Re: Nightmare Scenario: Public Key Distribution Controlled
Does the following provision of the amendment lighten Tim's dim glim? "§ 2804. Encryption products manufactured and intended for use in the United States ... (d) USE OF PRIOR PRODUCTS LAWFUL.-- After January 31, 2000, it shall not be unlawful to use any encryption product purchased or in use prior to such date. [Bottom page 13] That gives about 450 days to widespread stego, surrept onions and backchannels to prepositioned stashes. Max use prior to. Or, say to hell with it, coders will forever evade USCoders.
John Young, who informs so many, mulled the worst case scenario:
That gives about 450 days to widespread stego, surrept onions and backchannels to prepositioned stashes. Max use prior to.
Hmmm. Isn't it time for a reality check? Getting bent out of shape because the House Intelligence Community -- surely the legislators closest to the spooks and spies of the Permanent Government, and rather addicted to its product -- votes to outlaw cryptography without a backdoor seems to be excessive. Declan or someone who tracks Congressional voting trends should double-check me, but I harbor doubt that the US Congress (or rather, the House of Represenatives) is about to vote and approve such a bill. I understand the Senate is perhaps gone, but the House? If I'm right, then we have been given the focus for a major political action campaign. I'm up for a bullet vote, where possible. We must build a coalition which will demand a yea or nay promise on access to strong crypto from prospective candidates for the Senate and House in '98. And from presidential candidates for 2,000. Personally, I think we should define the correct choice in terms of Full Citizenship -- the option to whisper or encrypt that should be available to every law-abiding citizen. And we should define the Spook & Spy alternative as the stunted choice: a citizenship stripped of basic rights by an ambitous, jealous, and greedy class of professional spies and their acolytes. This Nation, and the rights of citizenship the state conceeds, were not defined and enumberated in terms of what will make police oversight and investigation most cost-effective. Suerte, _Vin "Cryptography is like literacy in the Dark Ages. Infinitely potent, for good and ill... yet basically an intellectual construct, an idea, which by its nature will resist efforts to restrict it to bureaucrats and others who deem only themselves worthy of such Privilege." _ A thinking man's Creed for Crypto/ vbm. * Vin McLellan + The Privacy Guild + <vin@shore.net> * 53 Nichols St., Chelsea, MA 02150 USA <617> 884-5548
At 04:34 AM 9/14/97 -0500, Thomas Junker wrote:
On 14 Sep 97 at 0:00, Vin McLellan wrote:
Declan or someone who tracks Congressional voting trends should double-check me, but I harbor doubt that the US Congress (or rather, the House of Represenatives) is about to vote and approve such a bill.
Some thought the same of the CDA. In a few years more some will be saying the same of some death camp bill. It's all relative, and the relative window in this step-wise game of incremental slavery is quite narrow these days.
This Nation, and the rights of citizenship the state conceeds, were not defined and enumberated in terms of what will make police oversight and investigation most cost-effective.
Right, but it's illustrative of the problem that one writes, "and the rights of citizenship the state concedes," because this nation was founded on no such basis.
The key thing to realize is that the power of the state in the US derives from the will of the governed. What Cypherpunks tend to ignore is the simple fact that the governed want to be governed. The People want warrantless wiretaps, they want crypto to be outlawed, they want the death penalty for anyone that passes a joint to their kids. That they arrived at these wants due to propaganda is irrelevant. Congress simply reflects the will of the People. If you doubt this fact, just conduct a poll that asks the following question: "Should suspected nuclear terrorists and child molesters be allowed to engage in their activities unchallenged OR should the government be enabled to have access to all plaintext?" Crowley would argue that this is not their True Will. Correct, but since the People are not going to discover their True Will, who cares? --Lucky Green <shamrock@netcom.com> PGP encrypted mail preferred. DES is dead! Please join in breaking RC5-56. http://rc5.distributed.net/
At 04:34 AM 9/14/97 -0500, Thomas Junker wrote:
If you haven't noticed, we are well down on the slippery slope of acceptance of unconstitutional legislation and executive acts. With the substitution of outrageously unconstutional language for the original text of SAFE, the slope has just steepened dramatically and the edge above is pretty well out of reach.
