- cypherpunks-legacy@lists.ogf.org

Moral dilemma.
by Johan Helsingius 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

This is a typical example of the dilemmas faced by an anon posting operator. Here is my reply to the complaint from an user in rec.music.gdead. Don't feel good about it, but... ------- Forwarded Message To: <DELETED> Subject: Re: abuse of internet access > To whom it may concern: > > I direct your attention to the following post made on the rec.music.gdead > newsgroup: > > Article 30001 (26 more) in rec.music.gdead: > From: an13488(a)anon.penet.fi > Subject: Tickets available > Organization: Anonymous contact service > X-Anonymously-To: rec.music.gdead > Date: Thu, 25 Feb 1993 20:48:01 GMT > Lines: 28 > > > We have the following tickets available: > > Rosemont: > 3/9 12 tickets > 3/10 6 tickets, 4 taper tickets > 3/11 10 tickets, 8 taper tickets > > Richfield: > 3/14 12 tickets > > Landover: > 3/16 12 tickets > 3/17 12 tickets, 6 taper tickets > > > 3/17 12 tickets, 6 taper tickets > 3/18 6 tickets, 2 taper tickets > > Tickets will be sold for best offer. Include your phone number with your > bid. Winning bidders will be contacted by phone to arrange payment > and delivery of tickets. We accept Visa and Mastercard. Bids are > taken up to 5 days before the show, although we may contact you earlier > if we feel your bid is suficient to warrant immediate sale. > - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- > To find out more about the anon service, send mail to help(a)anon.penet.fi. > Due to the double-blind system, any replies to this message will be anonymized, > and an anonymous id will be allocated automatically. You have been warned. > Please report any problems, inappropriate use etc. to admin(a)anon.penet.fi. > *IMPORTANT server security update*, mail to update(a)anon.penet.fi for details. > > > This is ticket scalping, pure and simple (selling a ticket for higher than its > value. This is extremely illegal in the United States. This is also a posting > promoting a private enterprise for profit on the internet, extremely unethical. > > Furthermore, the people who are doing this are selling what are known a > s > "taper tickets". These tickets are only available through the Grateful Dead Ti > cket Service via mail order. The reason GDTS does this is to help deter scalpe > rs. I hereby request 2 courses of action from you: > > 1)You immediately suspend Internet access priveleges of the individual(s) > responsible for this posting. > > 2)You provide the individual's (or individuals') name(s) to the Grateful > Dead Ticket Service so they may take legal action against these criminals. > > I hope my letter is merely one of many that have reached you concerning this su > bject. I assure you, there are many people who will not tolerate this and > will do everything in their power to see that these people are caught and stopp > ed. Furthermore, if you are going to offer people anonymous Internet access, > be prepared to face the consequences when your clients break U.S. law. As far > as I am concerned, you are an accessory and should do everything in your power > to rectify this situation. > > I hope you take the time to respond and tell me what measures you have taken. I have sent the person a message informing him/her that the account will be blocked if the inappropriate postings continue. In an international world, where laws, customs and morals vary from one place and culture to another, and where a lot of people are trying to force their views onto others, the only way a service like anon.penet.fi can operate is by very simple and firm rules that are followed without exception. One rule is that I *never* reveal the true identity of an anon user, and another is that I *never* block access to the server without warning and without giving the person a chance to defend him/herself. I do understand your views, and I am very sympatetic to them, but I hope you also realize that inpartial service requires "blind" abiding to these rules. Julf ------- End of Forwarded Message

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Re: Poor Man's Anonymous Remailer
by George A. Gleason 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

Re Thug & Phiber on the long-term chances that OSPS will forward the entire number to the destination.... The solution to this is Anonymous Diverters. You have pairs of telephone numbers set up. Callers come in on one side, and are connected to the other side behind a toll-restrictor that only allows calls beginning with 1-800+. The minimum configuration is two lines, one in and one out. With a PBX you can handle from three patches at one time all the way up to 10,000. I can provide hardware and associated programming to anyone who is interested in starting one of these services. When using an Anonymous Diverter, the destination 800-number only gets the ANI of the diverter's outgoing side. Now of course, Big Brother can simply watch the incoming side of the diverter if he wants to, but at least this keeps your originating number secret from the destination 800-number. Right now there are 900/976 numbers set up with this kind of service, but I don't see any evidence that they are designed for data applications; and the per-minute rates are typically way high. What is needed is a network of local service providers who can do the same job either free as a public service or at a reasonable cost. One way to provide service at reasonable cost is to have prepaid flat-rate cash accounts from regular subscribers and give each of them some kind of password (no ID there either; you pay cash and choose your password, it never ties in to your name or anything else). This is also something we can set up on our larger PBXs if you're interested. Come to think of it, we have a client whose PBX would be ideal for this, but we have to check with them. It would only be open on an after-hours basis of course, when they're not using the lines. And it won't cost them anything since those 800+ calls are free. Now also, if anyone in the Bay Area wants to set up one of these, the actual monthly cost is less than $50.00 for lines, plus line cards at the rate of about $600 per each eight trunks (four links through the system). Anyone interested...? We're going to be putting in a larger switch later this year which will also give us the ability to do those anonymous cash accounts such that you could have toll-call dialling privileges through the system on a prepaid basis. Anyone interested in *that*...? - gg(a)well.sf.ca.us

