- cypherpunks-legacy@lists.ogf.org

Requesting all records of the Clipper review panel
by gnu 14 Aug '93

14 Aug '93

This is a draft, which will be sent out within a day or two. John Karl Bell Deputy Director of Administration Freedom of Information Act Officer National Institute of Standards and Technology Building 101, Room A-110 Gaithersburg, MD 20899 Dear Mr. Bell: This is a request under the Freedom of Information Act ("FOIA"), 5 U.S.C. $ 552, on behalf of Mr. John Gilmore for all agency records pertaining to and utilized by the Skipjack review panel ("Panel"). This request also requests access to records which must be made available under the Federal Advisory Committee Act ("FACA"), 5 U.S.C. App. II (1972). Section 8(b)(2) of the FACA requires that the supervising agency for an advisory committee must assemble and maintain records for the committee; Section 8(b)(3) of the FACA provides that such records are subject to the FOIA. The Panel's review is being performed pursuant to the President's direction that "respected experts from outside the government [] be offered access to the confidential details of the algorithm to assess its capabilities and publicly report their finding." The Acting Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology sent letters of invitation to potential reviewers. This request for records includes, but is not limited to: all records relating to the selection of the Panel members; all records of the Panel's activities and use of funds [FACA $ 12(a)]; the charter of the Panel [FACA $ 9(c)]; all notices of Panel meetings [FACA $ 10(a)(2)]; all written determinations to close any part of a Panel meeting [FACA $ 10(d)]; all records, reports, transcripts, minutes, appendices, working papers, drafts, studies, agenda or other documents which were made available to or prepared by the committee [FACA $$10(b) & (c)]. For instance, the Panel's interim report states that: We attended an initial meeting at the Institute for Defense Analyses Supercomputing Research Center (SRC) from June 21-23. At that meeting, the designer of SKIPJACK provided a complete, detailed description of the algorithm, the rationale for each feature, and the history of the design. The head of the NSA evaluation team described the evaluation process and its results. Other NSA staff briefed us on the LEAF structure and protocols for use, generation of device keys, protection of the devices against reverse engineering, and NSA's history in the design and evaluation of encryption methods contained in SKIPJACK. Additional NSA and NIST staff were present at the meeting to answer our questions and provide assistance. All staff members were forthcoming in providing us with requested information. All records pertaining to this and other meetings of the Panel are included within the scope of this FOIA/FACA request. If the requested records are not in the possession of your agency, I ask that you forward this request to any agency that you believe may have records that are responsive to this request. In the alternative, I ask that you inform me of other agencies that might have such records. As you know, the FOIA provides that even if some requested material is properly exempted from mandatory disclosure, all segregable portions must be released. [5 U.S.C. $ 552(b)] If any or all material covered by this request is withheld, please inform me of the specific exemptions that are being claimed. If any of the requested material is released with deletions, I ask that each deletion be marked to indicate the exemption(s) being claimed to authorize each particular withholding. In addition, I ask that your agency exercise its discretion to release information that may be technically exempt but where withholding would serve no important public interest. As you know, the FOIA provides that agencies may reduce or waive fees if it would be "in the public interest because furnishing the information can be considered as primarily benefiting the public." [5 U.S.C. $ 552(a)(4)(A)] Release of this material would be of benefit to the public because of the importance of public discussion of technology which can enhance personal privacy. Moreover, in previous FOIA requests to NIST, Mr. Gilmore has amply demonstrated his ability and willingness to disseminate such information to the general public. I therefore ask that you waive any fees relating to this request. Mr. Gilmore promises to pay up to $1000 in processing costs should this fee waiver be denied, so that NIST can begin processing this request while you rule on the propriety of this fee waiver. If you have any questions regarding this request, please telephone me at the above number. I would be happy to discuss ways in which this request could be clarified or somewhat redesigned to reflect the agency's filing system and speed the search for records. As provided under the FOIA, I will expect a reply within 10 working days. Sincerely yours, Lee Tien On behalf of Mr. John Gilmore

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CA online legislative database access
by L. Detweiler 14 Aug '93

