- cypherpunks-legacy - lists.cpunks.org

Port Watson
by Greg - Kucharo 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Anyone who is intrested in T.A.Z should also check out a short story from the Science Fiction anthology Semiotext SF,"Visit Port Watson".It's wierd how much the story resembles T.A.Z.The mythical Port Watson is located on the real islandof Sonsorol in the South China Sea,about 400 miles from The Philippines.The Portis a free enclave,a enclave with no laws of any kind.The inhabitants of the island recieve dividends from a bank who has only virtual money.Each citizen recieves and equal share of the dividends which is calculated by computer based on money made by investors.The Bankers are "libertarian computer hacks and anarcho-capitilists".Sounds like CypherPunk Nation to me.Here's the bibiliography info; Semiotext(E) SF Copyright 1989 Autonomedia,New York.Ed.Peter Lamborn Wilson andRudy Rucker.

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Re: Can GAK be made "not interoperable" with PGP?
by Duncan Frissell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 10:26 AM 9/13/95 -0700, Timothy C. May wrote: >But is this even possible, to make a GAK system "not interoperable" with, >say, PGP? > >Unless the GAK system has some sort of entropy analyzer, and can recognize >high-entropy sources which it presumes to be encrypted data (*), one can of >course PGP-encrypt a text file and then GAK the resulting file. I took it to mean that they were saying that an approved program on one end of a communication exchange could not exchange encrypted messages or established an encrypted session of some kind with an un approved program on the other end. Not trying to outlaw superencryption (PGP on both ends using a GAKed channel) but GAK on one end working with an unapproved system on the other end. A ringer GAK-work-alike that would defeat the intent of GAK. I don't know if the government can prevent that with a software-only system or indeed if half a secure system can be made completely secure. DCF "Markets and open systems beat governments and closed systems."

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message pools revisited - CORRECTION
by jim＠bilbo.suite.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I realized only after posting that "routing" messages through a remailer that is a member of the message pool you belong to is a risk. Keep in mind that I'm still speaking within the context of "all remailers and message pool servers are colluding". Jim_Miller(a)suite.com

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No Subject
by Anonymous 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Well, keeping in the spirit of the original message, I will reply to it anonymously. Besides, what I am going to say probably won't be popular. >i'm glad ghio caught that message in his mailbox through careful screening >so that it wouldn't go out to the newsgroups. I always thought the >remailers were automated, but I guess in most case the operators are >screening all the stuff. this is good, because we don't need any more >Detweiller junk out there (amazing how peaceful things are without him!!!) >too bad if the message was forged, because it would be LOTS of fun to >EXPOSE THE BASTARD!!! (insert evil smirk here) Did anyone else shudder when they read this? All I can say is that I am *glad* this person does not run a remailer (although, if I were really paranoid, I might speculate that he does!). As Tim May and Carl Kadie have pointed out on numerous occasions, by systematically filtering mail the operator tends to lose the protection of the legal status of "common carrier". I don't know if a remailer operator would be classified as such but others have proposed that idea. But just from a philosophical view, I think any remailer operators hunting for Detweiler-grams in all their incoming mail are employing a procedure that is antithetical to their entire commitment. Isn't it just a *teensy* bit hypocritical? Is this how you are going to build cyberspatial-wide confidence in the use of your remailers for their dependability and secrecy? Isn't it just a *teensy* bit hypocritical to yell to the world that ANONYMITY IS THE RIGHT OF MAN and have a little whisper in small print, "unless you are an official enemy of the cypherpunks"? Is it just me, or is this Detweiler thing blown *way* out of proportion? He seems like a harmless crackpot occupying himself by banging on a keyboard. In fact, being consistently at the tmp(a)netcom.com even helps to filter him. Cypherpunks, we believe in the philosophy that we are being oppressed by numerous forces that seek to deprive us of our privacy-- big business, the government, police, etc. But how can we claim to uphold the philosophy of freedom of speech and privacy looking at our relationship with Detweiler? Sometimes I think he was sent by God to test us. What is it in the human psyche, rooted deep in our subconscious, that pushes us to *vengeance* against those who offend us? That pushes us to want to *expose* them (as the person said above, "EXPOSE THE BASTARD!!!"). Do we have any consistent beliefs? How is that we, who are dedicated to privacy, broadcast to everyone listening in a clear voice, that "freedom of speech does not belong to people who offend us"? There is a saying, "who will guard the guardians themselves"? Who will ensure that those who advocate anonymity actually follow through, if they don't? I personally advocate that the Detweiler-Detritus be allowed through the remailers unaltered as a blaring advertisement to the entire world of cyberspace that yes, we believe that anonymity is *sacred*, even more so than we believe that Detweiler is the AntiChrist of the Cypherpunks. "I detest what you say, but I will defend to my death your right to say it." --Voltaire "Freedom of speech does not end at the point that it offends; to the contrary, that is where it begins" --Supreme Court justice (paraphrase) That's all I have to say.

