- cypherpunks-legacy - lists.cpunks.org

Re: CYPHERPUNK considered harmful.
by Peter Trei 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Tim writes: >Indeed, some people here have been calling themselves by various names >("CypherGeek," "Crypto Rebel," etc.) for a long time. Personally, I despise >the terms "geek," "dweeb," and "nerd," and think anyone who calls themselves >by these insults is not "reclaiming and deconstructing the labels of the >oppressor class," as the slogan goes, but is merely insulting themselves. >Blacks who call themselves "niggers," homosexuals who call themselves >"queers," and computer programmers who call themselves "geeks" and "dorks" >are all playing the same game. I fail to see how you can write this, and then claim it's OK to call yourself a 'punk'. >A better approach is for the "conservatives" who want a "more conservative" >name to simply do what I suggested: form a new group and name it what they >like. They wouldn't have to quit this list, they would just be able to >cleanly recruit for their new list. >Seems simple to me. And honest. And less devisive than trying to change the >name of a group with a long history (by modern standards) and with several >well-known achievements. Who is trying to be dishonest, and what are they trying to be dishonest about? I'm really confused by this. Tim, I don't want to take your toy away, or minimize the acheivements of the cypherpunks (among whom I somewhat presumptively include myself). OK. Let's NOT drop the term 'cypherpunk'. However, I do think we need to have available another term for 'people with our interests' if we're going to have maximal effectiveness. What follows is my original followup, written last night. - --------------------------------------------------------------- I've gotten a number of responses to my post 'Cypherpunk considered harmful." It's pretty clear that a lot of people did not really understand what I was getting at. This is my fault. I'll try to clarify. What is the situation on the ground, here in mid September 1995? It's utterly clear that the US and other governments, are dead set against the widespread use of strong, unencumbered crypto. 'They' are using many different (and weak) pretexts to delay or prevent it's incorporation into commercial software. If there is a hidden state agenda, 'our' belief is it is that the state wishes to retain it's current ability to spy unseen on the citizenry, wiretapping with or without warrents, and examine stored information without the cooperation of the owner. The general 'cypherpunk viewpoint', if I may generalize, is diametrically opposite: It's not really a hidden agenda, since frequent rants make it pretty clear. Since we're not a unified command and control system like the state, different cypherpunks have different goals, but I hazard that most would agree with: 'Strong, uencumbered cryptography is an empowerment tool for the electronic age; it strengthens the individual in relation to the state, allowing him (or her) to communicate privately, and store his data as securely as if it resided in his own head. The widespread use of strong cryptography will lead to social changes that we regard as desirable.' If you accept this arguably paranoid vision of our situation, then it's clear that we are in a battle for the hearts and minds of the people: The State wants to convince people that their safety and prosperity lies in trusting Big Brother to watch over and take care of them, and nothing but danger lies outside of BB's line of sight. The cypherpunks take a much more libertarian viewpoint; that the state is already too strong and intrusive, and that cryptography will not only allow us to engage in commerce and protect ourselves against crime, it will also allow us to act outside of improper state control. But time is running out. All the state has to do is convince people that strong unescrowed encryption is needed only by criminals - if you trust the state, there is no reason to object to it being able to listen in - after all, all laws are reasonable, and the state won't listen in without a warrant. 'We' have a harder task. We need to convince people that they need encryption - it will protect us against criminals, snoops, and hackers, and the state's proposals will not do this. It's a much more subtle thesis, without the easy emotional hooks that can be exploited by the state to promote it's position. I don't think we can turn people into libertarians, and then get them to adopt cryptography to protect themselves from the statists. At least, not enough people to count in the short term, and the short term is where we need to focus at the moment. I *do* think we can persuade people that they need cryptography to protect themselves against criminals, and that the governments proposed standards for key length limits and key escrow will make the crypto so weak and insecure that it will cause more crime than it will prevent. That's a critical point - that the individual can, without difficulty, use cryptography to protect him or herself against criminals more effectively than he could by relying on the state. The memes we want to propagate are 1. "I need strong unescrowed cryptography to protect myself against criminals." If we can convince a large portion of the population of this (and we have truth on our side), we'll be well on our way. 2. "The government's initiatives on encryption, while they may be well-intentioned, are worse than useless, and will endanger me and my loved ones." If we can get this through the public's collective head as well, we'll have won the battle. This goal is where the 'cypherpunk considered harmful' title comes from. I want to propagate these ideas. If I go up to an average person and tell them "The State is working to ensure that it can spy on your every communication, and can't be trusted to follow it's own rules for doing so. Use cryptography to help promote cryptoanarchy!", he will usually dismiss me as a nutcase. If I say "Criminals and hackers can tap your internet communications, defraud your cell phone account, eavesdrop on your calls, impersonate you, steal your credit card numbers, and spy on your business secrets. I can tell you how you can easily prevent this", then he is interested, and wants to know more. Terms like 'cypherpunk' and 'cryptoanarchy' tend to pigeonhole us as nutcases for many people, and are a barrier to getting our ideas across. I'm not saying this pigeonholing is correct - in fact I despise people who judge a book by it's cover, but so many people DO make such snap judgements that we need to take this into account when talking to the general public. For those who have responded, *I* do not have a problem with the term cypherpunk. However, I know that there are many people who do, people we want on our side. I propose that in communicating with the cryptographic laity, we should be emphasizing the anti-crime aspects of crypto, as well as it's enabling impact on commerce and the American software industry. We'll get a lot more converts with this approach than we would by emphasizing the political aspects of cypherpunk, no matter how important we think they are. Think about it. Which future would you rather see: 1. Lots of people demanding strong unescrowed crypto for what you consider rather peripheral and politically unaware reasons, which you have educated them in. 2. Unescrowed crypto banned, with those who promote considered aiders and abeters of the four horsemen, (but boy are they ideologically pure!). Peter Trei I probably won't see any responses till Monday. I'm going for a weekend at a resort on Lake Winnipesaukee. If you need me, I'll be in the hot tub. :-) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMFmmK1QxhKXe9s8VAQE+tgP+NcKdGvBeJpa8AHGr/RhKCHudZP2qmRNP J699UCCvN006ywIjurjuis48VPj26uxBkcRbeuzNxGlKmZqXIkS0vEcFjrrZhBsK V9dLFFGTZ6JG3nK++mleW1wQB/F0azXXvXKJWa6R+Tnj1oo2ADUxGNQMs9IVmgR3 zsyK3fej+IQ= =YqDH -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- Peter Trei Senior Software Engineer Purveyor Development Team Process Software Corporation http://www.process.com trei(a)process.com