14 Aug '93

Letter writers needed ASAP! This is the bill that will open up legislative databases to the masses and serve as a model for other states and even the country! cypherfolks, do you have any idea what these efforts are the faint glimmers of? Imagine a future society where *anyone* can propose laws, not just the elite few called Legislators and identified in an exceedingly time-consuming, tedious, and troublesome process. Imagine that everyone has complete access and full understanding of all the laws that affect one's life, and the ability to propose and *pass* superior modifications. It would be a sort of Legislative Free Enterprise, a competition in the marketplace of laws such that superior ones would prosper and inferior, archaic, and absurd laws would be rooted out and expunged by the citizenry itself, in a very dynamic, interactive, and responsive process! Far from this bureacratic nightmare we lumber in daily! Write that small letter to set in motion this grandiose cyberspatial karma! ------- Forwarded Message >Date: Tue, 10 Aug 93 17:14:01 -0500 >Newsgroups: austin.eff >From: jwarren(a)well.sf.ca.us (Jim Warren) >Subject: UPDATE #21-AB1624: *ACTION ALERT*: END-GAME APPROACHING (& misc notes) > >[MODERATOR'S NOTE: This is a California bill, but its outcome could set >a precedent which would help or hurt similar efforts in other states, >including Texas. If you've got friends in California, you might want >to pass this along to them. -- Prentiss Riddle, riddle(a)tic.com] > >August 9, 1993 > >*** PLEASE WRITE, NOW!*** PLEASE, DON'T STOP NOW! > > Assembly Bill 1624, mandating online public access to public legislative >information via the public networks (i.e., the Internet and all the nets >connected to it - including wherever you are receiving this msg), will either >pass the Legislature by Sept. 10th, or will die - and we have to re-fight the >whole battle, year after year. > LETTERS & FAXES ARE *NEEDED*!. THEY *WILL* DETERMINE THE OUTCOME. > >REMAINING 1993 LEGISLATION SCHEDULE > Jul 16th, the Legislature went into remission - uh, recess. > Aug 16th, the Legislature reconvenes to diddle remaining 1993 business. > Sep 10th, the Legislature quits working in Sacramento for the year. > Oct 10th, the Governor must veto legislatively-approved bills he opposes. >On AUGUST 18TH, the Senate Rules Committee run by Sen. Dave Roberti >(D-Van Nuys area) will hear AB1624. If Roberti doesn't like it, he can and >will kill it. If Roberti passes it, it will almost-certainly pass the >Senate. Then we need for the Assembly to "concur in amendments" and the >Governor to not veto it. > > > Address letters/faxes to "State Capitol, Sacremanto CA 95814." > >AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, send a one-page letter supporting AB1624 to the >Senate Rules Committee - who have seen essentially *no* support for it: >Sen. David Roberti, Chair, Room 400; fax/916-323-7224; voice/916-445-8390. > and to the other four members (tiny, *powerful* committee!): >Sen. Ruben Ayala (D-Chino area), Room 5108; f/916-445-0128; v/916-445-6868. >Sen. Robert Beverly (R-Long Bch), Room 5082; f/not avail.; v/916-445-6447. >Sen. William Craven (R-Oceanside), Room 3070; f/not avail.; v/916-445-3731. >Sen. Nick Petris (D-Alameda), Room 5080; fax/916-327-1997; v/916-445-6577. > >Important: Please send COPIES of ALL letters to the AB1624 author: >Hon. Debra Bowen, Room 3126; voice/916-445-8528; fax/916-327-2201. > > >CAN EMAIL VIA ME, IF YA CAN'T FIND TIME FOR SNAIL-MAIL > If you don't have time to send snail-mail, you can email your message via >jwarren(a)well.sf.ca.us. > Write it exactly as you would snail-mail, but be SURE TO INCLUDE your name, >address and phone #s for legislators' independent verification. Upon receipt >by email, I will print and/or fax the entire message to Bowen and to the >legislator(s) to whom you address it. (Please allow for that delay.) > > >LEGI-TECH'S OLDER BROTHER DONE GOOD! > The McClatchy organization is the owner of Legi-Tech, one of the two >largest online distributors of California legislative information. They are >also owner of a number of newspapers - their flagship being the powerful >Sacramento Bee. > On Jul 26th, the Bee ran an editorial *strongly* supportive of AB1624 - >laudible, principled action by The Bee, McClatchy, and presumably by >Legi-Tech in the face of a difficult trade-off between the public's >interests versus their business interests. > Applause! Applause! > > >CALIFORNIA LEGISPEAK: "AUTHOR" VS. "SPONSOR" VS. "SUPPORTER" > In California legislative circles: >A bill's AUTHOR is a legislator who introduced the bill. >A bill's SPONSOR(S) is a person or organization, if any, that requested that >the bill be introduced by the bill's author. >A bill's SUPPORTER(S) is a person or organization that is officially listed >as being in favor of the bill, usually including its sponsor(s), if any. > All bills have one or more authors. Some bills do NOT have sponsors. > AB1624's author was Assembly Member Debra Bowen. It had no sponsors, but >has a growing number of supporters. > > >PROGRAMMERS: SAMPLE LEGISLATIVE DATA-FILES ALSO AVAILABLE AT CPSR.ORG > AB1624 Update #19 detailed a set of sample data-files for review and >test-programming, available from Tim Pozar's KUMR.LNS.COM by anonymous ftp. > As of Jul 22nd, those Legislative Data Center sample files were/are also >online at cpsr.org in /ftp/cpsr/states/california/ab1624/sample_data >for binary ftp access. For questions about accessing them there, contact: >Al Whaley al(a)sunnyside.com +1-415 322-5411(Tel), -6481 (Fax) >Sunnyside Computing, Inc., PO Box 60, Palo Alto, CA 94302 > > >We have a voice. Use it or loose it. >--jim >Jim Warren, columnist for MicroTimes, Government Technology & BoardWatch >jwarren(a)well.sf.ca.us -or- jwarren(a)autodesk.com >345 Swett Rd., Woodside CA 94062; voice/415-851-7075; fax/415-851-2814 > > > ------- End of Forwarded Message

