November 2014 - cypherpunks - lists.cpunks.org

Darknets/science vs. GPA/LEA/Law, and playing dirty pool
by grarpamp 08 Nov '14

08 Nov '14

On Fri, Nov 7, 2014 at 9:29 AM, Öyvind Saether <oyvinds(a)everdot.org> wrote: >> http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-29950946 > > "The BBC understands that the raid represented both a technological > breakthrough - with police using new techniques to track down the > physical location of dark net servers" > > They do have the capability to locate Tor hidden services at this point. > > To those who want to pretend otherwise: The first step to fixing a > problem is to admit that it exists. There is no point in pretending > these .onion sites are secure anymore. The only interesting question > now is: How can this be fixed? > > They could simply look for high amounts of Tor traffic and pull the > plug in IPs whos traffic pattern look like it may be a hidden service > and see if anything goes down. This is a critical weakness of any anonymous system if... the way things are looking worldwide, GPA's seem to be the real deal and they seem to have no problem handing off to the LE side, and laws be damned... well, the old ways are over, it's the Wild West. Filling all the network links with chaff could be a way to protect users (maybe they were just loading the homepage over and over), but they could still bounce all the IP's to look for servers. There may be an oppurtunity for the operators of anonymous services to band together and monitor themselves or each other for bounces simply to confirm if bounce tests are infact happening against all such service participants, high data/connection rate ones, services based on age of identity key, or any other such class they are able to identify. And they'd have to characterize true bounces from network reachability anomalys. This is hard to defend against. Store-and-forward... maybe. Decentralized p2p/blockchain... more likely, at least for market-like things that could be modeled as transaction-listing-like things. Another way to test is for someone to use perfect opsec (wifi, tor, bitcoin, etc), and actually run a number of illegal sites and see what happens. Then consider some sites may be allowed to live even if actionable, or simply won't be taken down if there are no real world links to act on. Tor had one recent whitepaper that claimed to have actually located hidden services (real or test) within a minor budget and timeframe by abusing nothing other than the Tor network itself. Right? Has anyone replicated that work? People need to be analysing these court documents very carefully to see what bits of knowledge can be drawn from them. That's a project in itself and EFF/Tor wiki would be a good home to begin cataloging them all and making notes of such things in each case. It's pretty obvious something is going on besides opsec, especially with the quotes in the news. Question is, what is it? Tests need done, knowledge needs found, capabilities need catalogued, and defenses need developed. Step by step, scientific method. While you're at it, play some dirty pool in return, set up a bounty for leakers. Cash, sex, drugs, whatever. Not everyone is motivated by the same things Ellsberg/Snowden et al are. > Regardless of how it is actually done: It seems perfectly clear that > they are able to identify the servers hosting hidden services. Those > who pretend otherwise at this point are either cointelpro/military/law > enforcement or morons.

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Re: [Cryptography] Third amendment crypto defenses
by grarpamp 07 Nov '14

07 Nov '14

On Fri, Nov 7, 2014 at 4:37 PM, Steve Furlong <demonfighter(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On Fri, Nov 7, 2014 at 2:46 PM, Phillip Hallam-Baker <phill(a)hallambaker.com> > wrote: >> >> I think there is a reasonable interpretation >> which would find that the military should not have anything to do with >> such activities. > > Check the cypherpunks archives from 2001 or 2002. This is not a new idea. http://www.metzdowd.com/mailman/listinfo/cryptography Forwarding context to cpunks... http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/wmborj/vol2/iss1/4 http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/07/22/third-amendment-nsa-spying… http://misguidedchildren.com/technology/2014/01/nsa-violating-3rd-amendment…

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Node Operators Web Of Trust
by grarpamp 07 Nov '14

