On Sun, 17 Nov 1996, Huge Cajones Remailer wrote:

Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 08:12:12 -0800 From: Huge Cajones Remailer To: cypherpunks@toad.com Subject: Re: The Utility of Privacy

At 4:11 AM 11/17/1996, Black Unicorn wrote:

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On Sat, 16 Nov 1996, Huge Cajones Remailer wrote:

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Date: Sat, 16 Nov 1996 18:22:33 -0800 From: Huge Cajones Remailer To: cypherpunks@toad.com Subject: The Utility of Privacy

Privacy is a hassle. Is it worth it?

Which unfortunate situations does privacy prevent? What are the odds that they will occur? How much effort will it take to prevent these outcomes? As a model, use the present and future situation of a typical reader of this list.

Insurance is a hassle. Is it worth it?

Which unfortunate situations does insurance prevent? What are the odds that they will occur? How much effort will it take to prevent these outcomes? As a model, use the present and future situation of a typical reader of this list.

I know many people who were happy they had insurance due to car accidents, health problems, or whatever. What is more, the odds of these events are carefully calculated and available. Call an actuary.

Are there similar sources of information calculating privacy risk? I don't think so.

Ah, so let's ignore the risks, on the grounds that we have no idea what they might be, or their magnitude. That's clever. I like that.

Informally, I don't know anybody who has suffered due to a loss of privacy.

Your circle of associations must be limited.

It may be the case that it is politically beneficial to have a society of privacy fanatics. But, this is different from the direct benefit to each participant.

Agreed, but since you do not quantify the magnitude of either of these, even in terms of speculation, I'm not sure what your point is.

My question remains unanswered, probably because privacy isn't worth the effort.

And no one can answer that question but you. Privacy is a personal decision. I'm sure there are many out there who will suffer no harm even if their SSN is published in the Wall Street Journal. Why, however, fail to take out insurance when the cost is so low? Really it doesn't take much in the way of effort or money to assure one's privacy. (Hint: It's getting cheaper every day in some ways). Answer: Nearly all of the cost of privacy is concentrated in set up cost. Maintaince costs are minimal once set up has been made. Yet getting over that first hurdle is the biggest leap. -- Forward complaints to : European Association of Envelope Manufactures Finger for Public Key Gutenbergstrasse 21;Postfach;CH-3001;Bern Vote Monarchist Switzerland

Forgive me if I missed it, but there seems to have been little discussion of the link between privacy and identity in this thread. (The list is so noisy that I miss a lot of things.) On most computer systems, one's identity is represented by some secret, whether it's a login password or a private key. Obviously, to maintain the integrity of the identity the secret must be protected which requires privacy. Now whether or not I have "something to hide", I very much want to protect my identity from being usurped. (He who steals my purse steals trash...) Now is it the case that people are interested in stealing identities? Certainly. My account on the CMU Andrew system (where this is being written) was compromised once. Not out of any animosity toward me, but simply as a platform to launch a hacking attack on some other system. (Universities, and I suspect other networks, are rife with packet sniffers. Having been burned once, I rely tremendously on encrypted connections.) This is not to say that one's identity-secret is the only secret worth protecting. But I thought I'd mention it as something to think about. Mike P.S. In a way, credit card numbers are identities --- the fact that we just hand them out to people is very disconcerting. (I'm told that most credit card fraud is by vendors.)