At the RSA conference I saw a company selling Starium-equivalent units, both for voice and data encryption. The voice only units were about $1400 apiece. (frankly, at that price, you could plug a PC with an A/D converter card between the handset and the base, and roll your own). I'm still decompressing, and have not unpacked all my bumph, else I'd have more specific data. Peter Trei
---------- From: Declan McCullagh[SMTP:declan@well.com] Reply To: Declan McCullagh Sent: Sunday, April 15, 2001 1:46 PM To: Dr. Evil Cc: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net Subject: Re: Starium?
I have a pair of their preproduction units they sent me in December. --Declan
On Sun, Apr 15, 2001 at 02:01:10AM -0000, Dr. Evil wrote:
Does anyone know if Starium is ever going to release anything? I noticed on their News section that they have engaged an M&A specialist. That's probably not a good sign for them operating as a stand-alone company. email to them bounces.
Peter, Thanks for the tip on that. I'll be looking out for it, although at that price, it's cheaper to buy a dedicated PC and run SpeakFreely, as you point out. Linux PDAs with good sound chips are just around the corner, apparently, and it seems that it shouldn't be too big a feat to get SpeakFreely or something similar running on them. These PDAs are a lot cheaper than the dedicated encryption hardware, such as Starium, which was going to price at around $500, last I heard. Also, because everything in the PDA is open source, it would be easier to trust it. Maybe when I have time and money to do it, and the PDAs with the necessary hardware are really shipping, I'll do some project like this. Basically, all it needs would be a full-duplex sound chip, and a built-in modem, and a reasonably fast CPU. It's just a shame that we have encryption all over the place, except for the one medium which we probably use the most: voice.
At 6:33 PM +0000 4/16/01, Dr. Evil wrote:
Peter,
Thanks for the tip on that. I'll be looking out for it, although at that price, it's cheaper to buy a dedicated PC and run SpeakFreely, as you point out.
There seem to be good market reasons for dedicated set up, especially one that ordinary phones attach to easily. The "bump in the cord" model. For one, security. Which is more likely to have been compromised: a small sealed box implementing D-H forward secrecy or a PC which may have been tampered with by intruders, maids hired by the Feds, whatever/ Second, ease of use. Many of the intended users of the secure phones may not even be heavy users of computers, or may have various machines not supported by SpeakFreely or other programs. Third, integration of the Starium-type chipset in cellphones remains the Big Win, right? What Pablo Escobar wants is a secure cellphone he can use on the run, in his villas, not some SpeakFreely program possibly bugged by the CIA or DEA.
It's just a shame that we have encryption all over the place, except for the one medium which we probably use the most: voice.
It's been out there for years. Nautilus, SpeakFreely, etc. Just not much interest, hence not much development. A Cypherpunks physical meeting was done with DES-encrypted audio links between Mountain View, Cambridge (MA), and Northern Virgina. This was in 1993. Impressive as hell. --Tim May -- Timothy C. May tcmay@got.net Corralitos, California Political: Co-founder Cypherpunks/crypto anarchy/Cyphernomicon Technical: physics/soft errors/Smalltalk/Squeak/agents/games/Go Personal: b.1951/UCSB/Intel '74-'86/retired/investor/motorcycles/guns
There seem to be good market reasons for dedicated set up, especially one that ordinary phones attach to easily. The "bump in the cord" model.
That is the best model, probably, but there are some intermediate models between "bump in the cord" and "compile SpeakFreely and figure out how to get it to work". Starium is obviously the easiest to use. Plug it in, press one button, you're done. However, with a small dedicated PC or a PDA, it should be possible to get closer to what Starium promises. Obviously it would be ideal to have Starium-type chips embedded in every voice communications device in existence, but we're not there yet.
For one, security. Which is more likely to have been compromised: a small sealed box implementing D-H forward secrecy or a PC which may have been tampered with by intruders, maids hired by the Feds, whatever/
Both probably could be tampered, but I guess a generic PC would be easier.
Third, integration of the Starium-type chipset in cellphones remains the Big Win, right? What Pablo Escobar wants is a secure cellphone he can use on the run, in his villas, not some SpeakFreely program possibly bugged by the CIA or DEA.
