At 11:16 AM 5/10/94 -0700, Paul E. Baclace wrote:
I just tuned-in last night...Has anyone discussed the NYT op-ed by David Gelernter (associate prof. at Yale)? It was accompanied by a comic "the first wiretap"
I'd be interested in seeing a scan of that comic, our local paper didn't include it. Gelernter's <Gelernter@cs.yale.edu> piece has merit, but he seems to be missing the point entirely. He acknowledges that smart criminals would NOT use Clipper, but then asserts that it's still a good idea because half-witted ones would. Am I missing some vital logical point, or does this just not make sense? Take two criminals, Danny Dumbo and Sam Smart. If Danny is too dumb to use alternative encryption, where does it follow that he would use any sort of encryption at all? Thus whether his equipment is Clippered or not, the gov't could easily tap his line. Whereas Sam is smart enough to choose some other form of encryption that the gov't can't monitor. So what good does Clipper do in either case? And thus, why does it even exist? If the gov't needs Clipper to secure its own communications, why don't they just sanctify PGP or something likewise? Dismissing the likely explanation; that Clipper is just some Cold-war-style pork barrel project, we're left with one question. How can Clipper ever be effective? The only two possible answers are: 1) if usage of alternative methods is outlawed. (Which we've been told won't happen. Veracity-alert! Whoop! Whoop!) 2) if the Clipper chip itself could somehow compromise alternative encryption schemes, perhaps by monitoring keystrokes during password entries? I'm really reaching with this one, but I thought it would be wrong to dismiss it entirely. And no, I'm not a proponent of the "Grass Knoll" and "Frozen Aliens stored in Nevada" conspiracy theories too. :) ...dtw ---------------------------------------------------------------- Notice of address change: Please send mail to the following: dwitkow@eis.calstate.edu (Mail sent to dwitkows@nermal.santarosa.edu will be forwarded) ---------------------------------------------------------------- Transmitted via modified Eudora 1.4.2 over LINUX host dialup! ---------------------------------------------------------------- Finger dwitkows@nermal.santarosa.edu for PGP key ----------------------------------------------------------------