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1000 points of light?
by fergp＠sytex.com 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

<dmandl(a)shearson.com> David Mandl writes - DM> Yup, there are dozens of reasons to want anonymity. This DM> should be completely obvious to anyone moving in cypherpunk DM> circles--or alt.sex circles, where, amazingly, some DM> well-respected sexosophists actually spoke out against anonymous DM> posting recently. No offense intended, but anyone who can't think DM> of situations where anonymity is essential should get out more. DM> Any first grader can list dozens of places where even mild DM> blasphemy will get you locked up for a long time. [Begin Zerowork DM> tangent] And even if you think the U.S. isn't one of them (which DM> it is), keep in mind that most workplaces are effectively stalinist DM> dictatorships, and bosses may not be thrilled about having their DM> employees discuss crypto anarchy, the overthrow of governments, or DM> S & M on the net. Point taken, however there will be those who will argue that, "S & M has no business being discussed on the net in the first place." Not exactly my sentiment, but you know the spiel. That type of "Stalinist dictatorship" mentality inherently exists in every nook and cranny of society, including the nets. My original post was not issued as a challenge, but merely a question to gauge some of the responses and justifications I hoped to receive. ;-) Cheers. Paul Ferguson | Network Integration Consultant | "All of life's answers are Alexandria, Virginia USA | on TV." fergp(a)sytex.com (Internet) | -- Homer Simpson sytex.com!fergp (UUNet) | 1:109/229 (FidoNet) | PGP public encryption key available upon request.

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my pgp key
by bill powell 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

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scheme
by Mike Johnson 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

> This encryption scheme uses XOR to encrypt data 1 character > at a time. Because of this it is suitable for protocols > where you need to send single bytes (or less) at a time. > Examples of this would be interactive ascii. Also it > is easily applicable to crippled lines like 7 bit lines. > This is because if the plaintext is 7 bits you can send > just the 7 bits after the XOR. Even more general you can > use it to encrypt any size at a time, down to single bits > if you just have 1 bit to send immediately and dont want > to wait for more data to become applicable. > Ok. So what are its disavantages? Syncronization, as > soon as synchronization is gone thats it, its all over. Each > block of 'pad' is generated from previous plaintext, if you > cant figure out the previous plaintext you are lost. > > Notice it uses a hash() function, this could be anything, ie > DES, or perhaps a one way function (no unhash() is ever needed). > The algorithm is fairly simple, the beginning is a bit wierd > and could have been done several ways. The first 8 bits in > this implementation are used for synchronization. > ...(source code omitted) If you use DES, you are just using a variation of DES in cipher block chaining mode. If you use some other hash function, your cipher is as weak as the hash function. If you use key bytes directly to XOR with, and never reuse key material, you have a variation of the one time pad (which is good, but takes LOTS of key material). If you reuse key material when XORing it directly, you have a weak cipher vulnerable to a known plain text attack. There is nothing really new here... For more info on this, if you have a PC and a modem, you can call a BBS at 303-938-9654, download CRYPTMPJ.ZIP, and read THESIS.DOC in that file. Perhaps one of you could put this file at an ftp site for wider distribution? The stuff in that file about data compression is kind of out of date, but the cryptographic information (including some source code) might be of interest to some others in this group. Mike Johnson mikej(a)exabyte.com

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Dining Crypto -- An Introduction
by Duncan/Lois Frissell 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