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===>> FREE 1 yr. Magazine Sub sent worldwide- 315+ Popular USA Titles
by janet.dove＠ledip.py 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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Re: CancelMoose = William Nagengast?
by futplex＠pseudonym.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Mark writes: > #define paranoia on > > Just ask your local TLA that has traffic monitors on the up and down links of > all the remailers so they can track a piece of email from sender to recipient. > They will take the (relatively small) logs of the hour and pump out a name > for you. > > #define paranoia off > > :) That's one of the principal advantages of Mixmaster over the earlier generation anonymous remailers. Approaching a Chaumian digital mix more closely than previous implementations, it uses only encrypted standard-sized packets in transit. This protocol should make it hard or impossible to narrow the list down to anything like a single name, depending on ambient traffic conditions. -Futplex <futplex(a)pseudonym.com> "Our encryption doesn't use an encryption algorithm" -Elementrix

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Re: SPAM bait
by koontz＠MasPar.COM 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

To: janet.dove(a)ledip.py Subject: Re: ===>> FREE 1 yr. Magazine Sub sent worldwide- 315+ Popular USA Tit

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Re: Commercial Mixmaster (was Re: Mixmaster status)
by loki＠obscura.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

That is correct. The current code can not be recalled. That is part of why I released it that way. So that I could not be coerced into withdrawing it. -Lance At 12:48 PM 9/15/95, Futplex wrote: >Anonymous writes: ># Consider this scenario ... Mixmaster get's bought by the Acme ># Crypto Company of Ft. Meade, MD. They "improve" it, and offer a new ># version. It's even FREE (for non-commerical use)! But their ># "improvements" make it incompatible with previous versions, and so ># you have to upgrade. The new "commercial" version comes with no ># SOURCE CODE, of course... > >Lance Cottrell writes: >> 4) There will always be a free version of the client with source code. >> >> While I have not discussed it, I can not imagine that there would not also >> be a free version of the server code (with source). Without remailers what >> is the point of the client software? > >Beyond taking Lance on his PGP-signed-word, which I'm strongly inclined to do, >I suspect he may not have much legal leeway in this regard. > >With the caveat that I Am Not A Lawyer, it seems to me that the GNU General >Public License (Version 1 from 1989, Mix/GNU.license in the Mixmaster .tar or >http://hopf.math.nwu.edu/docs/Gnu_License) which covers all extant >distributions of Mixmaster, has some significant implications for any >commercial development of Mixmaster. It's applicable to "the Program or any >derivative work under copyright law: that is to say, a work containing the >Program or a portion of it, either verbatim or with modifications and/or >translated into another language". > >The GNU GPL specifies that: > > 2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of > it, and copy and distribute such modifications under the terms of > Paragraph 1 above, provided that you also do the following: > [...] > b) cause the whole of any work that you distribute or publish, that > in whole or in part contains the Program or any part thereof, either > with or without modifications, to be licensed at no charge to all > third parties under the terms of this General Public License (except > that you may choose to grant warranty protection to some or all > third parties, at your option). > >and that: > > 3. You may copy and distribute the Program (or a portion or > derivative of it, under Paragraph 2) in object code or executable > form under the terms of Paragraphs 1 and 2 above provided that you > also do one of the following: > a) accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable > source code, [...] or, > b) accompany it with a written offer, [...] to give any third party > free (except for a nominal charge for the cost of distribution) a > complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, [...] > >So it looks to me as though Mixmaster source code will continue to be >legally available, no matter what.... > >Better informed interpretations are enthusiastically solicited. > >-Futplex <futplex(a)pseudonym.com> ---------------------------------------------------------- Lance Cottrell loki(a)obscura.com PGP 2.6 key available by finger or server. Mixmaster, the next generation remailer, is now available! http://obscura.com/~loki/Welcome.html or FTP to obscura.com "Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra. Suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night the ice weasels come." --Nietzsche ----------------------------------------------------------

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laptop passwords
by RopeGun＠alaska.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I've got a dilema. 2 laptops that I just purchased at a police auction have passwords, from what I can tell they are passworded at the cmos level. I would normaly just pull out the battery and clear the cmos but these are laptops and I'm not to comfortable about doing that. Any ideas? laptop1 - Toshiba Satelite Pro T2400CT laptop2 - Epson Action Note 500 c Oren Tanay RopeGun Productions \\V// o o J +--

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Re: Linking = Showing = Transferring?
by Carl Ellison 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- >>To:cyberia-l@warthog.cc.wm.edu >>From:tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May) >>Subject:Linking = Showing = Transferring? >>_Linking_ is effectively _showing_, given the point-and-click mechanics of >>hypertext. This is a situation anticipated by authors (e.g. Ted Nelson), >>but is now coming to the fore. >> >>Granted, providing a link is not the same as actually _including_ the >>material the link points to, but it is very, very close. Arguably, the >>same. There are two important differences. The first difference is in ownership of the data. If the source of the link decides to clobber the file, then the fact that I have a page with the URL does not guarantee access to that file for the user of *my* page. Similarly, the person owning the file can freely change the content of the file, without my changing the URL which points to it. The other difference is in handling of the data. If the link were to a pornographic image and someone were to access it through my page's URL, the bits of that image would never touch my computer. Meanwhile, <a href="http://dcs.ex.ac.uk/~aba/rsa/"> RSA encryption system in PERL </a> might be a URL which violates US export laws -- if this interpretation were to be taken -- but if so, does it violate them in this mail message? That depends, I suppose, on whether your mail agent is aware of URLs and turns them into point-and-click units. Is it a violation if the URL is printed in a paper magazine? After all, it's the convenience of the web browser which is at issue. One can invoke netscape with or without a parameter. Yes -- interesting legal times ahead. - Carl +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+ |Carl M. Ellison cme(a)acm.org http://www.clark.net/pub/cme | |PGP: E0414C79B5AF36750217BC1A57386478 & 61E2DE7FCB9D7984E9C8048BA63221A2 | | ``Officer, officer, arrest that man! He's whistling a dirty song.'' | +----------------------------------------------------------- Jean Ellison -+ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMFniL1QXJENzYr45AQFlYAP8DGHGk6EEmHXyPbeA7hoZjQ1pkEiyW2xB 1srFbXVsdJt9cwNQbBmFSfKARKVOnh1f+rEEqFZEwXXS1BbwlSljDz/hykZwfQwv h1kXPvJ9MMqleg6y8IXM5nTL9lKnq+ThKmgl/aciDYZqZ009IL4ssb81gUA5r5lC mYkfhqulWsU= =AYRX -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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international clampdown on money laundering
by an215712＠anon.penet.fi 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