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Re: Spooking of neural nets and image recognition...
by nfe＠scf.nmsu.edu 14 Aug '93

14 Aug '93

As to serveilence cameras, is anyone familiar with methods of not getting photographed in the first place? Some methods I've heard of: 1) spray paint or vasoline on the lens (kinda obvious :) 2) putting a pin or finnishing nail in it's coaxial cable (umbilical if you will) - how good of a job of scrabbling the image will this do? 3) mounting a "test pattern" in front of the lens. 4) placing a magnet on the side of the camera (does this work?) 5) timing the pan, and taking advantage of "dead areas" (areas not covered for brief periods). Anyone familiar with the general range/resolution ratio, and how wide an area will get covered? Any other methods?

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encrypting viruses
by nobody＠rosebud.ee.uh.edu 13 Aug '93

13 Aug '93

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Fellow cypherpunks, Speaking of cryptostacker and beneficial viruses that encrypt files for you in the background, I just got a copy of one in the mail! I think this may be of interest to the group, so I am posting. Here's a section from the documentation: - ---begin excerpt Wouldn't it make sense to have a virus that encrypts your system for you? It can work in the background, and just encrypt every floppy you make, and put a copy of itself on that disk too, if there's room, so when you take it somewhere, you can still decrypt. And best of all, the encryption is public domain and free. Well, now you have just the virus you need. The Potassium Hydroxide Virus is a friendly virus, desinged specifically to solve the problems of the average computer user who attaches some value to the privacy of what he has on his computer - either because he doesn't agree with the strictest interpretation of copyright law, or for any other reason. I say it is "friendly" because it doesn't just go in and infect your system without your knowledge, and use some unknown key for encryption so you can't recover. Rather, the Potassium Hydroxide politely asks if you want to infect (yes, it even uses the word "please"), and it asks you for a password to use for encrypting. As far as encryption goes, the Potassium Hydroxide uses two different algorithms. One is slow-but-good, the other fast-but-easy to break. And it allows you to choose which one will be used on your hard disk. That way you can choose the level of security and performance you like. Floppy disks are always encrypted with the slow-but-good algorithm, since they are already slow. The slow-but-good algorithm used is state-of-the-art. It is the International Data Encryption Algorithm (known as IDEA), which was developed by someone besides the government , (for those of you who do not trust the government to keep you data safe) and has been the subject of intense public scrutiny for several years. Although cryptographers admit that IDEA is fairly new, and someone may find a way to crack it in the future, no one has done so yet. [skipping a few sentences] Using the Potassium Hydroxide Installing the Potassium Hydroxide on your computer is fairly easy. However, as with installing any cryptographic system, I'd highly recommend you back up everything on your hard disk first. After all, if the power fails after your FAT has been encrypted, but nothing else, it's going to be tought to recover without a backup Step 1: Format a floppy and put the system files on it so it can boot to the DOS prompt. Pull the disk out and put it back in. (You must do this or the virus won't infect it) Step 2: Execute the KOH.COM file included on the disk with this issue. This will encrypt the diskette in the A: drive and install the Potassium Hydroxide on it live. Enter a password when it requests one. This password is only temporary. Do a directory on this disk, and you will see only gibberish. That will prove to you it has been properly encrypted. Step 3: Boot from the disk you just infected. The virus will then request permission to infect your hard disk. Tell it yes. Step 4: Reboot your computer from the hard disk. Now the virus will ask you if you want to encrypt your hard disk. If you do, enter "Y". If you don't, all floppies will still be encrypted, and you must enter the floppy encryption password at boot-up. I recommend you attempt to boot at least once without encrypting just to make sure the virus installed properly on the hard disk. Step 5: After booting once without encrypting, reboot and encrypt this time. You will be asked if you want casual (fast) encryption or strong (slow) encryption. Make your choice. Next you'll be asked for a password for floppies and for the hard disk. The floppy password is stored on your hard disk in (strong) encrypted form, and the hard disk password must be entered every time you boot. Enter them both at this time. The initial encryption process then begins. It is admittedly very slow. Just allocate and hour or so for strong encryption and be patient. The virus does not use a very large buffer for encrypting because it doesn't want to take up too much memory. Step 6: After the encryption is done, you should reboot your computer and test it. With any luck it will work just fine. A good test to make sure everything worked OK is to run CHKDSK, and test out some of your favorite programs. If you experience problems, you may have to use your backup to restore everything. That's no different than any encryption program, though. Compatibility [been tested with DOS 4,5,6 and Windows 3.1. So far, the only problem is with the 32-bit disk driver for Windows 3.1] Incidentally, the Potassium Hydroxide has been donated to the PUBLIC DOMAIN. - ---end excerpt I can't seem to find mention of what the fast/casual encryption algorithm is. Instead of source code, a hex listing is provided. According to further notes, there is a hot-key for toggling floppy encrypt, and another hot key to uninstall from the hard drive. All the same, if I get a chance this weekend I'll probably try it out! -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQCVAgUBLGwl24OA7OpLWtYzAQExMwQAv2d/CJA+qq/1CcRWR/IH2kDPlqqMMw2J W5WWLz1ngaNSWYddY1c29mrRlgKKdLdt+ijLNo6iP2/YbFzS3x66Y7c14dvmtfZP J1S0yvc70eWu/gZPNQLpyYwvYJjYL8jWMtdLWROlXk9UYQSolxTETRugRo02eApt tO5ZPIs+iYw= =beMR -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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MEET: Reminder: Boston Area Cypherpunks
by Derek Atkins 13 Aug '93

