaugp(a)alpha.c2.org wrote: >... >I am unsure about using my modification, together with these drivers >that are not connected to a real hardware RNG. In what way would the use >of these drivers' methods of gathering entropy be superior to PGP's >method of getting entropy from keyboard timing? If you choose to do >something like this, you should think carefully and make a careful study >of the code. If there are no common-mode sources, xoring two streams will not reduce the entropy. If you use PGP's keyboard timings for one stream, and (e.g.) disk drive randomness for the other, the output of the xor of the two streams should have at least as much entropy as the best of the two. However, I would be worried if /dev/random and PGP were both using keyboard timings to generate entropy. Bill

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Digital Cash on sci.crypt
by Hal 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

There has been some discussion on sci.crypt of digital cash and its facilitation of kidnapping, extortion, etc. Here is a posting I made when mentions an on-line paper on the topic. I had met the author, Markus Jakobsson, at Crypto 95, but I only had a chance to check out his web site yesterday. awc(a)slcawc.aug.ipp-garching.mpg.de (Arthur Carlson TOK ) writes: >[In response to a discussion of whether digital cash could be used to >provide anonymous collection of ransom money] >Is there really no technical fix for this? To enable the prevention of >double spending in off-line systems, the ID of the withdrawer is coded >into the coins in a way that is verified by the bank. If the victim's >relatives can undo enough of the code to satisfy the bank, why can't >they undo the rest to detect when the coins are spent? Alternatively, >why can't the bank put an identifier on the coins (in a way that isn't >destroyed by the unblinding) that amounts to a message encoded in the >public key of the withdrawer? Then the withdrawer can make the >destination of the ransom money visible by revealing his private key >(after the victim has been released, of course). (He also reveals >every dime he spent in the last year and all his kinky love letters, >but, hey, we're trying to catch a kidnapper here.) There has been considerable discussion of this problem in the literature recently. A paper I found yesterday on the net is by Markus Jakobsson and Moti Yung: Revokable and Versatile Electronic Money, at <URL:http://www-cse.ucsd.edu/users/markus/revoke.ps> (postscript format). It has references to other work as well. The specific attack I discussed earlier applies to the current DigiCash scheme (or at least how it is assumed to work). Offline cash systems would be more complicated. The references in the paper mentioned above describe how these attacks would work on such systems and some ways of avoiding them. However there is a more powerful attack, which the Jakobsson paper addresses, in which the bank as a whole is coerced. Maybe terrorists threaten to blow up the World Trade Center unless Citibank engages in a specific protocol which will leave the terrorists with millions of dollars in fully blinded electronic cash. Even if the normal withdrawal protocol has signatures, etc. which would prevent this, Jakobsson shows that there is a corrupted protocol which if the bank is forced to follow it will leave the criminals with valid but untraceable electronic cash. The solution in the paper is to make it so that none of the ecash issued by the bank is untraceable. Under normal use it is anonymous, but if necessary the authorities can break the anonymity. This is sometimes called "Clipper cash" after the U.S. Clipper chip proposal which had similar privacy properties. With Jakobsson/Yung's approach even the more powerful attack can be defeated because the cash is traceable, and no amount of coercion will allow the attacker to create valid but untraceable cash. While these approaches are technically interesting, the political implications are more ominous. While Jakobsson labels the entity who has the power to break the anonymity an "ombudsman", implying that he defends the interests of the cash holder, he could equally well be called a "policeman" because he is the one who catches the criminals. It is all a matter of how you look at it. The question is whether these various threats of kidnapping, blackmail, extortion, etc. are good enough reasons to go to a cash system where privacy is protected only at the sufferance of government agencies. There are plenty of precedents for governments misusing supposedly- private information, such as the use of phone records to track down those who resisted the German regime during World War II. One of the attractive aspects of electronic cash has been its immunity to this form of governmental coercion. The overwhelmingly negative response to the Clipper chip proposal (other than in the cryptographic and law enforcement communities) may apply to Clipper cash as well. A related issue is the possible competition of rival cash systems. As with Clipper, where it would apparently be necessary to forbid the use of alternatives, so with Clipper cash it would seem that people would prefer true anonymity over conditional protection, even if you call the cash tracer an "ombudsman". So there would seem to be a need for governments to criminalize the use of fully anonymous electronic cash in order to force people to use the ones which the government could track. Whether this will even be possible in an increasingly global financial system remains to be seen. Hal Finney hfinney(a)shell.portal.com

