At 2:40 PM 11/1/95, anonymous-remailer@shell.portal.com wrote:

It's come to my attention that the US government has a group called the 'Department of the Treasury Financial Crimes Enforcement Network' in Vienna, Virginia.

I know that burocrats like to keep themselves busy, but even I didn't think they would go so far as to enforce crimes to keep the law enforcement people busy.

What a curious way to spend the taxpayers money.

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, FinCEN, is well known to readers of this list. If you grep for it in my Cyphernomicon FAQ, you should find references in several places. I first learned of it in 1990, and have followed it as best I can since. Not too much has been published about it. It's an interagency working group, with participation by Treasury, State, FBI, CIA, IRS, Justice, etc. A good overview of it was in an early issue of "Wired," and is likely available at the HotWired Web site. FinCEN's Web page is: http://www.ustreas.gov/treasury/bureaus/fincen/fincen.html --Tim May Views here are not the views of my Internet Service Provider or Government. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^756839 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."