----- Forwarded Message Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 23:35:58 -0400 (EDT) From: Brad Dolan <bdolan(a)use.usit.net> To: snet-l(a)world.std.com Subject: Int'l Money Laundering, Part the Second (fwd) - ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 10 Oct 1995 19:31:40 -0800 Subject: Int'l Money Laundering, Part the Second INTERNATIONAL ASPECTS The increasingly long arm of US law Those of you who have read my earlier exploration on the subject of jurisdiction (http://www.communities.com/paper/swamp.html) should be aware of a wide variety of ways that the US can "reach out and touch someone" they're not pleased with. Well, last week, I learned a few more. There are several ways in which the US is attempting to exert hegemony throughout the world wrt banking regulation: o Identification of "fiscally tolerant" nations and banking havens, and close regulatory examination of all transactions with these countries. o Pressure on major US trading partners and allies to pass and implement anti-money-laundering legislation and regulatory regimes. o Regulations on foreign banks with offices in the US, making compliance demands on world-wide operations. o Criminal prosecution of banks suspected of institutional involvement in money laundering, even if said bank has no offices or branches in the US. o Worldwide pre-trial substitute asset forfeiture of banks suspected of institutional involvement in money laundering, even if said bank has no offices or branches in the US. Pariah Nations in Banking ========================= As I touched on briefly in the previous section, transactions with well-known banking havens can automatically qualify as "suspicious." And in addition to some of the better known havens, a number of countries were pointed out at the conference as being "fiscally tolerant", including Malta, Uruguay, Japan, Ireland and Belgium; in another presentation the countries of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union were identified as "rapidly growing" sources of suspicious baning activity. Transactions with counterparties in such countries will be flagged by regulators for closer examination -- banks with large percentages of transactions with these countries will be expected to meet a higher standard in their attempt to identify "suspicious" behavior and will be under increasing pressure to investigate their customers' business practicies and motivation for all bank transactions. Some countries are clearly going to continue to tell the US to "get stuffed." However, if the US is successful in pressuring more and more countries to "tow the line", it will leave a shrinking pool of transactions subject to closer and closer examination. New Money Laundering Legislation ================================ Two presentations, one from Taiwan, the other from Thailand, focused on new or proposed legislation wrt money laundering in those countries. Based on my direct experience of living in the former, and my reseach into the latter, it's going to be a very, very long time before such legislation has a significant impact on either country. Chinese people (who are in the majority in Taiwan, and form an economically active minority in Thailand) are very cash- oriented; I vividly remember payday in Taiwan, with the boss sitting at a table piled with money, bundling up salaries for everyone. I'd come home at the end of each month with a giant wad of cash from my several different jobs. One could hardly imagine a better environment for money laundering than a society in which large quantities of cash change hands on a regular basis. After his talk, the Taiwanese speaker acknowledged the problems, but seemed hopeful that progress could be made. The speaker from Thailand, Nualnoi Treerat, a professor of Economics, discussed the proposed legislation primarily as an attempt to reduce the impact of organized crime on political life and society in Thailand; however, by her own estimations, the underground economy in Thailand represents 17-19% of the country's GDP (mostly drugs and prostitution.) Given the extensive corruption which she also detailed, it seems that such legislation will be a very small step indeed. Other speakers addressed the issue of cultural differences with respect to the use of cash and attitudes towards privacy, and it came up at lunch both days -- in many cultures, financial privacy is held in much higher regard than in the US, and people have a much stronger suspicion towards the government. Furthermore, there are many people who feel this way in the US. There is going to be an inevitable clash between atttempts to closely regulate and monitor money movements and people's fundamental desire for privacy. It's not clear that people of any culture can be sufficiently frightend by the bad guys to give up as much of their privacy as would be required for ultimate success in the War on Money Laundering. Despite the dim chances of success, it's clear that the US has been at least partially successful in coercing and coaxing other countries to adopt measures against money laundering, and to some extent there is local support for these measures. But these direct efforts pale by comparison to some other techniques... Foreign Bank Regulation ======================= In various pro-privacy publications I've read, there have been oblique warnings about doing business with foreign banks that maintain offices in the US. At this conference, I learned some very concrete reasons for this. It turns out that if a foreign bank wants to open a US office, they must demonstrate compliance with US money laundering laws throughout their _worldwide operations_. Furthermore, they're expected to have solid leadership for these policies from their home offices. This puts such banks in a serious bind. For instance, while Annunzio-Wylie absolves (or attempts to absolve) banks from civil liability for filing Suspicious Activity Reports and Criminal Referral Forms on their