At 8:17 PM -0700 9/3/97, Brian B. Riley wrote:

So, looking at all this, what does it mean???? Are they going to have an amnesty period when I can run down to my local firehouse and turn in my PGP5 CDROM without risking going to jail? Will MIT turn over logs of everyone who ever d/l-ed PGP2 and we have four weeks to turn over every backup disk we ever made? If they do get this by us, and I decide to use their silly-assed encryption, do I get a ten year all expense paid vacation at the Allenwood Hilton if I send my bootlegged PGP message inside their encryption?

As I understand what Freeh said, not even he is talking about banning existing programs. Rather, he's talking about requiring the "capability" be added to Internet programs (presumably browsers, mail programs, etc.). It's obvious that one could use an old word processor, editor, PGP, etc., and then paste the text into the Freeh-approved Internet program. What would the status be of this? (In other words, it would be a truly draconian move to try to ban all encrypted messages.) But I think we should accelerate the use of steganography. (Oh, and for the bozos who've said I just "talk," while they write code, check the ancient archives of sci.crypt, circa 1989, and see that I reported on using the LSBs of GIF images and DAT tapes to hide bits. I didn't find earlier messages in sci.crypt reporting on this idea, but it's quite possible that I was not the first to think of this. I don't claim a scientific discovery! I reported my experiments over the next couple of years, and Romana Machado credited me in her "Stego" program, circa '93. Of course, by the time Peter Wayner wrote his little book, "Disappearing Writing," or somesuch, all of the "inventors" of this LSB approach to crypto were others, and they did their work several years after my sci.crypt posts. I guess I didn't shout out enough. Or Peter didn't do much research.) --Tim There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of laws. Only one response to the key grabbers is warranted: "Death to Tyrants!" ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^1398269 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."