From: lce@wwa.com (Larry E) The goal is to convince the two groups of concerned parties[, in short, users & lawyers,] that the remailer operators don't know the contents of what's passing through their remailers: This is exactly right. With a sealed box which you can't look in at all, this is easy. Providing an assurance on a general purpose computer is more difficult. And yes, it _is_ always possible to simulate a filter that's not a filter, blah, blah, blah. We are in the realm of social interactions here, not in the realm of technology. The remailers are operated by people who want to promote information flow, not restrict it. They provide an important service that is of critical importance to some people and groups who use the net. They shouldn't be held accountable for the few who abuse the remailers, and encryption helps prevent that from happening. I agree with this argument. It is the germ of discourse about the public policy of remailers and anonymity generally. I want to point out the rhetorical content of this statement, though, more than my agreement with it. The cypherpunks list is filled with paranoid nay-sayers who can't distinguish their own paranoia from a legitimate technological failing. I feel a dire need for a positive rhetoric of cryptography. I want to be 'for' something and to know what it's good for rather than to be against everything that doesn't meet my personal desires. How many times have I seen particular solution whose response is "But I want more, and this won't work for that"! The most self-deceptive say "It can't be done", the slightly more honest say "You can't do it", and none say "I will not do it". So now all you people who think that remailers don't work, don't run one. Good, I see most of you are already complying with this directive. Even the simplest remailer has utility. If there were no utility, then nobody would use them (duh). It is not only foolishness and idiocy but also mendaciousness to say that "remailers just don't work". It is constructive to say, however, that "the current remailers don't work against the following opponent", but this is not usually the case. Rather, the speaker's paranoia silently projects their own requirements onto a technical discussion, leaving only confusion. Look at the recent conversation over postage for remailers. Paraphrasing: "Credit cards won't work because they're not anonymous". My response: "Bullshit". Using a credit card as a means of payment does put constraints on usage, but it doesn't prevent usage (duh redux). What credit card payment does do is to require more effort in order to link email transactions. This is an unalloyed good, but pure silver instead of gold. There are better ways, one of them First Virtual, which at the least has counterparty anonymity; another, blind sigs (as yet unusable for payments). The implicit assumption here is that "If I can't use it to smash the state, it's worthless". Well, thank you very much for constraining my ability for privacy with your political agenda. And I have a hint for all the state-smashing wannabe-businesspeople out there: the ones who have a business (less secure) now will eat your lunch for the business (more secure) later. To be dry and academic about this, I'd say that the problem was an insufficiency in threat modelling. But that just doesn't quite mean the same thing, n'est ce pas? Eric