cusomters, this absolution does not extend to the home countries of these banks, where substantially different laws may obtain -- possibly explicitly forbidding this kind of reporting. There is almost a certain kind of logic to this kind of activity, but not content to extend our laws over the worldwide operations of banks with US offices, there are two ways in which US authorities are now attempting to extend US laws to banks _with no US offices_. Extraterritorial Reach ====================== The best paper presented at the conference, hands down, was "Surviving the Solution: The Extraterritorial Reach of the United States," by Kirk Munroe, a criminal defense attorney practicing in Miami. [I intend to find out if an online version of this paper can be made available.] To quote Mr. Munroe: The US money laundering law specifically provides for extraterritorial jurisdiction when (a) the conduct is by a US citizen anywhere in the world, or, if by a non-US citizen, the conduct occurs, at least in part, in the United States, and (b) the transactions, or a series of related transactions, exceeds $10,000. [18 USC $ 1956(f)] Some add'l background: banks involved in international business typically have a number of _correspondent accounts_ scattered around the world that are used for clearing wire transfers and other transactions. Since the BCCI scandal, the US government has increasingly gone after these accounts when a bank is suspected of facilitating money laundering. Furthermore, banks can have these correspondent accounts seized, even if they no longer contain "dirty" money, because they _facilitated_ a money laundering activity. When you combine these elements, you get a strategy that permits the US government to confiscate worldwide correspondent accounts of banks, even if they don't have a US presence. The first case Mr. Munroe cites is that of Banco de Occidente (Panama), one of his clients, that was alleged to have facilitated the laundering of the proceeds of drug transactions. The indictment included criminal charges against the banks and a criminal forfeiture charge. The government also filed a civil action for the forfeiture of $412 million allegedly laundered (although it had already passed completely through the bank.) The government then proceded to freeze not only the bank's US correspondent accounts, but also accounts in Germany, Switzerland and Canada, leading to the insolvency of the bank and its subsequent takeover by the Panamanian Banking Commission. [The Germans quickly unfroze the account after a civil action brought by the bank.] Quoting Munroe: After months of difficult and complicated negotiations which involved the banks' various interests in eight nations, a resolution was reached with the governments of the US, Canada, and Switzerland... [the bank] entered a guilty plea and agreed to forfeit, over a period of four years, $5 million to the US. The US, in turn, paid the Swiss and the Canadians $1 million each from the initial $2 million forfeiture payment. [Those of you who are still under any delusions about the "safety" of Swiss bank accounts, take careful note of this.] Mr. Munroe concludes that the only reason that the bank got off this "lightly" was because of substantial evidence that it was, by and large, a highly respectable institution and that this instance of laundering was an aberration. The next case cited by Mr. Munroe is that of Bank Leu. I quote from his paper: In sum, a Luxembourg bank with no office in the US was charged and convicted of money laundering in the US on the basis of clearing US dollar negotiable instruments drawn on a US bank but deposited by non-US citizens in Luxembourg. In other words, acceptance of US-dollar negotiable instruments by a bank anywhere in the world outside of the US renders the bank susceptible to US criminal jurisdiction in the money laundering field. The case boils down to this: Bank Leu wanted to expand its private banking business, and hired an officer to market accounts in South America. Two related accounts were opened, and over a one- year period $2.3 million in cashier's checks, all below $10K, were deposited in the two accounts. Although no guilty knowledge could be shown, this case was pursued and won on a theory of "willful blindness", that is, the bank "should have known" that the transactions had no valid business purpose and were inherently suspicious (came via Columbia, were sometimes more than 6 months old, all in small amounts, etc.). According to a LEA representative at the conference, there was a lot of joking in the backoffice at Bank Leu about the money being dirty, and clerks were repeatedly told "don't worry, it's ok" by bank officers. Certainly if this is true, it amounts to _extremely_ willful blindness, but this case still represents an amazingly long reach for US laws. [more to come... "Things bad people do with money"] --****ATTENTION****--****ATTENTION****--****ATTENTION****--***ATTENTION*** Your e-mail reply to this message WILL be *automatically* ANONYMIZED. Please, report inappropriate use to abuse(a)anon.penet.fi For information (incl. non-anon reply) write to help(a)anon.penet.fi If you have any problems, address them to admin(a)anon.penet.fi

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Re: "Use implies consent to monitoring"
by Rich Salz 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

`h > Please be advised that use constitutes consent to monitoring Use of what?

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Re: Commercial Mixmaster (was Re: Mixmaster status)
by Rich Salz 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>Better informed interpretations are enthusiastically solicited. Lance owns the code. He can take it, strip off the copyright, and transfer all rights to Bill Gates for a million bucks. He cannot, however, rescind the copyright or licenses that he has previously given out. /r$

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