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Poor Detweiler Forgery
by wcs＠anchor.ho.att.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Someone pretending to be "L." Deteiler posted an article, pretending to be from Detweiler's account, that had a forgery of Tim May posting to all the Cyphertentacles about how well the work he and Eric were doing is going. The real "L." Detweiler, of course, wouldn't have done so, because that would be saying the tentacles are sufficiently different humans that they need to send mail to each other, rather than merely talking to herself; he or she would have posted a fake announcement to the net or something like that. :-)

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Internet Without Frontiers?
by James M. Cobb 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Friend, A 02 11 96 Reuter newsstory from Brussels, headlined ---------------------------------------------------- STRASBOURG MEDIA DEBATE HEADS FOR SHOWDOWN reports: ...the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Wednesday... hammers out new rules for the European Union's audio- visual sector. The EP may try to revise the 1989 law puffed as "television without frontiers." That law might be extended to govern "new" services such as ...teleshopping, the internet and pay television.... Ach! and Sacre bleu! Therefore-- A coalition of 40 companies and trade associations from the recording, advertising and technology industries has written to parliamentarians...to urge them against extend- ing rules to new services. But there's another factor. If the socialist demands for regulation of information high- way services...prevail, the Parliament will then be set for an almighty row with EU governments. Why? EU culture ministers agreed last November to keep current rules unchanged. It's cheaper to enlighten a few ministers, you see, than it is to enlist a whole gaggle of parliamentarians. Cordially, Jim NOTE. The newsstory's www.nando.net online filename: info13_8187.html This critical essay was composed 02 12 96.

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strick misses physical
by strick＠versant.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

To those people I said I would see at the Mountain View Physical cypherpunks meeting -- I unfortunately will miss it. (My father's brother had cancer for several years and died a couple of days ago; I'm in Oklahoma for the weekend for the funeral.) regretfully, strick

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My letter to Gore
by Carl Ellison 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Date: Sat, 12 Feb 1994 01:08:37 -0500 From: Carl Ellison <cme> Message-Id: <199402120608.BAA04637(a)ellisun.sw.stratus.com> To: vice_president(a)whitehouse.gov Subject: Re: Clipper Chip Newsgroups: alt.security In article <helen.760998516@access1> you write: > But Gore indicated Thursday that the administration's >position is "not locked in stone." > "Our determination to solve the problem is locked in stone, >and our determination to proceed with this in the absence of a >better solution is locked in stone," he said "...the burden is >on those who say there is a better solution because no solution >for the national security dimension of the problem >is unacceptable to us." Dear Mr. Vice President, I enjoy a good challenge and I am educated in cryptography. I am also an opponent of Clipper. If you would describe the national security dimension of this problem to us, I would endeavour to find a solution to that piece of the problem. However, the only expression of the problem which I have seen is a claim/fear that criminals can get access to strong cryptography (true and always has been true [cf., David Kahn's "The Codebreakers"]) and the claim that Clipper will somehow prevent that situation (false and never substantiated). The main supporter of Clipper in the technical community, Prof. Dorothy Denning, recently said in a public posting that the real reasons for Clipper are classified and therefore we the people have no ability to see the facts and must therefore leave decision making up to you and the President. I beg to differ. We must discuss this issue in public. We can not have a secret committee making such decisions. We are talking about a basic privacy right which the American people have held since the founding of this country -- the right to invent, disseminate and use cryptography as strong as the human mind can invent without any sharing of secret keys with the government. So, please Mr. Vice President, bring this issue into the public for debate and follow through on that debate. Last Spring, in response to NIST, I submitted a list of questions, most of which have never been answered. If those questions had been answered, perhaps we would have had a resolution by now of the "national security problem" to which you referred. Sincerely, Carl M. Ellison 2130 Mass Ave. #5B Cambridge MA 02140-1918 e-mail: cme(a)sw.stratus.com -- - <<Disclaimer: All opinions expressed are my own, of course.>> - Carl Ellison cme(a)sw.stratus.com - Stratus Computer Inc. M3-2-BKW TEL: (508)460-2783 - 55 Fairbanks Boulevard ; Marlborough MA 01752-1298 FAX: (508)624-7488

