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Another invasion of privacy
by Mike Markley 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

There was an AP story yesterday about how several states are using prisoners to input data about traffic accidents and such into databases. I believe the state that they focused on was Arkansas. An attorney received a phone call that his SSN was being sold by prisoners that had gotten it from an accident report. The state allows people to use their SSN as their drivers license number. This prisoners also have access to everything else on the report, your license number, your home address and potentially your work and home phone number. Does anybody know what other states are using prisoners for this type of work? I'm about ready to cut up all my credit cards and start paying cash for everything that I buy. Mike. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Mike Markley || The opinions here do not represent the mmarkley(a)microsoft.com || opinions of my employer. Attempts to || associate the two are pointless. "I want to look at life, In the available light" - Neil Peart -

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Re: Press Release on Secure NCSA Mosiac
by catalyst-remailer＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Hal wrote: > I suppose it goes without saying that the kinds of privacy-protecting > credentials we have been discussing are not what is being discussed here. No, but hopefully the standard can be extended (officially or unofficially) to include them, even if only a relatively small fraction of organisations will use the privacy-protection extensions initially. Hopefully once some organisations are doing so they'll have a real competitive advantage over those who want to collect marketing data. >This is outrageous! Where on earth did they get the idea that non-U.S. >residents have access only to 40 bit keys and RC2/RC4? Don't worry - as soon as it hits the streets in Europe I'm sure a number of us will be ripping out the RC4 code and implementing real encryption systems instead.... (assuming it comes as source code, otherwise we'll have to upgrade the normal Mosaic source instead once the standard is settled). Overall, I think it's a good thing, and hey, at least it isn't using Clipper !

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Re: CRYPTO: Money laundering and traceability
by Hal 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: hughes(a)ah.com (Eric Hughes) > > >Chaum's arguments appear to apply to virtually any electronic cash > >system which can prevent double-spending. They suggest that traceable > >cash will be the rule in any digicash system. > > That's true for transferable and off-line cash systems. The same > argument doesn't hold for on-line systems. There you can have an > exchange protocol to deposit a piece of digicash and immediately > rewithdraw it, blinding it again in the process. There need be no > account with the bank for this to happen. This is a good point, although I think on-line systems are unlikely to be used for payments to private individuals such as in the scenarios I mentioned, because of the cost of accessing a centralized database for every transaction. In any case, this suggests that it might be unwise to carry cash issued by such a bank, because of your vulnerability to robbery. Chaum even considered (in another paper) the threat of being coerced into withdrawing cash from a bank in such a way that you don't see the blinded cash. He had an approach where you would get all of your "blinding certificates" when you opened your account, and these would be the only things you could use to blind cash. So any stolen cash could always be recognized. I suppose one risk is that the robber exchanges the cash so quickly that the robbee has no chance to warn the bank; and once exchanged the cash is certainly anonymous. Perhaps banks would instigate some minimum time for handling an exchange in order to protect their cash holders from this threat. Hal

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Re: Remailer Musings
by juola＠bruno.cs.colorado.edu 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I disagree with Brad's interpretation. For example, if I photocopy a book and anonymously snail mail it to people, do you think the postal service is going to take the fall? Nope - they are just a carrier, and are not responsible for content. Like the common carriers - they just receive a message and pass it along. They aren't responsible for message content. If Brad Templeton's view of the world was the prevailing (or correct) one, then every common carrier in the country, including Ma Bell and the US Postal Service, would not exist, because they would've been sued out of existence long ago. On the other hand, part of the rules of being a common carrier are that one is *required* to cooperate with appropriate authorities to prevent this sort of abuse and to catch said abusers if/when it happens. I suspect that Mr. Templeton's lawyer could make a case that by setting up a remailer where one cannot "trace calls," one is violating the requirements of being a common carrier, and thus is responsible for content. - kitten

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re: Sgt Russell
by Graham Toal 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

: From: joshua geller <joshua(a)cae.retix.com> : I don't see any reason why sgt. harlow shouldn't be as welcome : as anyone else on the list. there are a large number of people : in the military, and any generalization drawn about them is : likely to be false (of course all generalizations are false, but : that is another matter). for those who enjoy paranoia, I would : point out that sgt. harlow is not the only person on this list : with past or present military associations. Quite right. This is ex Signals-Officer 23434072 Toal, G saying 'Roger out to you hello Charlie Papa come in over.' :-) G

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Re: Intolerance on the list
by Jim Sewell - KD4CKQ 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

<My computer told me that Russell Whitaker said:> >> My job is important to me. Learning about cryptography is going to >> help me protect my systems and my messages. I have no desire to eavesdrop on >> what you or anyone else is doing on this list. I merely want to learn, and > > Your motivations seem clear enough to me. Dig in! Enjoy yourself here, and I > look forward to your participation. I also agree with Russell. Although the organization for which you work may be unnerving to some, they should be willing to give you a shot at being an ok kinda guy as a freethinking individual. Besides that, has anyone considered this: If the good Sargeant here gets his system secured with PGP and Uncle Sam (via the President's efforts) says everything else is bad, you must use clipper... wouldn't it be good ammo to say 'Hey guys! Site x.y.z is secured to military satisfaction by using PGP. Clipper is somewhat weak and you even admit it by not allowing it to secure classified info. I think it would be great ammo in blowing up the Information Super-Highway-Patrol. Keep asking your questions and thinking freely! Jim -- Tantalus Inc. Bringing people together Jim Sewell-KD4CKQ 2407 N. Roosevelt Blvd. to have a little fun. Internet: jims(a)mpgn.com Key West, FL 33041 CIS: 71061,1027 (305) 293-8100 "We keep coding and coding and coding..."