07 Nov '14

Is it not time to establish a node operator web of trust? Look at all the nodes out there with or without 'contact' info, do you really know who runs them? Have you talked with them? What are their motivations? Are they your friends? Do you know where they work, such as you see them every day stocking grocery store, or in some building with a badge on it? Does their story jive? Are they active in the community/spaces we are? Etc. This is huge potential problem. NOWoT participation is optional, it is of course infiltratable, and what it proves may be arguable, but it seems a necessary thing to try as a test of that and to develop a good model. Many operators know each other in person. And the node density per geographic region supports getting out to meet operators even if only for the sole purpose of attesting 'I met this blob of flesh who proved ownership of node[s] x'. That's a big start, even against the sybil agents they'd surely send out to meet you. Many know exactly who the other is in the active community such that they can attest at that level. And so on down the line of different classes of trust that may be developed and asserted over each claimed operator. Assuming a NOWoT that actually says something can be established, is traffic then routable by the user over nodes via trust metrics in addition to the usual metrics and randomness? WoT's are an ancient subject... now what are the possibilities and issues when asserting them over physical nodes, not just over virtual nodes such as an email address found in your pubkey? And what about identities that exist only anonymously yet can prove control over various unique resources? If such WoT's cannot be proven to have non-value, then it seems worth doing. This doesn't just apply to Tor, but to any node based system.

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Re: [tor-relays] [tor-talk] Platform diversity in Tor network [was: OpenBSD doc/TUNING]
by grarpamp 07 Nov '14

07 Nov '14

On Thu, Nov 6, 2014 at 2:43 AM, David Serrano <tor(a)dserrano5.es> wrote: > On 2014-11-05 23:58:43 (-0500), grarpamp wrote: >> >> The real problem below is the 96% allocation of opensource to >> Linux and 4% to Other opensource. > >> Someone should really do an analysis of platform vs. exit bandwidth >> as well. Anyone? > > Here ya go. Observed bandwidth per OS in relays having the exit flag: > > 93.62% 4459816582 Linux > 4.51% 214639363 FreeBSD > 1.25% 59672066 Windows > 0.25% 11754598 Darwin > 0.17% 7896687 Bitrig > 0.15% 6964863 OpenBSD > 0.06% 3091495 SunOS This excessive Linux dominance in both node count and bandwidth really should be balanced out, like why not? I'd expect if some of the big relays switch to any other OS that would flatten out the bandwidth part pretty easily. You'd have to check say the top 10, 25, 50 or so relays to see to what extent they are part of this mess, I'm sure it's similar.

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Reverse Engineered Google Docs
by Александр 06 Nov '14

06 Nov '14

http://features.jsomers.net/how-i-reverse-engineered-google-docs/

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open ASIC SoC
by coderman 06 Nov '14

06 Nov '14

given interest in open source privacy enhancing technologies, what about open ASIC SoC for privacy routers and other hw? - 32bit RISC opencores. http://cdn.opencores.org/pdf/or1k-asic.pdf - TRNG series as native instruction; avalanche + RF + slow sampled from fast pair into aligned memory target as raw samples, each source tunable via MSR. http://www.cryptography.com/public/pdf/VIA_rng.pdf , http://moonbaseotago.com/onerng/ - Fab with chain of custody via domestic 22-nm foundry services. (Intel, other?) - Random quality and critical component validation with a FEI Versa 3D tear down , http://siliconexposed.blogspot.de/2014/03/getting-my-feet-wet-with-invasive… what else required? (IOMMU isolation?)

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cypherpunk consortium for carefree crossings
by coderman 06 Nov '14

06 Nov '14

regarding border crossing behaviors of the powers that be, it seems the most expedient response to detainments and data dupe'ings [0][1][2] is to answer with deterrent. possibilities to dissuade dastardly detours: - sunlight the best disinfectant; publicize attempts at intimidation and friction at crossings. - every detainment incurs a disclosure of intelligence collection technique. (requires a pool of un-disclosed spook ballast) - every detour spurs privacy enhancing technology development. a bounty for the most desired improvements, aggressive tactics lead directly to more users, better features, stronger privacy. other ideas? how many Tor trac tickets threatened to be develop to ensure ioerror a safe domestic passage? best regards, 0. "... her work has been hampered by constant harassment by border agents during more than three dozen border crossings into and out of the United States. She has been detained for hours and interrogated and agents have seized her computer, cell phone and reporters notes and not returned them for weeks." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laura_Poitras#Government_surveillance 1. "I'm flying back to the US after writing about helping Ed Snowden and the journalists he leaked documents to. Wish me luck at the border." - https://twitter.com/micahflee/status/529191556897443840 2. "I'm looking forward to the time when we don't have to worry about politically motivated US border harassment. A distant time, probably." - https://twitter.com/ioerror/status/529206920838930433