(Timothy May) Thanks for your repost of your message from the "Dawn of Time" (August 1992). Your list of "What DC Nets are Good For" was not specific enough for my taste. What DC Nets (untraceable communications) are good for: 1) Once voice/video/VR makes it to the nets and once we have enough bandwidth/speed even realtime communications can be untraceable: It's December 2000 and President Elect Clinton (Hilary) calls me for advice. The call goes to my "Virtual Communications Server" located "Somewhere on the Nets". The packets are forwarded to me after being split up and sent their various ways through anonymous remailers. My half of the conversation travels back the same way. The packets pay the anonymous remailers for their services with digital cash attached to their address headers. We notice no time lag because the nets are fast and the packets carry a "realtime" priority. With the proper setup, the President of the US will be talking to me without knowing (or being able to find out) where (or who) I am. 2) This means markets freed from even the theoretical possibility of regulation. Anything that can be digitized can be sold with no restraints save the absence of a willing buyer. Books, movies, VR epics, financial products, and all non-physical services can be traded without coercion (and without taxation). Remember too that "non-physical services" includes almost all management and professional services. The technique of "anonymous credentials" can be used to check out those you deal with. 3) The lack of regulation in the "spiritual realm" will distort market transactions in the still controlled "physical realm." People will tend to "unbundle" the non-physical aspects of their services and sell them on the nets even if it is less convenient to do so because of the *tax* savings. 4) The reduction is government "revenue" as economic activity transfers to the nets will induce a beneficial downward spiral in the authority and power of government. 5) People who become used to freedom in one part of their lives (their work and play on the nets) will not enjoy the coercion they suffer in the remainder of their lives (the place they sleep). They will have the motivation and the tools to liberate their whole lives. All without the Libertarian Party converting a single person. Freedom is a powerful recruiter. Duncan Frissell

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No Subject
by trump＠pluto.ee.cua.edu 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

things on my mind well i am relatively new to the cypherpunks list so i have a few comments to make on my behalf. (1) i read in a message about the current rise in the member of subscribers and this rise was passively related to Mondo. There was also some concern expressed in this message about the number of people dropping the list and from those comments i reply that the list does generate an awful lot of mail. And this mail is often quite technical (well if i was talking from a technically illiterate point of view it would very technical... i generally can follow the idea and their technicality though) and this technicality is a turn off to the Mondo type. I know that Mondo has said allot about the problems of personal security on the information age but not in tech-speek... i believe that most of the Mondo types will unsubscribe from this list because it is not a part of their focal of interest. Yes the list talks about current issues but again from a technical point of view and for the Mondo crowed n general it is a real turn off. (2) Att Mail is nice. If anyone cares i will find out about what features it has... i.e. ftp, telnet, irc, etc... My sister is an Att employee and she is given an attmail.com address for her on the go and work sight mail... it is nice because i can stay in contact with her because Att mail has a 800 international dialup. My sister has a portable NCR computer with modem and can get my mail where ever she is. In 1992 she was back and forth from Puerto Rico and New Jersey for AT&T now she is all over Europe. A very nice convenience for the (wo)man on the run. (3) Am I from D.C. and i am unsure if the world knows about this but in November the Secret Service raided our 26oo meeting at the Pentagon City mall. I know that we here in D.C. have all the more concern about security and frequently use are PGP keys because there is little doubt that our BBS are being taped et cetera and i am certain that in the near future there will be an upsurge of us D.C. boyz to your list. (4) About DES. The data encryption standard is, no doubt in my mind, quite cracked by NSA. If it is not completely cracked it is at least very easy to get into by these boys. I have found that there is too much evidence that NSA has gotten in to DES pretty well. For starters (not a proof by the way) the cryptographers who work for NSA spend most of their time breaking encryption and its pretty mind boggling to think that no short cuts have been found to DES by a bunch of dedicated cyptographers. Damn if that was my job and my field of knowledge i am sure i would have at least a little short cut of some sort. So i have been doing a little work on DES but i am unsure about the validity of my ideas and their effects on encryption... if i do feel that i find something i will certainly let it out but i was just wondering if people had any DES source in all or any languages??? it would be very helpful to get cross language DES source... Well i hope that this note wasn't too boring but i felt that i had to get it out to the list. so hopefully i will get some

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Overload! Unsubscribe with regrets
by Vince Tessier 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

I regret that I do not have time to keep up with the volume of mail this list generates, and must unsubscribe. If, however, you are able to digestify all the mail into a single piece, I would be interested again. -- Vince -- Vince Tessier (vtessier(a)vela.acs.oakland.edu) "When guns are outlawed, only Carl Rowan will have guns."

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Re: Law&Disorder (fwd)
by mbrennan＠netcom.com 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

Everything is happening in the Bay Area. And I'm stuck down here in the L.A. wasteland (sigh). Oh well. At least there's mailing lists. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Michael Brennan Internet: mbrennan(a)netcom.com Compuserve: 76206,2462 Applelink: M.BRENNAN

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Re: Poor Man's Anonymous Remailer
by George A. Gleason 26 Feb '93

26 Feb '93

Duncan's posting about AT&T mail as a "poor man's anonymous mailbox" misses one crucial fact. The moment you dial an 800 number, you generate a record of your phone number via ANI, which means AT&T gets that information in realtime and can probably correlate it with your phone account and service address and name. If you want anonymity, never ever ever use any service which requires you call in via an 800 number. -gg(a)well.sf.ca.us

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