Email tapping by ISPs, forwarder addresses, and crypto proxies

[Major Variola (ret)]

At 12:39 AM 7/22/04 -0500, J.A. Terranson wrote:
>On Wed, 21 Jul 2004, Major Variola (ret) wrote:
>
>> I'm following the Principle of not underestimating the
>> adversary,
>
>Don't go overboard: remember that there is a difference between
>underestimating your adversary and unrealistically *over*estimating
your
>adversary.

Good point.  Channelling Hettinga, crypto is economics.

>I (and I suspect you) live in the "high tech" world,

Um, yes :-)

>while a large part of academia tends to believe that the USG is around
ten
>years *behind* them (oh, to have such an ego!).  In my personal
>experience, they tend to have roughly a five year lead on what my
>world considers "bleeding edge".  That said, I'm willing to cut them a
few
>more years of slack when doing the necessary threat assessment, but I
just
>do not believe they are 20, or even 10 years ahead.  And that is not an

>"idle" belief, it's a considered, long formed opinion, based on an
awful
>lot of input data.

Fair 'nuff.  You know that 5 year predictions are too conservative, and
20 year predictions too liberal.  Ask Orwell.

My point is only that they will be killed should they leak their
actual capabilities.

>> Perhaps that grants the Maryland trogdyltes too much, but again,
>> conservatism rules in this game.
>
>Conservatism in the real world, unreasonable paranoia in the academic
>world (a necessary thing in that context).

My academic experience had nothing to do with networking.  I'm just
a manic mechanic, okay?


>> They also get radioisotope power supplies, etc.
>
>This is actually a *very* good point.  It would also address the
off-shore
>splice vs power issue nicely.  But we are still constrained by
backhaul.

Ergo my dark fiber remark, even if naif.

>Yes, VA and DC have gluts of glass.  In fact, that is one of the most
>concentrated glut areas.

And most worth observing...

>While this cannot be discounted in toto, the tech comes to them from
>academia (most of the time), so generally, if you are widely read,
you'll
>have a pretty good idea of what's *possible*.  You are likely dead-on
>accurate about the fabs though.

In the *public* lit.

>> Albeit, "Nortel" (even if Canadian, eh?)
>
>Yup.  The Irony Meter is hanging out at the right of the scale again
:-)

Bent so many needles, I don't even know my real name...

>Undersea taps are hard.  No matter how you figure it.

You think subs are just toys?

>The actual intel/counterintel guys make shit for money.

What I meant was, Ames and that FBI dude Hansen (sp?), at least the KGB
got Ames' wife as part of the package, whereas the FBI CI dude
let his wife off as part of the deal he cut.  Nice xian that he was, he
was
into strippers.

All under $2e6, all capable of reading their own records.  Go figure,
eh?

See you in Athens, or before :-)