- cypherpunks-legacy@lists.ogf.org

Censorpunks Demand Action Against "D. Lewdud"
by tcmay＠netcom.com 28 Feb '93

28 Feb '93

The "Censorpunks" now demand that action be taken against the rantings of one "D. Lewdud," an apparent newcomer to this list! His calls for complete anonymity and even anarchy are dangerous and impermissable. He writes: >WHY DIGITAL ANONYMITY SHOULD BE UNRESTRICTED >by D. Lewdud > >I want net anonymity to be completely unrestrained, and anybody who >thinks otherwise is an unAmerican communist censor sleazebag Puritan >prude spy who should be ruthlessly exposed and stoned for the sheer >criminality of their ideas. (rest of this excellent, er, I mean "unacceptable," posting elided) Censorpunks, we cannot allow garbage like this to pollute our net! There ought to be a law! ....... But seriously, Lance Detweiler does raise some serious points. And I hope neither Lance, nor George Gleason, nor anyone else was too offended by my satire about censorship. I felt John Gilmore and others had made the "slippery slope" arguments well enough, and I would add my comments in the form of a satire (as I like to do...you ought to see some of my spoofs over on the Extropians list!). A few comments on Lance's points: Nobody has ever said the transition to crypto anarchy will be pleasant (remind me sometime to discuss how easy assassinations for pay will become, once untraceable and robust digital cash becomes possible--it'll curl your hair!). The key is that it's essentially unstoppable by simple legalistic means. New kinds of solutions, like "positive reputations," will have to evolve. (In this context, a positive reputation system means people only accept e-mail from names or digital pseudonyms they know or have reason to be interested in.) The stratagem of controlling flaky, bad, or illegal posts by cooperation of the remailers will not really work, as new digital pseudonyms will be easily generated (and only the last remailer, the one sending it to a pool or a newsgroup, has any real hope of "controlling" the content by reading the plaintext). At the risk of sounding like another satire, I could point to the obvious problems we have in free and open societies with _verbal_ abuse, threats, blackmail, lies, propaganda, and other unsavory behavior. I could then suggest that controls on free speech are needed (I can expect someone to chime in here with the chestnut about how you can't shout "Fire!" in a crowded theater...the Supreme Court justice who coined this later said he regretted ever doing so, as every censor used it to justify controls on speech). The price paid to reduce these nuisances is too high. By the way, I have some scenarios for how crypto anarchy may be fought, how it may fight back, what law enforcement may do, etc. These are from a 2.2 MB file for my still-unfinished novel on these topics. The relevant sections on crypto and crypto anarchy are about 200K. They're mostly in "MORE" format (an outliner for the Mac), and conversion to ASCII tends to produce some ugly line indentation problems (the subsections indent OK, but the following lines wrap back to the left margin). Still, perhaps I'll try to convert them into readable essays for this list, if there's any interest. -Tim May -- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: MailSafe and PGP available.

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Re: March 13 cypherpunks meeting
by geoffw＠nexsys.net 27 Feb '93

27 Feb '93

I live in Mountain View about 2 miles from Cygnus (a short drive or long walk) and can have a few people crash at my house. I have lots of floor space But not many beds (I do have two sofas) I think I can comfortably sleep 3 and sleep 5-6 in a pinch. My address is 316 Escuela Ave. #62 MTV CA. I have an apartment not a house, It's clean but not lavish. I do have a small internet so you can get e-mail and I'm one-hop away from the Internet. You don't have to pay me money but you do have to buy your own food and bring your own supplies. No smoking in the house but you can smoke out on the balcony. send me e-mail if you are interested. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- NEXUS SYSTEMS/CYBERTRIBE-5 Editor/Instigator/Catalyst : Geoff White <geoffw(a)nexsys.net> Production Crew : Universal Movement Trinity <umt(a)nexsys.net> --PGP Public key available upon request-- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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Re: more ideas on anonymity
by George A. Gleason 27 Feb '93