The problem is that no constitution has the power to enforce itself. It depends entirely on a wide, usually mostly unstated agreement that its principles are Very Important Things. Liberia, you may recall, copied the U.S. Constitution almost to the word, and it did them no good whatsoever because the people were not imbued with the spirit of the document. It's quite remarkable that any semblance of our Constitution has lasted as long as it has, but it's pretty obvious that the general understanding and agreement that holds such things in place has passed below critical mass in the U.S. The government is now moving into "anything goes" mode. That's when the slope becomes nearly vertical.
If this is correct, expect some major anti-gun legislation in the next few years. Even if government is totally evil, the people can still protect themselves from jack-booted thugs if they are sufficiently well-armed. This means owning assault weapons. Get them while you can, they're going fast...and LOTS of ammunition.
Declan or someone who tracks Congressional voting trends should double-check me, but I harbor doubt that the US Congress (or rather, the House of Represenatives) is about to vote and approve such a bill.
Some thought the same of the CDA. In a few years more some will be saying the same of some death camp bill. It's all relative, and the relative window in this step-wise game of incremental slavery is quite narrow these days.
The process that brought Hitler is very similar to what is happening in the US today. 1. All guns had to be registered. (much of this work was done by Hitler's predecessors, but it made his job much easier.) 2. Abortion was made available on demand. 3. Euthanasia was made available for the terminally ill, then encouraged for the elderly and feeble-minded. 4. Privately owned guns were confiscated. Freedom of speech and press was curtailed. 5. Euthanasia gradually began to be applied to Communists, labor union organizers, Jews, homosexuals, religious leaders, and anyone else who opposed the government, eventually requiring the death camps to process all those requiring euthanizatrion. Most Germans didn't wake up to the situation until it was too late. Martin Neimoller's quote "...and when they came for me, I couldn't say anything, because there was nobody left to speak for me" (paraphrased) is one of the most damning indictments of the sheeplike tendencies of most people. At this time, we are working on steps 3 and 4 in the US.
This Nation, and the rights of citizenship the state conceeds, were not defined and enumberated in terms of what will make police oversight and investigation most cost-effective.
Right, but it's illustrative of the problem that one writes, "and the rights of citizenship the state concedes," because this nation was founded on no such basis. The state conceded nothing because the state was considered to have no natural powers, unlike the contemporary view in the rest of the world then, and for the most part, now. Both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution make it pretty clear that the foundation for the U.S. government is the delegation of powers from individuals endowed with natural rights. Most of the rest of the world still functions on the model of a soveriegn state which graciously grants rights to its citizen-units and can withdraw them by the same power. It's a fundamental differenc that few people outside the U.S. even contemplate.
Of course, this fundamental truth is not taught in public schools anymore, the better to condition the populace to embrace step 5. You have to be one of those home-school nuts or be able to afford a good private school to learn _real_ history.
Also, as has been suggested in another post, this is about *money*, not national security. Or it's about *power*. Or *money* as the lifeblood of *state power*. I doubt there is a politician or bureaucrat above the level of Mayberry who actually fears *any* of the Horsemen. On the contrary, the Horsemen are the statists' best friends. Without the hyped dangers there would be little excuse for the stepwise evisceration of the Constitution and the construction of the most technologically advanced police state in the history of mankind.
Obviously, Big Brother cannot propagandize "We hate strong crypto, because anonymous e-cash allows people to untraceably move funds anywhere in the world without our knowledge, avoid paying taxes, and create anonymous dead pools we can't trace or regulate." So the Horsemen are Big Brother's only option.
This latest assault on the Constitution was inevitable. Only the timing may have been affected by pro-crypto legislative efforts.
Major grabs of power are almost always preceded by a period of softening up by PR bombardment, exactly what we've been seeing for the last couple of years. Any time you see a concerted PR campaign to demonize something it's a lead pipe cinch that it will culminate in a move to grab power. Trace things back to the beginning of the PR campaign and that's the point in time when the ultimate objective was already in the sights of the movers and shakers behind the campaign.
