-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- In list.cypherpunks, tcmay@netcom.com writes:
Indeed, there are many kinds of "digital cash" or "digital money" being floated. I suspect the term is about to join "Information Superhighway" and "infobahn" in the popular media.
I believe I'll just be cringing now. Ugh! I hate the cute metaphors.
But all but a very few of them are polar opposites of what we as Cypherpunks want. Microsoft wants home banking, VISA wants it, and various cryptographically-incompetent schemes are being proposed.
As you on this list all know, these are Bad Ideas.
Widespread home banking would give the Con a real good window into not only the spending habits, but the sum of resources of a lot of people. When you add in debit-card transactions at the supermarket, you have pretty much a microscopic picture of a person (including a fair estimate of their cash transactions, albeit with no hard link to where the cash goes). I'm sure the electronic banking being done even now is harvested for statistical data. (And I'm having real second thoughts about the bank-by-phone service where I've toned in my account number and ATM PIN. I have no guarantee that my phone line is secure.)
What we can do to head them off or to deploy the right kinds of systems is the challenge ahead of us.
Preemptive deployment has to be the answer. Just like strong crypto everywhere else, get the product out there. What we need (and probably don't have a chance in hell of getting) is a regional bank to step out and make cryptographically secure home banking available. If it were me, I'd hit everywhere... telephone modem links, Internet connection (yeah, I know... trendy, but an effective attention-getting device) and some kind of interactive cable system. If one bank does it, and sells the crypto security hard, the others will have to follow suit for marketing, if no other reason. Now, if that bank also were to be a real Digi-Cash agent as well...
(My greatest fear: legislation to support home/cable banking, with restriction on competitors.)
That's the historical method, though. It's tough to deflect that kind of inertia. - -- Roy M. Silvernail [] roy@sendai.cybrspc.mn.org It's just this little chromium switch....... -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6 iQCVAwUBLhnrJBvikii9febJAQHHzgQAiH8uFXGCV32RAFIvimVUEEllUyjugurb uT425aR6OPOGm+XWWA7ixDU5Dl9p3zaT2pqRVW7Gy/a6WxXerFxbNkCcHp9D0nJb 295q/fgxLh7RtwxQtpJLCp55elAjkE7k/pW11H5yR5en4VhlH3Ybn3nsko/vOpC/ zafkK4fuJvI= =hjal -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----