[jason at lunkwill.org: Re: Pseudonymity for tor: nym-0.1 (fwd)]

[Tyler Durden]

Just a thought.

Wikipedia entries from anonymous sources, such as Tor, should have an 
expiration date and revert back, unless a Wiki Admin or other trusted user 
OKs the new entry.

-TD


>From: Eugen Leitl <eugen at leitl.org>
>To: cypherpunks at jfet.org
>Subject: [jason at lunkwill.org: Re: Pseudonymity for tor: nym-0.1 (fwd)]
>Date: Fri, 30 Sep 2005 10:34:00 +0200
>
>----- Forwarded message from Jason Holt <jason at lunkwill.org> -----
>
>From: Jason Holt <jason at lunkwill.org>
>Date: Thu, 29 Sep 2005 23:32:48 +0000 (UTC)
>To: or-talk at seul.org
>Subject: Re: Pseudonymity for tor: nym-0.1 (fwd)
>Reply-To: or-talk at freehaven.net
>
>
>
>---------- Forwarded message ----------
>Date: Thu, 29 Sep 2005 23:32:24 +0000 (UTC)
>From: Jason Holt <jason at lunkwill.org>
>To: Ian G <iang at systemics.com>
>Cc: cryptography at metzdowd.com
>Subject: Re: Pseudonymity for tor: nym-0.1 (fwd)
>
>
>On Thu, 29 Sep 2005, Ian G wrote:
> >Couple of points of clarification - you mean here
> >CA as certificate authority?  Normally I've seen
> >"Mint" as the term of art for the "center" in a
> >blinded token issuing system, and I'm wondering
> >what the relationship here is ... is this something
> >in the 1990 paper?
>
>Actually, it was just the closest paper at hand for what I was trying to 
>do,
>which is "nymous accounts", just as you say.  So I probably shouldn't have
>referred to "spending" at all.
>
>My thinking is that if all Wikipedia is trying to do is enforce a low
>barrier of pseudonymity (where we can shut off access to persons, based on 
>a
>rough assumption of scarce IPs or email addresses), a trivial blind
>signature system should be easy to implement.  No certs, no roles, no CRLs,
>just a simple blindly issued token.  And in fact it took me about 4 hours
>(while the conversation on or-talk has been going on for several days...)
>
>There are two problems with what I wrote. First, the original system is
>intended for cash instead of pseudonymity, and thus leaves the spender a
>disincentive to duplicate other serial numbers (since you'd just be accused
>of double spending); this is a problem since if an attacker sees you use
>your token, he can get the same token signed for himself and besmirch your
>nym. And second, it would be a pain to glue my scripts into an existing
>authentication system.
>
>Both problems are overcome if, instead of a random token, the client blinds
>the hash of an X.509 client cert.  Then the returned signature gives you a
>complete client cert you can plug into your web browser (and which web
>servers can easily demand).  Of course, you can put anything you want in 
>the
>cert, since the servers know that my CA only certifies 1 bit of data about
>users (namely, that they only get one cert per scarce resource).  But the
>public key (and verification mechanisms built in to TLS) keeps abusers from
>being able to pretend they're other users, since they won't have the users'
>private keys.
>
><rant>
>The frustrating part about this is the same reason why I'm getting out of
>the credential research business.  People have solved this problem before
>(although I didn't know of any Free solutions; ADDS and SOX are hard to
>google -- are they Free?).  I even came up with at least a proof of concept
>in an afternoon. And yet the argument on the list went on and on, /without
>even an acknowledgement of my solution/.  Everybody just kept debating the
>definitions of anonymity and identity, and accusing each other of anarchy
>and tyranny.  We go round and round when we talk about authentication
>systems, but never get off the merry-go-round.
>
>Contrast that with Debevec's work at Berkeley; Ph.D in 1996 on "virtual
>cinematography", then The Matrix comes out in 1999 using his techniques and
>revolutionizes action movies.  Sure, graphics is easier because it doesn't
>require everyone to agree on an /infrastructure/, but then, neither does 
>the
>tor/wikipedia problem.  I'm grateful for guys like Roger Dingledine and 
>Phil
>Zimmerman who actually make a difference with a privacy system, but they
>seem to be the exception, rather than the rule.
></rant>
>
>So thanks for at least taking notice.
>
>						-J
>
>----- End forwarded message -----
>--
>Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a>
>______________________________________________________________
>ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820            http://www.leitl.org
>8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A  7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE
>
>[demime 1.01d removed an attachment of type application/pgp-signature which 
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