Re: Sen. Patrick Leahy's PGP key now avail.
At 9:36 PM 5/2/96, Will Rodger wrote:
Wanna write the good Senator on the occasion of his newest bill? His pub key's out there. (URL is http://bs.mit.edu:8001/pks-commands.html#submit/ )
Why does anyone need his public key to communicate with Senator Leahy? If it's for sender-anonymity, this does not do it, though other tools (remailers) do. Unless the information is "secret," why bother? It adds extra time at his office's end (you don't think Leahy types in his password to PGP do you?), and it accomplishes little.
From a personal viewpoint, I'm glad my key is no longer very accessible. I used to get PGP-encrypted messages which had no earthly reason to be encrypted, except that people apparently wanted to practice their PGP skills. (For those who sent me items that had a reason to be encrypted, you know who you are and you know this comment does not apply to you.)
--Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."
Timothy C. May writes:
Why does anyone need his public key to communicate with Senator Leahy? If it's for sender-anonymity, this does not do it, though other tools (remailers) do.
Unless the information is "secret," why bother?
I would answer Tim, but I suspect that he would ignore something I might say. I will therefore quote Philip Zimmermann. Perhaps you think your E-mail is legitimate enough that encryption is unwarranted. If you really are a law-abiding citizen with nothing to hide, then why don't you always send your paper mail on postcards? Why not submit to drug testing on demand? Why require a warrant for police searches of your house? Are you trying to hide something? You must be a subversive or a drug dealer if you hide your mail inside envelopes. Or maybe a paranoid nut. Do law-abiding citizens have any need to encrypt their E-mail? What if everyone believed that law-abiding citizens should use postcards for their mail? If some brave soul tried to assert his privacy by using an envelope for his mail, it would draw suspicion. Perhaps the authorities would open his mail to see what he's hiding. Fortunately, we don't live in that kind of world, because everyone protects most of their mail with envelopes. So no one draws suspicion by asserting their privacy with an envelope. There's safety in numbers. Analogously, it would be nice if everyone routinely used encryption for all their E-mail, innocent or not, so that no one drew suspicion by asserting their E-mail privacy with encryption. Think of it as a form of solidarity. Never thought I would see the day where Tim stopped being a Cypherpunk. Everyone mark your calendars. Perry
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Unless the information is "secret," why bother? It adds extra time at his office's end (you don't think Leahy types in his password to PGP do you?), and it accomplishes little.
I agree with you to this point... Personally, I don't encrypt or even sign anything I send out, unless there is a reason to. For most of the mail I send out, I don't care if third parties read it, and most of it is so unimportant that if it were altered (highly unlikely) I wouldn't care. In fact, I can't recall the last time I encrypted a message (but I've signed a couple recently).
From a personal viewpoint, I'm glad my key is no longer very accessible. I used to get PGP-encrypted messages which had no earthly reason to be encrypted, except that people apparently wanted to practice their PGP
Now that's just plain un-cypherpunk of you. If people want to use PGP, let them use PGP! There are so many scripts etc. out there to make using PGP almost transparent, so decrypting your mail shouldn't be any harder than pressing a couple keys and typing in your passphrase. (I know, the passphrase is the killer.) Whatever happened to "Cypherpunks write code" and getting crypto out there? It's not enough for it to just be out there, people have to feel free to use it. Making your pgp key "no longer very accessible" doesn't exactly support that goal. Sorry if this is the 1001st reply you recieve. ===================================================================== | Steve Reid - SysAdmin & Pres, EDM Web (http://www.edmweb.com/) | | Email: steve@edmweb.com Home Page: http://www.edmweb.com/steve/ | | PGP Fingerprint: 11 C8 9D 1C D6 72 87 E6 8C 09 EC 52 44 3F 88 30 | | -- Disclaimer: JMHO, YMMV, IANAL. -- | ===================================================================:) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3ia Charset: noconv iQEVAwUBMYncPdtVWdufMXJpAQGowggAivgMhFbR1nMKFz7wWC6h4atBBVHD+jmP TIf/eBNj0UWXYywgfGdjS+UlrRC+u91nRmon6cWcZ7Zg5ctl0uNH6Ts162q3F3pH GjoismTYqVFhQZMNwGI60mXUqoQShfmQz9GUX/gU9HWta7pY7xOGVwJJwL5jkAHW ru1GtkLKVzr1ajYW+mg8Zrh+XsFTa8ruFEqN/eCx/AtOIXEmACj4qiwtDTC4WNXQ uDWjwSeDmtn1uS121PkUdw18uzl7mV7TpBbUJojWQACC+tW5GXeyh+2aziP8WIpM qqQyOQJ1UYzTIlXb8IBefwdsPlvKBvEaJdpmtwYLteCHMpsqSvGovQ== =dEm6 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- On Fri, 3 May 1996, Steve wrote:
Unless the information is "secret," why bother? It adds extra time at his office's end (you don't think Leahy types in his password to PGP do you?), and it accomplishes little.
I agree with you to this point... Personally, I don't encrypt or even sign anything I send out, unless there is a reason to. For most of the mail I send out, I don't care if third parties read it, and most of it is so unimportant that if it were altered (highly unlikely) I wouldn't care. In fact, I can't recall the last time I encrypted a message (but I've signed a couple recently).
Since I use UNIX, I have set up the mailing program so that it actually takes extra effort to not sign something. I have nothing to lose by signing my e-mail messages. Yes, I know that not everyone in the world uses UNIX and I don't know if there is a transparent mailing interface for Windoze or Macintosh. As for encryption, I encrypt a lot of my messages because if I only encrypted "secret" messages, that would automatically draw suspicion to every encrypted message that I send. I also always use ssh to log into my UNIX shell account. I know the probability of someone intercepting my password is low, but again I have nothing to lose.
Now that's just plain un-cypherpunk of you. If people want to use PGP, let them use PGP! There are so many scripts etc. out there to make using PGP almost transparent, so decrypting your mail shouldn't be any harder than pressing a couple keys and typing in your passphrase. (I know, the passphrase is the killer.)
As I said above, there is plenty of integration between PGP and UNIX mailers, but such is not the case for Windoze and Macintosh. - -- Mark =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= markm@voicenet.com | finger -l for PGP key 0xf9b22ba5 http://www.voicenet.com/~markm/ | bd24d08e3cbb53472054fa56002258d5 "The concept of normalcy is just a conspiracy of the majority" -me -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3 Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBMYpgfbZc+sv5siulAQFF1QP8DHrxzW3pkBxmHzWqUy5N79f3ECr2JJZa IFwwFnbj9T5d2ueqG7Ec7sGLk/HE4CfPky4WfZrRzJ3tNYOcgegYdKmvJ7Dv6W8z A5QSRtDo6YMko43goQgglXzuYDN65sBwwpIHoA6Qm2mjwSykBnmwrUJexOvR0aw9 gYBwt7pLYL0= =LdvT -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
Tim May wrote:
Unless the information is "secret," why bother? ...
I think its worth the bother as a necesary step in the process of making email match people's naive expections: that they are sending sealed letters, not postcards. I think it's particularly valuble in this case to reinforce the point in the Senator's mind that some of us want envelopes for our email, and that we require the technology needed to acomplished this. jps -- Jack P. Starrantino jpps@voicenet.com http://www.voicenet.com
participants (5)
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Jack P. Starrantino -
Mark M. -
Perry E. Metzger -
Steve -
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