27 Feb '93

Re your posting on categories of offenses and so on. Agreed strongly that sites should post banners stating the policies they adhere to. I'd suggest the following division of offenses: 1) Anything involving physical violence, threats of violence, incitement to violence. (this includes acts such as rape, pedophelia etc., since these acts involve power as much as anything and can be seen as primarily violent acts) (this also includes things like Nazi propaganda where there is a historic precedent or strong undertone that violent acts are encouraged) 2) Other (not violent) crimes against persons or property. 3) Antisocial or questionable actions such as victimless crime, propagation of lies (for instance a faked Challenger transcript), violation of Net rules. Obviously these have descending levels of severity by most reasonable standards. I would not in any way make sysops or admins responsible for postings which may be illegal in their country of origin: both for pragmatic reasons (no one can possibly be held to know the laws in all the other participating countries) and for ethical reasons (stalinist coup in Russia; fascist consolidation in ex-Yugoslavia, now you have to play cop against dissidents from both; no thanks!). I believe unpopular opinions ought to be protected as long as they don't encourage illegal or violent actions. The test case for this is racism or some equivalent. If someone wants to argue a case that their race is the Master Race or whatnot, I can't see squelching them for making opinion-noise unless they're also e.g. advocating violence. Once we get in the opinion-censoring biz, it's a steep slippery slope. OTOH, we also shouldn't be an arm of LE, and hence the idea that discussing victimless crimes ought to be a very bottom-of-the-list kind of thing. -gg

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March 13 cypherpunks meeting
by Eric Hughes 27 Feb '93

27 Feb '93

Announcing: The First Annual Post-CFP cypherpunks meeting. The next physical meeting of cypherpunks will be March 13, 1993, at the usual time, noon, in the usual place, Cygnus Support Offices. This is one day after CFP-93, the third Conference on Computers, Freedom, and Privacy. CFP is an increasingly important conference concerning an only slightly broader spectrum of privacy issues than are normally discussed on the cypherpunks list. At the first CFP conference I met David Chaum, who awakened a latent interest in cryptography. This awakening led indirectly to the formation of this list. There will be people from all over the country there. We have set the date of our meeting so that they could attend. We are, in fact, going to give out an open invitation there. I would urge all of you who have been considering making a trek to come to one of these meetings to do so this time. And while I do not expect Dorothy Denning to show up (although she would be welcome, if uncomfortable), I do expect some surprises. Please surprise me yourself. If you need a place to stay, ask on the list. I myself am already putting up some friends before the conference. For that matter, I would urge all of you to come to the conference itself. If you can't afford to go, just remember that while the sessions you have to pay for, the hotel bar you do not. A word to the wise is sufficient. Thank you all. Eric ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- MEETING Date: Saturday, 13 March 1993 Time: 12:00 noon Where: Cygnus Support Offices, Mt. View, California SCHEDULE Meeting 12-6 Dinner 7-? AGENDA We have Arthur Abraham's talk on hash functions left over from last time, which was interrupted by a photo shoot. Scott Collins intimated that he'd have more results on random numbers. With the opportunity given to have so many people there, I'd suggest that discussion of cryptographic infrastructure would be appropriate, together with a goal setting session. Please discuss this on the list. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- DIRECTIONS Cygnus Support 1937 Landings Drive Mt. View, CA 94043 +1 415 903 1400 switchboard +1 415 903 1418 John Gilmore Take US 101 toward Mt. View. From San Francisco, it's about a 40-minute drive. Get off at the Rengstorff Ave/Amphitheatre Parkway exit. If you were heading south on 101, you curve around to the right, cross over the freeway, and get to a stoplight. If you were heading north on 101, you just come right off the exit to the stoplight. The light is the intersection of Amphitheatre and Charleston Rd. Take a right on Charleston; there's a right-turn-only lane. Follow Charleston for a short distance. You'll pass the Metaphor/Kaleida buildings on the right. At a clump of palm trees and a "Landmark Deli" sign, take a right into Landings Drive. At the end of the road, turn left into the complex with the big concrete "Landmark" sign. Follow the road past the deli til you are in front of the clock tower that rises out of one of the buildings, facing you. Enter through the doors immediately under the clock tower. They'll be open between noon and 1PM at least. (See below if you're late.) Once inside, take the stairs up, immediately to your right. At the top of the stairs, turn right past the treetops, and we'll be in 1937 on your left. The door is marked "Cygnus". If you are late and the door under the clock tower is locked, you can walk to the deli (which will be around the building on your left, as you face the door). Go through the gate in the fence to the right of the deli, and into the back lawns between the complex and the farm behind it. Walk forward and right around the buildings until you see a satellite dish in the lawn. Go up the stairs next to the dish, which are the back stairs into the Cygnus office space. We'll prop the door (or you can bang on it if we forget). Or, you can find the guard who's wandering around the complex, who knows there's a meeting happening and will let you in. They can be beeped at 965 5250, though you'll have trouble finding a phone. Don't forget to eat first, or bring food at noon! I recommend hitting the burrito place on Rengstorff (La Costen~a) at about 11:45. To get there, when you get off 101, take Rengstorff (toward the hills) rather than Amphitheatre (toward the bay). Follow it about ten blocks until the major intersection at Middlefield Road. La Costen~a is the store on your left at the corner. You can turn left into the narrow lane behind the store, which leads to a parking lot, and enter by the front door, which faces the intersection. To get to the meeting from there, just retrace your route on Rengstorff, go straight over the freeway, and turn right at the stoplight onto Charleston; see above. See you there! John Gilmore

