Re: PA Remailer Concerns
Has anyone examined the legislative history associated with this statute? I would be surprised if they were singling out anonymous remailers. They may have had other concerns regarding phone abuse, e.g., long distance fraud. Then again, I could be full of it...
On Sat, 14 Oct 1995 anonymous-remailer@shell.portal.com wrote:
I would be surprised if they were singling out anonymous remailers. They may have had other concerns regarding phone abuse, e.g., long distance fraud.
I am sure no PA state legislator knows what an anonymous remailer is. They have just made them illegal though. The question is, will the police ever figure out what they are, and will they ever bother to selectively enforce the law. -Thomas
I am sure no PA state legislator knows what an anonymous remailer is. They have just made them illegal though. The question is, will the police ever figure out what they are, and will they ever bother to selectively enforce the law.
More likely the law will be used when a remailer operator wont play ball with the local LEA and surrender any existing logs. Then the LEA can simply throw the operator into a court under this legislation. If (when?) something serious is perpetrated and planned using a remailer then they will have the motivation to shut them down. Cheers, Mark mark@lochard.com.au The above opinions are rumoured to be my own.
[I'm sending this to the cypherpunks and remailer-operators lists. Replies are directed to c'punks, just to avoid crossposting followups, but I read both lists. -Futplex] Mark writes: [re: a new Pennsylvania law]
More likely the law will be used when a remailer operator wont play ball with the local LEA and surrender any existing logs. Then the LEA can simply throw the operator into a court under this legislation.
If (when?) something serious is perpetrated and planned using a remailer then they will have the motivation to shut them down.
I would very much like to see this law tested. I think it could prove fairly important to attack it with a well-planned, benign test case rather than wait for the next National Liberation spam or a death threat. I don't live in PA, but I would be willing to participate as the defendant in a test case under the right circumstances. Presumably I would open an account with an ISP in Penna., set up a remailer on the account (need to find an ISP that clearly allows that), and have somebody send a message through it. We would need to design a promising test case and find an attorney willing & able to offer pro bono services. Any comments or suggestions, esp. from legal types (who of course are not offering formal legal advice to anyone :) ? Is this realistic ? What would it take to elicit a prosecution for such a test case ? -Futplex <futplex@pseudonym.com>
I've sent mail to John Gilmore asking him if the EFF might want to take part in suing the state over this thing. We'll see, I guess. -- sameer Voice: 510-601-9777 Community ConneXion FAX: 510-601-9734 The Internet Privacy Provider Dialin: 510-658-6376 http://www.c2.org (or login as "guest") sameer@c2.org
On Mon, 16 Oct 1995, Mark wrote:
More likely the law will be used when a remailer operator wont play ball with the local LEA and surrender any existing logs. Then the LEA can simply throw the operator into a court under this legislation.
Make fake logs. A random log generator with the e-mail addresses of the country's state, municipal and federal legislators, schoolchildren and a random sampling of the (*!ahem!*) tamer usenet groups would make for an excellent seed file. I really don't see there being very much enforcement following an initial case. It would do wonders for Nobody, an12345 and Tommy de Tourist's (as Tim's sig puts it) reputations, wouldn't you say?
The above opinions are rumoured to be my own. You aren't sure either, eh?
On the banque des cypherpunks front, I recently pinged cthulhu.com as a joke. It worked. One wonders if the offshore and underwater Ryleh inc. is passing itself off as a PPP account as it prepares to resurface. They're just waiting for a sign. I know who my banker's gonna be. Somehow I don't think US jurisdiction extends just that far. Takes care of black securities & banking probs too. Who'd dare to cross the big boss? (looking forward to anonymous, untraceable, digital ftagn$)
participants (6)
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anonymous-remailer＠shell.portal.com -
futplex＠pseudonym.com -
Mark -
s1018954＠aix2.uottawa.ca -
sameer -
Thomas Grant Edwards