-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Robert Hettinga wrote that David Kaufman wrote that Reuters wrote:
``It could take a $30 million supercomputer a year to figure out the simplest encrypted message without this feature,'' Freeh said. ``And that message might be 'we have the victim and will kill him in an hour'.''
This seems like a good time to try out The Cypherpunk War Cry: Shine Shine!! Bakayarou!! Aho!! Manuke!! Anpontan!! (Hope it means something bad!) Jonathan Wienke correctly pointed out the absurdity of Freeh's example. But, there are two ways Louis and his supporters can wriggle out of this point. One is that the friends and relatives of the kidnap victime are sometimes tempted to conceal the crime as they may believe that a quiet negotiation and ransom payment will be more likely to secure the hostage's release than involving the authorities. (In many countries it is illegal to do this.) However, if the all knowing and all seeing secret police agency can intercept all communications they will be able to find out and interfere with plans to make ransom payments and jail the friends of the victim. That might be a little rough on the trophy, it is true, but it will be said that this will generally discourage other kidnappings in the future. The second is that encryption makes remailers possible. Remailers make it possible for kidnappers to untraceably send messages. What Louis and his supporters are neglecting is that kidnappers are already able to do this without encryption. The unabomber, while not a kidnapper, is an especially good example. For the at least a decade he was communicating with the FBI itself on a regular basis without facing any consequences. Monty Cantsin Editor in Chief Smile Magazine http://www.neoism.org/squares/smile_index.html http://www.neoism.org/squares/cantsin_10.htm -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQEVAwUBNFbKiJaWtjSmRH/5AQFNngf+Jly6DbqAU2JFPsF2gghY4tXHmp8XkVx3 t7F2IlBterhE99wxEbs+B6Nm4e0MvOCoTNbKly+XJi4If/3llFbcqBEisiib511N eX7ttczuV+ne5I2yNmt0M5vPwqRG/iaOSvwyDNbKQw72Y19PsMhZLfTp1WXYcYTC y/FcQa7JZKcf0/17kvVTgOq20XB4qxfPVMI6j7L4Dh7qRKl7Ph9CENaUq/uJtbBq NSDgsK64KFktTrERtnisJJA6RtDO+ZKUPU93vyoRuttST34EUDOcUq0QP566BAlw OKfi28+12AJtEqSUD2MEh0EgwLkKWUIkDNUp8yXzgI7BZeSSeoPbDg== =FPRq -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----