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Hellman and DES
by Dave Banisar 27 Feb '93

27 Feb '93

I've talked to Martin Hellman quite a few times (he came to my last crypto conference and gave an overview of the field), he has never said that he could crack true DES. When DES first came out, he was one of the people most actively opposing the 56 bit key as being too small. At the time, he estimated that a machine of parallel processors could be built for $10M that would crack DES keys easily. DES at the time was only supposed to be for 10 years and then a new system was supposed to replace it. Today, he advocates for security that you triple-DES your communications/files. At last word (and I may have missed any advancements in the flame wars on sci.crypt), Shamir and Biham had cracked up to 2^^46, thats still quite a ways computationally from 2^^56. Dave

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Re: DES
by John.Nieder＠f33.n125.z1.FIDONET.ORG 27 Feb '93

27 Feb '93

* Reply to msg originally in Cypherpunks <INET> phiber(a)eff.org (Phiber Optik) writes: BK> Slow down. Firstly, DES encrypts a 64-bit block with a 56-bit key. BK> Are you talking about key lengths? Yes. BK> It was originally proposed to use a BK> 128-bit key space, alla IBM's LUCIFER. But they opted on the smaller BK> key, which fuels this NSA conspiracy theory. As was their reaction to Hellman's proposal for a 64-bit key and any other proposed out-of-house improvement at that time. BK> Saying that Hellman "broke" anything is a bit BK> strong. I remember reading a published paper, I believe by Hellman and BK> one other, describing that they were able to WEAKEN DES (with a smaller BK> key space for their experiment), using a statistical approach, and that BK> this could possibly be applied to the DES standard. I refer you to Warren on this. It was my understanding of the article that Hellman had actually decrypted DES cyphertext prepared with the then-proposed 54-bit key standard. BK> If you're not just some NSA-paranoid wacko, BK> reference some papers to back up your claims. Otherwise, you're just BK> another NSA-conspiracy theorist, and part of the noise. Please, there's no need for abuse here. I was referring to a published column by Jim Warren of the Electronic Frontiers Foundation in _MicroTimes_, a Bay Area computer paper. I do not know if you consider Warren or the EFF to be reputable. I assumed Warren's statements were factual. The assertion that Israeli intelligence made short work of DES was presented as I got it - an interesting rumor from someone who has been a fairly-reliable source of information in the past. BK> We're all BK> capable of suspecting underhandedness on the part of the NSA, but when BK> you start misrepresenting your opinions as fact, you're being BK> nonconstructive. I was merely relating published assertions by the EFF. If you believe these to be incorrect, then I'd advise you to take the issue up with Warren. I have no "opinion" in the matter, only suspicions. A great many people with academic background superior to mine also share these. My own background is in applied rather than theoretical security. I defer to academics in academic matters, but know that in matters of top security it is difficult to invest confidence in any mechanism as mired in continuing controversy as DES. That's all. JN ... "Oceania, 'tis for thee..." --- Blue Wave/Opus v2.12 [NR] -- John Nieder - via FidoNet node 1:125/555 UUCP - ...!uunet!hoptoad!kumr!fidogate!33!John.Nieder INTERNET - John.Nieder(a)f33.n125.z1.FIDONET.ORG