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Re: [tor-relays] [tor-talk] Platform diversity in Tor network [was: OpenBSD doc/TUNING]
by grarpamp 06 Nov '14

06 Nov '14

>> I'd agree simply because Windows presents a much larger attack surface. The >> amount of code running on a minimal Unix installation plus Tor is a lot less >> than a Windows system, especially network facing code. > ... > Running code, or network accessible code? Either way I don't see how > you came to that calculation. 'Minimal' Unix + Tor + SSH restricted > by SSH Key vs 'Minimal' Windows + Tor + RDP restricted by Client > Certificate. I also don't know what you mean by 'minimal' as very few > ... > I think a Windows Server, properly configured, is roughly as secure as > a properly configured Linux Server. > ... > I think there have been more bugs that result in RCE on production > Linux servers running SSH and a webserver in the past 4 years than > there have been in production Windows servers running RDP and IIS. > ... > I think if you're pointing fingers at China and the NSA, you should > assume they have RCE in both Windows and Linux. > ... > I think running relays on Windows Servers is no worse than running > relays on Linux Servers, and therefore it is good to do, because it > adds diversity to the network. Attack surface on a well adminned relay comes down to three things: - Network stack itself (kernel) - Daemon software itself (tor + remote admin) - Their respective use of other kernel/library/shell provided resources. I might suggest the current proportion of Windows to Linux is roughly ideal. This is primarily because, all other things set equal at 'minimal' (= tor + remote admin), good adminning, and good control of corporate secrets (or moles)... Windows still has one huge strategic weakness at that point... the magic packet. It's the whole binary vs. opensource argument. So essentially, the correct ratio of the two might be the odds you place that a binary OS has a magic packet. Today's node count shows 73% to opensource platforms. I'd suspect 73% is about where a lot of analysts might bet on Windows being magical, whether by/for the NSA, or any other reason or source. (Remember this... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSAKEY That was just from running 'strings'. Good luck trolling all of Windows with a disassembler... a nice fat payoff if you do. And the number of disassembling vs. opensource auditors is probably even more heavily skewed. And Windows is 'trusted' by buyers, nor can you replicate their binaries from any 'source code sharing agreements'. Then it's Patch Tuesday again... so it could be no one has or ever will disassemble audit it. So odds end up being pitched instead. And for many applications, that's good enough.) The real problem below is the 96% allocation of opensource to Linux and 4% to Other opensource. That's something that should be fixed. For these purposes, it doesn't matter which BSD/Other you pick... once you get the security odds there back towards say 50:50 Linux:Other, then you can debate userland and relative security amongst them all you want. Here's some links to get you started, including two other main branches of the Unix Kernel family tree at the bottom... 5939 Linux 1591 Windows 173 FreeBSD http://www.freebsd.org/ 56 Darwin 44 OpenBSD http://www.openbsd.org/ 7 NetBSD http://netbsd.org/ 6 SunOS 4 Bitrig https://www.bitrig.org/ 2 GNU/kFreeBSD https://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/ 2 DragonFly http://www.dragonflybsd.org/ 0 Illumos (OpenSolaris) http://wiki.illumos.org/display/illumos/Distributions 0 Minix http://www.minix3.org/ Official metrics... https://metrics.torproject.org/network.html Someone should really do an analysis of platform vs. exit bandwidth as well. Anyone? Also, isn't there some project out there that is counting the historical number of kernel bugs+severity per OS over time? [To cpunks to cover all the other volunteer node based networks out there that could benefit from tuning their platform ratios.]

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Cody Wilson to run for Bitcoin Foundation board, plans its destruction
by grarpamp 05 Nov '14

05 Nov '14

http://upstart.bizjournals.com/entrepreneurs/hot-shots/2014/11/04/cody-wils…

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Crypto collision used to hijack Windows Update goes mainstream
by Georgi Guninski 05 Nov '14

05 Nov '14

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/05/md5_hash_collision/ The cryptographic hash collision attack used by cyberspies to subvert Microsoft's Windows Update has gone mainstream, revealing that MD5 is hopelessly broken.

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