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Re:
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 01:41 PM 2/12/96 -0500, A. Padgett Peterson P.E. Information Security wrote: > >>Yet if I read you correctly earlier, you don't think the USG has the right >>to regulate those communications. Why the distinction ? > >Okay, obviously I need to drop down a gear & explain *my* feelings: > >Part of the definition of a "sovereign nation" is to define and carry >out both high and low justice over it's domain - the absolute right >of a sovereign. Is not mentioned in the US constitution because it >was a given. Hardy har har! This sounds like a joke, right? Anything you WANT the Constitution to have said, "is not mentioned in the Constitution because it was a given." Thanks for making me laugh...at you! >"Free speech" means that a citizen is free to speak (communicate) anthing, >anytime, anywhere. This is the right guarenteed by the first amendment. This >does not relieve the individual from being liable for the consequences of >the exercise of "free speech". This statement is internally inconsistent. If the speech is truly "free," it is (and should be!) unconstrained. To whatever extent it is constrained, it is not entirely "free." Now, even if we all agree that SOME speech should be limited, don't try to use this argument to allow the government to restrict ALL speech! >However, the government is under no obligation (though in the silly seventies >it seemed that we were going that way) to aid or abet in the exercise of >free speech. 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. Here you get wacky again. You first make a true statement, and then come to a false conclusion. Logic lesson for Padgett: There are at least three categories here: 1. Government restricts communication. 2. Government neither assists nor restricts communication. 3. Government assists communication. (through stolen tax dollars, BTW.) Your first sentence in the paragraph immediately above simply says that item 3 is not required. That is a true statement. However, you falsely (apparently deliberately?) suggest that item 2 cannot exist; the only alternative is item 1. Get real, Padgett. Wake up. Jim Bell Klaatu Burada Nikto

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Re: Req. for soundbites
by cmca＠alpha.c2.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- [To: cypherpunks(a)toad.com] [Subject: Re: Req. for soundbites] It was written (in English) by bob bruen <bruen(a)wizard.mit.edu>: The four letter words that are considered indecent are an anachronism from the days when the French/Normans ruled England, (~1066-1300's). A quick look at the words and their acceptable counterparts will make clear the issue. The four letter word are all of English derivation and the socially acceptable ones are of French (sometimes Latin) derivation. Even the term "four-letter" is a derogatory term for the English language in general, because the French considered English second rate because the words tended to be short, unlike French. Anyone who supports the suppression of these words is merely enforcing the old French repression of the English and the English language from over 500 years ago. Why think for yourself when tradition can do it for you? eg: to piss - to urinate to shit - to deficate to fuck - to copulate cunt - vagina So, what is the French-derived word for Motherfucker? And, being nice and long, why isn't it acceptable? :-) for the implicit-smiley-impaired mofos. Chris McAuliffe <cmca(a)alpha.c2.org> (No, not that one.) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6 iQCVAwUBMR/TAYHskC9sh/+lAQGowQP+Jq3TPolK3C5pEeIHaypF8MyZSrnbxtbp FpmVpXWw5ZqJ2txccSpTiykfE5gcANN6VeRh8N3xKJyxP3039qOQF+lpb1cAEcpF oMU/BYUCAq3TzPboetL5dDXn6Z1OhogwQS6gv687l1gSedO6rtDBcltYft1YLjzc WX5VSEpjDqs= =o6E6 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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No Subject
by owner-cypherpunks＠toad.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