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What We Need to Censor
by tcmay＠netcom.com 27 Feb '93

27 Feb '93

I, too, am disturbed and worried by the abuses and politically incorrect postings being sent through anonymous remailers, so I support the calls by some on this list for censorship of various "bad" postings. Topics for banning: - hatred, such as the hatred some have for particular operating systems (unless the hatred is for DOS, which is justifiable, and hence acceptable). - advocacy of violence, which is why postings about Rambo movies and various porno movies (violence against women, don't you know?) need to be blocked by remailers. "Women Against Pornography" will be happy to instruct us on what media materials are acceptable and what are not. Jesse Helms, who is working closely with Andrea Dworkin and other feminists, will be happy to provide a list of banned topics. - this ban on advocating violence will also of course cover discussions of the Mideast, Bosnia, and the student uprisings in China several years ago (there was a lot of advocacy of violence then--can't have a repeat of that!). Let's all chant: "Hey Ho, Hi Ho, "rec.guns" has got to go." - ethnic slurs and advocacy of racial superiority (unless it involves the heartfelt calls for action by our oppressed African-American brothers and sisters, who have every right to call us honkies and advocate burning down our cities--we just can't tolerate those who call themselves "Aryan-Americans"). - advocacy of illegal acts, including nearly all postings to alt.drugs, alt.sex.children, talk.bizarre, and sci.crypt.underground. Come to think of it, perhaps those groups should just be shut down? - anonymous phone calls apparently are possible...perhaps we can require all phone calls go through government-cleared operators? And I have even heard that anonymous letters--even threats, blackmail (wonder where _that_ name came from?), pornography, and extortion demands--are possible using the U.S. mail system! How can this be? What can we do? I know, let's censor the mail system the same way we plan to censor the Net! So, you anarchists, let's implement these bans on what goes through remailers! One small problem: how can we do this when everyone's a remailer? When multiple routes exist? When sites are in many countries? Hmmmhhh...perhaps we censors just need to shut down the nets and stop all this loose talk. -Tim, applying for a job as a Usenet censor -- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: MailSafe and PGP available.

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Real World Kinda Guys Unite
by deltorto＠aol.com 27 Feb '93