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Re: Warrentless Search
by gtoal＠an-teallach.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

: From: Ed Carp <ecarp(a)netcom.com> : This was the famous Millikan experiment in the 50's (60's?). The Erm... wasn't that the one where people were suspended between two electric plates and the voltage adjusted so they *wouldn't* get a shock? ;-) G Nee hee Neddie! Shot in the cringe!

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Re: Remailer Musings
by juola＠bruno.cs.colorado.edu 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Ed Carp sez : I understand your objections, but think about it this way: nothing in the world says that you have to put a return address on the envelope. Nothing in the world says that you have to present any form of ID in order to drop a letter into a postal box. Sure, the postal inspectors have to "cooperate", but if you drop a letter with no return address into a box, how could they trace it back to you? Are people going to say to the US postal folks, "hey, it's *your* fault that they didn't put a return address on their envelope!" I think not. Yes, but that's not what anonymous remailers *do*. Anonymous remailers accept mail that comes in an envelope *with a return address* and repackage it in a different envelope without a return address. So, yes, in a way, it *is* the analogical Post Office's fault that the letter arrived without a return address. Similarly, I think that anonymous remailers, like the post office, ma bell, etc., are common carriers. You can't have it both ways - either you are a common carrier and exercise no editorial control over what goes through your remailer, or you are a publisher, and are held to a certain degree of legal responsibility. But if one is a common carrier, one is required to assist. The whole remailer paradigm is designed to prevent such assistance. Therefore, by running a remailer, you are stating that you are *not* willing to assist the appropriate authorities, i.e. that you are not a common carrier. Or so a lawyer could claim. - kitten

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Re: Remailer Musings
by jamiel＠sybase.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 4:26 PM 04/19/94 -0600, juola(a)bruno.cs.colorado.edu wrote: >X-Authentication-Warning: bruno.cs.colorado.edu: Host localhost didn't use >HELO protocol Just thought I'd let you know about this heading, in case you are debugging anything... >Subject: Re: Remailer Musings >Date: Tue, 19 Apr 94 16:26:24 MDT >From: juola(a)bruno.cs.colorado.edu >On the other hand, part of the rules of being a common carrier are that >one is *required* to cooperate with appropriate authorities to prevent >this sort of abuse and to catch said abusers if/when it happens. I >suspect that Mr. Templeton's lawyer could make a case that by setting >up a remailer where one cannot "trace calls," one is violating the >requirements of being a common carrier, and thus is responsible for >content. > > - kitten I wonder how this would jive with the factoid someone on this list (don't have the original handy) found a while back about the court ruling in favor of the right to operate under an alias in (constitutionally?) protected, at least in terms of publishing, etc.? I remember the case happening in L.A., I think. Anyway, what are the odds a case could be made that my 'anonymous identity' "fooperson" is a legal pseudonym? Stretching it some, but a possibility, and one case where similarities with publishing can work in favor of privacy. jamie -- "Sure, people mistake me for straight, but when I do get someone in bed,that's when being a femme *really* pays off." -Bryna Bank, on Butch/Femme jamie lawrence jamiel(a)sybase.com

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Re: Milgram & Authority
by Jeff Davis 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- From: lefty(a)apple.com (Lefty) Subject: Re: S Milgram & Authority Response >said: > > We better be DAMN careful who we put in authority in this country. Really? When was this, precisely? Lefty (lefty(a)apple.com) March/April 1976- I'd just gotten divorced and the bullet hole in my abdomen was healing quite nicely. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQCVAgUBLbRekV/ScHuGXWgVAQE10AQAz7y6jFSZ42OuCyrSAcc7LrNjNq4hcay9 Yg6nmJD/DxOBX4Nl4y8qATD+7TDX9KBX0QFy18i7JUvU9oMU2cAYVq3ZOrB8CaZv PIfkU7uK7KgRP0oYyUop+Ea1Wfa+/QLrKFyKhwW1xRN3RMmWfxNRfkunMxXUng9P EW1Cz4RezKQ= =3/1J -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- PGP PUBLIC KEY via finger! JAFEFFM Speaking & Thinking For Myself! * eagle(a)deeptht.armory.com email info(a)eff.org * *** O U T L A W S On The E L E C T R O N I C F R O N T I E R **** ***** Committed to Free Public Internet Access for World Peace *****

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