TJ
Those who do not learn history are condemned to repeat it. Jonathan Wienke What part of "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" is too hard to understand? (From 2nd Amendment, U.S. Constitution) PGP 2.6.2 RSA Key Fingerprint: 7484 2FB7 7588 ACD1 3A8F 778A 7407 2928 DSS/D-H Key Fingerprint: 3312 6597 8258 9A9E D9FA 4878 C245 D245 EAA7 0DCC Public keys available at pgpkeys.mit.edu. PGP encrypted e-mail preferred. Get your assault crypto before they ban it! US/Canadian Windows 95/NT or Mac users: Get Eudora Light + PGP 5.0 for free at http://www.eudora.com/eudoralight/ Get PGP 5.0 for free at http://bs.mit.edu:8001/pgp-form.html Non-US PGP 5.0 sources: http://www.ifi.uio.no/pgp/ http://www.heise.de/ct/pgpCA/download.shtml ftp://ftp.pca.dfn.de/pub/pgp/V5.0/ ftp://ftp.fu-berlin.de/pub/pc/win95/pgp ftp://ftp.fu-berlin.de/pub/mac/pgp http://www.shopmiami.com/utopia.hacktic.nl/pub/replay/pub/pgp/pgp50/win/ RSA export-o-matic: print pack"C*",split/\D+/,`echo "16iII*o\U@{$/=$z;[(pop,pop,unpack"H*",<> )]}\EsMsKsN0[lN*1lK[d2%Sa2/d0<X+d*lMLa^*lN%0]dsXx++lMlN/dsM0<J]dsJxp"|dc`
At 12:04 pm -0400 on 9/14/97, Steve Schear wrote:
So, if these "instruments of freedom" could only be useful to criminals, then the last great hope for our country may be in the hands of drug-trafficers, terrorists and the like, since only they will be free ;-)
Either that, or we apply Moscaritolo's Conjecture: "If we could just pass a few more laws, we'd all be criminals." :-). Cheers, Bob Hettinga ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com), Philodox e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' The e$ Home Page: http://www.shipwright.com/
On Sun, 14 Sep 1997, Jonathan Wienke wrote:
1. All guns had to be registered. (much of this work was done by Hitler's predecessors, but it made his job much easier.)
2. Abortion was made available on demand.
3. Euthanasia was made available for the terminally ill, then encouraged for the elderly and feeble-minded.
4. Privately owned guns were confiscated. Freedom of speech and press was curtailed.
5. Euthanasia gradually began to be applied to Communists, labor union organizers, Jews, homosexuals, religious leaders, and anyone else who opposed the government, eventually requiring the death camps to process all those requiring euthanizatrion.
Most Germans didn't wake up to the situation until it was too late. Martin Neimoller's quote "...and when they came for me, I couldn't say anything, because there was nobody left to speak for me" (paraphrased) is one of the most damning indictments of the sheeplike tendencies of most people. At this time, we are working on steps 3 and 4 in the US.
Worse, they voted for Hitler (who by the way stopped the "Taxi Murders"), and the legislature voted him emergency powers. The NAZIs did everything by a stricty legal process. The principle was clear but overridden by pragmatism. From life is sacred (or inviolable if you don't like religous connotations) to life not worthy of life. There were those speaking for principle then, as now, but the divisive politics said not to listen to them because a government can provide Utopia if you will just provide them the power. Faschism is more dangerous than socialism, since it keeps some kind of ownership in private hands, but has all the controls - consider Hillary's healthcare plan - doctors and hospitals would still be privately owned. PGP and RSA will still own the intellectual property under GAK.
Those who do not learn history are condemned to repeat it.
I saw a very ironic session on C-SPAN with the Congressional Black Caucus sponsoring lecturers on victims of police violence. A few times the crime of "Driving while Black" was mentioned. They mentioned this will get worse as the states move to primary enforcement of seatbelts, but forgot to mention that the administration is pushing the initiative (they needed something since 55 was repealed). Also mentioned was the war on drugs and a few of the other invasive federal programs. My question is why the minorities vote to give police arbitrary powers (or withold funds from the state if they don't), and expect that the police won't act arbitrarily and mostly against minorities.
