Tim May wrote... "If cops ask local neighborhood members to report any suspicious activity, the folks know that any benefits they gain from acting as informants tend to be a lot smaller than the danger of being beat up or even killed by the Mafia. When the cost of acting as an informant is zero, no risk, more people act as informants. I think restoring some risk to being a rat is a good thing." There is of course the old argument about states such as Nazi Germany: what percentage of the population would have participated had they known that in wearing the Nazi uniform (even just on the streets of Berlin), there'd be a nonzero chance of them coming home alive? The problem in the present situation of course is underlined by the fact that the mafia is a fairly coherent set of relational organizations, acting in conjunction with centrally identified aims, but actintg on those aims across a wide swath of territory/etc. A "restoration of risk" would require some form of large-scale activities along these lines. A "lone nut" or unabomber that does something like this can be ignored as insane. And indeed, his actions will probably end up being counter-productive. If it were commonly understood that lots of people (who may live next door) take offence at being narced, then (and only then) would things be a little different. How do you get there from here? Dunno, but the obvious paradigm these days is P2P. -TD PS: One possible thing missing from the "response" list. Anyway to make a virus that will install fake/random name lists?

From: Tim May <timcmay@got.net> To: cypherpunks@lne.com Subject: Re: Responding to orders which include a secrecy requirement Date: Sat, 30 Aug 2003 09:10:48 -0700

On Saturday, August 30, 2003, at 06:10 AM, Eric Murray wrote:

...

On Fri, Aug 29, 2003 at 06:54:03PM -0700, Tim May wrote:

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But when Big Brother commands that his Carnivore boxes be added, ISPs are afraid to shoot his agents who trespass.

...

I think my solution may be best: take a few ISPs who have bent over for Big Brother and kill their owners and staff. A few ISP owners found necklaced and smoking may send a message to others.

The message it sends is to accept the cops offer of on-site "protection" when the ISP is faced with allowing the tap or being put in jail. By upping the stakes you force the business owner to accept the cops as the lesser of two evils.

The mafia's actions tended to make business owners clamor for more police and more intrusive police protection. Not less.

This is a problem that's better solved with crypto.

If cops ask local neighborhood members to report any suspicious activity, the folks know that any benefits they gain from acting as informants tend to be a lot smaller than the danger of being beat up or even killed by the Mafia.

When the cost of acting as an informant is zero, no risk, more people act as informants.

I think restoring some risk to being a rat is a good thing.

--Tim May

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