Moving beyond "Reputation"--the Market View of Reality

[Greg Broiles]

At 02:26 PM 11/30/2001 -0800, Meyer Wolfsheim wrote:

> > Following which the buyer posts all the signed emails between self and
> > seller detailing the fraudulent transaction.
>
>Worthless, as all of those messages could have been forged. Or did you
>mean to say that they had been dated by a third party timestamping
>service?
>
>The fact is, digital signatures are irrelevant if private keys can be
>compromised.

I strongly suggest that you look beyond simple all-or-nothing thinking 
about digital signatures; they are neither the "undeniable irrevocable 
absolutely certain proof of enforceability" that their proponents want to 
believe, nor are they "irrelevant" or worthless because of the mere 
possibility of key compromise.

Other kinds of proof and evidence with respect to transactions and 
agreements admit many more levels of nuance, meaning, and reliability and 
there's no reason to expect that digital signatures will prove to be any 
different .. or should be any different.


--
Greg Broiles -- gbroiles at parrhesia.com -- PGP 0x26E4488c or 0x94245961
Eliminate due process, civil rights? It's the Constitution, stupid!