What part of "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" is too hard to understand? (From 2nd Amendment, U.S. Constitution)
Another thing I heard was the move to ban small, inexpensive handguns. The type mainly bought by women to protect themselves. I think it was something brought forward by Feinstein. --- reply to tzeruch - at - ceddec - dot - com ---
On 14 Sep 97 at 0:00, Vin McLellan wrote:
Hmmm. Isn't it time for a reality check? Getting bent out of shape because the House Intelligence Community -- surely the legislators closest to the spooks and spies of the Permanent Government, and rather addicted to its product -- votes to outlaw cryptography without a backdoor seems to be excessive.
I disagree. "They" instinctively perceive that they have a PR climate in which they have successfully elevated the Horsemen to deities that no politician who values his reelection will challenge. The whole situation has been engineered, in part for this moment. They will do it this session if they can, otherwise next session. If you haven't noticed, we are well down on the slippery slope of acceptance of unconstitutional legislation and executive acts. With the substitution of outrageously unconstutional language for the original text of SAFE, the slope has just steepened dramatically and the edge above is pretty well out of reach. The problem is that no constitution has the power to enforce itself. It depends entirely on a wide, usually mostly unstated agreement that its principles are Very Important Things. Liberia, you may recall, copied the U.S. Constitution almost to the word, and it did them no good whatsoever because the people were not imbued with the spirit of the document. It's quite remarkable that any semblance of our Constitution has lasted as long as it has, but it's pretty obvious that the general understanding and agreement that holds such things in place has passed below critical mass in the U.S. The government is now moving into "anything goes" mode. That's when the slope becomes nearly vertical.
Declan or someone who tracks Congressional voting trends should double-check me, but I harbor doubt that the US Congress (or rather, the House of Represenatives) is about to vote and approve such a bill.
Some thought the same of the CDA. In a few years more some will be saying the same of some death camp bill. It's all relative, and the relative window in this step-wise game of incremental slavery is quite narrow these days.
This Nation, and the rights of citizenship the state conceeds, were not defined and enumberated in terms of what will make police oversight and investigation most cost-effective.
Right, but it's illustrative of the problem that one writes, "and the rights of citizenship the state concedes," because this nation was founded on no such basis. The state conceded nothing because the state was considered to have no natural powers, unlike the contemporary view in the rest of the world then, and for the most part, now. Both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution make it pretty clear that the foundation for the U.S. government is the delegation of powers from individuals endowed with natural rights. Most of the rest of the world still functions on the model of a soveriegn state which graciously grants rights to its citizen-units and can withdraw them by the same power. It's a fundamental differenc that few people outside the U.S. even contemplate. Also, as has been suggested in another post, this is about *money*, not national security. Or it's about *power*. Or *money* as the lifeblood of *state power*. I doubt there is a politician or bureaucrat above the level of Mayberry who actually fears *any* of the Horsemen. On the contrary, the Horsemen are the statists' best friends. Without the hyped dangers there would be little excuse for the stepwise evisceration of the Constitution and the construction of the most technologically advanced police state in the history of mankind. This latest assault on the Constitution was inevitable. Only the timing may have been affected by pro-crypto legislative efforts. Major grabs of power are almost always preceded by a period of softening up by PR bombardment, exactly what we've been seeing for the last couple of years. Any time you see a concerted PR campaign to demonize something it's a lead pipe cinch that it will culminate in a move to grab power. Trace things back to the beginning of the PR campaign and that's the point in time when the ultimate objective was already in the sights of the movers and shakers behind the campaign. TJ
Obviously, Big Brother cannot propagandize "We hate strong crypto, because anonymous e-cash allows people to untraceably move funds anywhere in the world without our knowledge, avoid paying taxes, and create anonymous dead pools we can't trace or regulate." So the Horsemen are Big Brother's only option.
So, if these "instruments of freedom" could only be useful to criminals, then the last great hope for our country may be in the hands of drug-trafficers, terrorists and the like, since only they will be free ;-) --Steve
participants (8)
-
John Young -
Jonathan Wienke -
Lucky Green -
nospam-seesignature＠ceddec.com -
Robert Hettinga -
Steve Schear -
Thomas Junker -
Vin McLellan