IP addresses are a scarce resource today. Try getting a /16 allocation (what used to be a class B). There are politics in the process already. Addresses will not be easily 'transferable.' The IETF is discussing a 'Best Current Practices' document that talks about address portability. Basically, it can't happen, because the routers only have so much memory, and the routers at the core of the internet can't keep in memory how to reach every one; there needs to be aggregation. The only feasible aggregation seems to be provider based, ie, MCI, Alternet, and other large ISPs get blocks of addresses. They give them to smaller companies, like got.net, which gives them to customers. The result? The core routers have a few more years. Lastly, 32 bit addressing is going away. IPv6 offers 128 bit address space, and (hopefully) much more efficient allocation, as well as such useful things as hooks for automatic renumbering of address space. Adam Alan Olsen wrote: | >Markets for IP Addresses | > | >The 32-bit numbers used for Internet addressing and routing are a | >limited resource. As this resource becomes scarcer, political | >considerations are likely to creep into allocation decisions made | >through existing administrative processes, leading to suboptimal | >allocations. By granting transferable property rights to addresses, | >allocation decisions can be removed from the political realm into the | >economic realm, so that addresses are allocated to those who value them | >most. This project seeks to develop consensus in the Internet community | >for a move to market-based allocation, and investigates alternative | >designs for an electronic market to coordinate the exchange of IP | >addresses. | | This proposal bothers me. I do not see any positive results from this | proposal. (Or at least the negatives will far outweigh the positive.) | | Here is what I see as the results of such a plan... | | Getting an IP address will become prohibitivly expensive except for the | largest megacorps. Instead of solving the limitations of the current | system, this plan will cause people to "invest" in IP addresses in the hope | that the price will go up. IP addresses will become part of a corporation's | invenstment portfolio. This will result in less usage of IP addresses, not -- "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -Hume

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No Subject
by owner-cypherpunks＠toad.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- At 07:28 PM 2/13/96 -0500, Rich Salz wrote: >Okay, so how the hell did Microsoft get export approval for this? I mean, >this is the classic crypto-with-a-hole; a service-provider interface (SPI) >with DLL's means "plug your crypto here". This is usually considered an >"anciliary" device in ITAR language, and therefore export controlled. I >mean, how long until you see MSWord with "full privacy" option? > >Word I've heard is that the office of Export Control has had a lot of >turnover and "nobody knows anything" anymore. At the risk of blowing my usual horn, I would argue that one advantage in vocal, common, and loudly hostile talk against government is that they have begun to understand how unhappy we are with them. To make an analogy with late-1700's France, the sound of a guillotine being tested probably had a remarkable effect on the upper strata of their society; likewise, dicussions of how we can all chip in and bump off the whole lot of the bastards might remind a few of they key government players that they are not immune from eventual retribution. Resulting in "a lot of turnover." If we make a "reasonable assumption" that most of those government employees aren't stupid, and they discover that the prospect for Crypto-Anarchy (trademark owned by Tim May?) is good, it seems reasonable to assume that they'll want to avoid being around when THE END comes for their employer. Jim Bell Klaatu Burada Nikto -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMSF8vvqHVDBboB2dAQExXQP+JHO6P80VfXE1+x5JmstA14dg+wlmXBK2 +8UYUnD7IpK2QzIKoEbmot2/WfUK/9zzOiuRuXvzc6FxfscRm7xNzNO28vviTN5U osVNgm72t/R2jZspMPr+cYE3GcxDIcQvTEOth5Tz9J9q7TfI4+NPl68fN7sqEOsG m44PPIy6F2I= =m3hQ -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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