Official Anonymizing

[Phillip H. Zakas]

> A. Melon writes:
> John Young takes a courageous stand:
>
> > I propose that all anonymizers adopt a code of practice that
> > any sale to officials of anonymizers or their use be disclosed
> > to the public (I suggested this to ZKS early on when first
> > meetings with the feds to explain the technology were being
> > sometimes disclosed). That seems to be a reasonable response
> > to officially-secret prowling and investigating cyberspace.
>
> Absolutely appropriate, given cypherpunk goals.  It may be difficult
> to apply in every case but the intention is laudable.
>
> Here is an example of the principle put into practice, from the
> anonymous web proxy service at http://proxy.magusnet.com/proxy.html:
>
> : If you are accessing this proxy from a *.mil or *.gov address
> : it will not work.

Given the amount of federal research conducted at the poles you might end up
blocking santa claus (which would piss him and his gang of elves off.)

It's impossible to determine the ultimate end-user.  For example, what if a
university performs secure computing research via a federal grant or
directly for an agency?  Are you going to block *.edu?  What if an
agency/contractor/employee/grantee uses comcast business internet access?
Or speakeasy sdsl service? What about using a qwest cybercenter and peering
with dozens of tier-one providers?  are you going to block the ones that do
business with the government?  What about international carriers?  Will you
block Deutsche Telekom just because the german govt. uses DT?  The world is
too complex for simple rules such as the above regardless of the intent of
the rules.

phillip