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Nixon, Johnson, and the Dollar
by Jeff Gostin 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Sandy Sandfort <sandfort(a)crl.com> writes: > Don't believe it? What did Johnson say just before silver was removed > from US coinage? For bonus points, what did Nixon say two weeks before > he closed the gold window to foreigners and devalued the dollar? I'll show my ignorance of history once again... I've not clue, but you've tickled my curiosity. Care to inform us? :-) --Jeff -- ====== ====== +----------------jgostin(a)eternal.pha.pa.us----------------+ == == | The new, improved, environmentally safe, bigger, better,| == == -= | faster, hypo-allergenic, AND politically correct .sig. | ==== ====== | Now with a new fresh lemon scent! | PGP Key Available +---------------------------------------------------------+

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Re: A Cyberspace Independence Refutation
by jamesd＠echeque.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

James Donald writes: >[in reply to strata] >> Your other arguments casually dismiss the very real power that large numbers >> of able people with good communications can exercise, have just exercised >> very recently. At 05:03 AM 2/16/96 -0500, lmccarth(a)cs.umass.edu wrote: >Large numbers of able people with good communications very recently exercised >their putative "very real power" against the passage of the CDA. They had no >substantial impact AFAICS. (I intend no slur against the effort.) Could you >name some examples, and add some qualifications that made the difference in >those cases ? 1. President Clinton declared CDA unconstitutional and directed the Justice department to refrain from enforcing it. 2. The normal course of events, when a new medium starts competing against an old medium, is for the new medium to be censored to an utterly ludicrous degree, analogous to the law requiring a man with a red flag to walk in front of horseless carriages, while the old medium has censorship radically relaxed. In the normal course of events one would expect a strict ban on pictures of women in clothes cut below the neck or above the ankles, and a ban on any unpleasant or disturbing subject. (For example the comics code, and the TV rule that married couples had to have separate beds) Instead alt.pictures.binaries.erotica.children is still going strong. --------------------------------------------------------------------- | We have the right to defend ourselves | http://www.jim.com/jamesd/ and our property, because of the kind | of animals that we are. True law | James A. Donald derives from this right, not from the | arbitrary power of the state. | jamesd(a)echeque.com

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pgp bugs list?
by Adam Back 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I seem to remember someone saying that pgp's +makerandom function was broken. However I'm unable to find any confirmation of this with a web search. I'm sure there used to be a known pgp bugs list held at MIT? I can't find it now. Anyone know of the bugs lists whereabouts, or could confirm/refute any security problems with +makerandom? (premail uses it, pgp stealth could use it, if it worked). [the (undocumented) feature is this: pgp +makerandom=1024 out creates 1024 bytes of what should be good random nos, in file "out"] Adam -- print pack"C*",split/\D+/,`echo "16iII*o\U@{$/=$z;[(pop,pop,unpack"H*",<> )]}\EsMsKsN0[lN*1lK[d2%Sa2/d0<X+d*lMLa^*lN%0]dsXx++lMlN/dsM0<J]dsJxp"|dc`

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Re: Fingerprinting annoyance
by SBinkley＠atitech.ca 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

With regards to filling in your own card, what about using a disappearing ink?? Then your prints would disappear! You could even do your name, right infront of them, and it would disappear, leaving these anynonomous prints behind!! Or you could make an inkpad that is damp with sodium hydroxide (lye) instead of ink. That way, you could lightly roll your fingers in it, like it was ink, and then wait a minute, and wipe it off. That way, the only skin being eaten away, would be the ridges of the fingerprints. Do this enought times, and the rigdes will end up the same height as the valleys, and will then essentially be flat. Just a thought, but I'd like to hear if anyone would think either ideas would work. /sb

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Re: Senator Leahy's Public Key
by Sig Porter 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> Date: Sun, 5 May 1996 13:23:09 -0400 (EDT) > From: Black Unicorn <unicorn(a)schloss.li> .... > I'll visit his office and ask if he wants he key signed this week. So? ------------------------------------- Sig Porter sporter(a)electriciti.com finger for pgp key

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Re: Edited Edupage, 9 May 1996
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 3:57 PM 5/14/96, Doug Hughes wrote: >I wouldn't normally respond to such an offtopic post, but this post is >so egregious I couldn't let it pass. Who says they make a choice to live >in rural areas? Do they also choose not to have enough money to pay >for shoes? So, because they live in a poor district they are not entitled Your shoe example is apt. Fact is, we *don't* pay for people's shoes. Why should we pay for their Net access when we don't pay for their shoes, or their food, or their electricity, or their phone bill, or their cable t.v. subscription? Many of these things seem like higher priorities than being able to "surf the Net." (It is true that we as a society--wrongly in my opinion, but this is another topic--give people various handouts. These handouts can be used to buy things, presumably including a $20/month unlimited access Internet account.) >to the same level of education as a rich city suburb? The illiteracy >rate in Alabama is 40%! This is just plain sick! I don't think that >every school needs a net connection, I think they need better teachers. But "Better teachers"? I doubt this changes anything. Only a cultural change will. (Why is it that dirt-poor "boat people" who floated into San Francisco Bay on inner tubes had children go from nearly zero English to 99% literacy in less than 5 years? Often in crowded schools, too. Think about it.) >Education is one thing (perhaps the only thing) that deserves to be >subsidized in this country. We're rapidly falling behind. Actually, the subcultures in American society which value learning and achievement are doing extremely well. Hand a motivate kid a book and he'll learn. Hand a gang-banger a book and he'll pull out a gun and kill you for the thrill of it. As a result, some subcultures are headed for the scrap heap. Think of it as evolution in action. --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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