Well, if I have enemies as powerful as the CIA or the DEA, I'm probably in a lot of trouble no matter what I do, but... yes, chips everywhere would be best.
It's been out there for years. Nautilus, SpeakFreely, etc. Just not much interest, hence not much development.
But the lack of interest is mostly related to how difficult it has been to use this stuff. Example: RSA encryption was used by millions of people for Lotus Notes, or ordinary web browsers, because it was completely, invisibly integrated, but not many people (comparatively) use PGP, because it's not invisibly integrated, even though the technology is the same. If we could get crypto easier to use for voice, I'm sure most people would want to use it. I hope to have time to take a crack at doing Starium-on-a-PDA.
A Cypherpunks physical meeting was done with DES-encrypted audio links between Mountain View, Cambridge (MA), and Northern Virgina. This was in 1993. Impressive as hell.
That's cool.
At 8:27 PM +0000 4/16/01, Dr. Evil wrote:
There seem to be good market reasons for dedicated set up, especially one that ordinary phones attach to easily. The "bump in the cord" model.
That is the best model, probably, but there are some intermediate models between "bump in the cord" and "compile SpeakFreely and figure out how to get it to work". Starium is obviously the easiest to use. Plug it in, press one button, you're done. However, with a small dedicated PC or a PDA, it should be possible to get closer to what Starium promises.
I encourage you to offer your design services, for sale of course, to Eric Blossom and Starium. They have been working on this issue for a number of years and don't seem to be close to the PDA yet. The "small PC" has more bandwidth, but mobile Pentiums and suchlike are not there yet. (Pablo Escobar will not likely become a gargoyle and wear a hip PC and glasses, at least not anytime soon.)
For one, security. Which is more likely to have been compromised: a small sealed box implementing D-H forward secrecy or a PC which may have been tampered with by intruders, maids hired by the Feds, whatever/
Both probably could be tampered, but I guess a generic PC would be easier.
Indeed. And harder to show tampering with.
I hope to have time to take a crack at doing Starium-on-a-PDA.
I encourage you. But it won't be a weekend hack. I doubt even an iPAQ has the horsepower, and certainly the Dragonball PDAs don't.
A Cypherpunks physical meeting was done with DES-encrypted audio links between Mountain View, Cambridge (MA), and Northern Virgina. This was in 1993. Impressive as hell.
That's cool.
Yes, it was. IIRC, Hugh Daniel did most of the legwork to get it set up and running. --Tim May -- Timothy C. May tcmay@got.net Corralitos, California Political: Co-founder Cypherpunks/crypto anarchy/Cyphernomicon Technical: physics/soft errors/Smalltalk/Squeak/agents/games/Go Personal: b.1951/UCSB/Intel '74-'86/retired/investor/motorcycles/guns
At 12:05 PM 4/16/01 -0700, Tim May wrote:
Thanks for the tip on that. I'll be looking out for it, although at that price, it's cheaper to buy a dedicated PC and run SpeakFreely, as you point out.
There seem to be good market reasons for dedicated set up, especially one that ordinary phones attach to easily. The "bump in the cord" model.
For one, security. Which is more likely to have been compromised: a small sealed box implementing D-H forward secrecy or a PC which may have been tampered with by intruders, maids hired by the Feds, whatever/
Ask that headless arab about the impermeability of handset-style devices. "MossadBell --reach out and touch someone" If you want, epoxy the case closed. Voila, instant embedded system. [You can build the same amount of trust using a COTS pocket pc as you can with a slicker dedicated gizmo. Its easier to prototype starting with COTS if you don't have an industrial design lab at your disposal.]
Second, ease of use. Many of the intended users of the secure phones may not even be heavy users of computers, or may have various machines not supported by SpeakFreely or other programs.
Yep, ease of use is a real problem.
Third, integration of the Starium-type chipset in cellphones remains the Big Win, right?
Getting anything into a cell handset is the Big Win, yep. What Pablo Escobar wants is a secure cellphone he
can use on the run, in his villas, not some SpeakFreely program possibly bugged by the CIA or DEA.
Heh, he wants a *disposable* secure cellphone sold from vending machines on the street. So do the chip makers ;-)
participants (4)
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David Honig -
Dr. Evil -
Tim May -
Trei, Peter