27 Feb '93

>>Hal >> >>P.S. How about Deadbeat posting a public key? He keeps signing his >>messages but I can't check them. Yeah. How 'bout that, 'Beat? At _least_ we'd have the false security of being able to check your Pkey now and then... I feel full of Piss and Vinegar, so I'm volunteering to help get this WhistleBlowers thingus up and rolling. First, we need to disseminate PGP in it's various forms (UNIX, Amiga, Mac, DOS, etc) to some news agencies (e.g. TV stations, newspapers, radio like KQED, etc.). I need each person who represents a platform to send me a full package of PGP with Docs that I can have duped for mailing (for educational purposes only). No charge. We'll begin with a core group of media people and see how it goes. I have floated a few trial balloons and they're ready to bite. I suspect that we'll see it take off like a rocket, as Tim May suggested. All this discussion is truly fascinating, but if it doesn't get out into the real world it ain't worth the media it's magnetized on. I guess I'm just a real world kinda guy. 1. Let's get a reasonably friendly anon remailer process going for them. It *must* come with complete instructions for the hapless many. Get writing and send 'em to me. I am working on some simple instructions for MacPGP and will post an example as soon as I can get through all the damn mail in my various mboxes. (Overload!) 2. Let's hook some Govt. employees into it ASAP and really get this whistleblowing thing going. I want to stir up some mud at the bottom like Kelly suggests and I want it done NOW. 3. I need help from ALL of you to do this. I am beginning to compile a comprehensive list of Govt Officials from the White House on down thru the Congress to the Cabinet and the Joint Chiefs. This database will include their various addresses (USM and email), their many phone and fax numbers, and other pertinent info (party, salary, etc.). Anyone can have a copy when I finish it. I hope to make it fairly administration-independent so it will last and will probably set up a process on CompuServe so that public can send in updates as officials are un-appointed, die and/or are voted out of office, etc. 4. Eventually, we'll do an anonymous posting to a massive number of Govt sites inviting WBlowers to post to the list and inviting Press people to log on and download the dirt. I will be at the Modern Times bookstore event on March 7th in San Francisco if anyone wants to discuss this. I would also dearly like to attend CFP, but I haven't yet found a way to do it without money (anyone who knows a way I can volunteer my way in and help out please say so - I'll sweep up after, anything...). d2t

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Re: more ideas on anonymity
by George A. Gleason 27 Feb '93

27 Feb '93

I agree with Jim that I may be treading a thin line on censorship, but consider the following: someone posts a series of inflammatory statements with the intent of stirring up trouble, attracts a following, and starts organising them for some kind of violence. Then one day along comes a message to start the race war or whatever. The next day there are a bunch of random acts of violence. Uh-oh... The point is that this is a broadcast medium, though without the limitations of conventional broadcast. I think we may end up facing these issues one way or another, sooner or later. Hopefully, LE can prevent violent acts by conventional means without resorting to limiting privacy. The thing is though, given the increasing cultural diversity in society and its resulting flattening of the normal curve of acceptable behavior, we're more and more going to be facing issues which are located in the depths of murky gray areas and in which we may find ourselves needing to tread fine lines, split hairs, and make all kinds of distinctions where there are no firm certainties. (run-on sentence alert!) -gg

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Biham and Shamir on cracking DES
by Marc Horowitz 27 Feb '93

27 Feb '93

This is, I believe, the state of the art in published techniques to break DES. Note that this attack is basically useless against one-time or short-lived keys, since there's no chance to make repeated chosen plaintext attacks against the key. Short form: If you can get me to encrypt 2**37 plaintexts *of* *your* *choice* against my key, you can crack it. Marc This info is forwarded from a friend. Eli Biham and Adi Shamir, "Differential Cryptanalysis of the full 16-round DES," December 19, 1991. The paper was announced in Dec. '91 on the net, and paper copies circulated from people who had gotten copies directly from Biham & Shamir. The paper was submitted to Crypto '92 and presented there on August 20, 1992. The Crypto '92 proceedings will be published by Springer-Verlag at some point, so you could also reference it this way: {\sl E.~Biham and A.~Shamir}, Differential Cryptanalysis of the full 16-round DES, {\sl Advances in Cryptology: Proceedings of Crypto '92}, E.~Brickell, ed., {\sl Lecture Notes in Computer Science}, Springer-Verlag, New York, to appear. Biham is at Technion - Israel Inst. of Tech. Shamir is at Weizmann Inst. of Science. I don't know of an FTP site where the paper is available.

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