13 Aug '93

This is a final reminder that there will be a Boston Area Cypherpunks meeting this Saturday, August 14, 1993, from 4-8 pm in MIT room 1-115. Directions: Get to MIT. By T: you can get off at Kendall Sq., off the red line. By BUS: route #1 stops right in front of MIT's main entrance at 77 Mass. Ave. By Car: Have fun parking!! ;-) Room 1-115 is on the first floor of building 1. Building one is just a little south of the Main MIT entrance at 77 Mass. Ave, close to Mass. Ave. If you take the T, you will have to cross campus to get to Mass Ave. There will be signs (hopefully) to point the way once you get close to the main entrance. If you need more detailed directions, please call me at home: 868-4469, or send me email. See you Saturday at 4! -derek

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Re: Secure voice software issues
by peter honeyman 13 Aug '93

13 Aug '93

> do not use error correction or compression. (they will slow you down) huh?!? my file transfer times would *double* if i turned off v.42bis (modem compression). *that* would slow me down. and you can't run v.42bis without running the error handling protocol (v.42), for obvious reasons. what's more, v.42 gives an immediate 20% (or so) increase in throughput, by eliminating start and stop bits. arguably, i could (and should) be running compression in my slip or ppp driver, but certainly it is false to say that v.42bis and v.42 slow me down -- the opposite is true. > and tcp does it's own error correction. as for 160ms round trip times > that is acceptable for slip. i don't much care about round-trip times, as i use my slip line principally for afs, which runs as a data stream. round-trip delays are amortized over file transfers. phil karn's points about modem buffering interfering with type-of-service queueing are the strongest condemnations of modern modems, in my view. i wish someone would build a modem that recognized ip packet framing. peter

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pagers
by koontzd＠lrcs.loral.com 13 Aug '93

13 Aug '93

>I wonder if they noticed that they never got any pages... Geez, you would have thought they were bank tellers, too. Seems silly they wouldn't trust us to just turn them off. They would certify coffee pots going into the SCFs too, once in they can't come back out.

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Re: Electracy: Evil Revisited
by paul＠poboy.b17c.ingr.com 13 Aug '93

13 Aug '93

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Fully participative electronic democracy is what you get when you cross cable TV with mob rule. I'm a little suprised no one has brought up Brunner's Oracle from _The Shockwave Rider_. For those of you who haven't read it, imagine a sort of Nintendo-meets-OTB system where you can vote- and *bet* - on the probability of certain events. Of course, the government has the means to effect the outcome of many such events (money supply, availability of crypto, who wins the Miss Teen USA pageant), but it's an interesting concept. The problem with Lance's positive reputation, et al system is that having power, money, status, influence, or a stout reputation doesn't automatically mean you're _right_. (cf. Armand Hammer, J. Edgar Hoover, Lani Guinier), and the lack thereof doesn't necessarily mean you're wrong or that your ideas shouldn't be heard (cf. Alger Hiss, the guy-who-invented-variable-delay-wipers, early Martin Luther King Jr.) -Paul - -- Paul Robichaux, KD4JZG | "Change the world for a better tomorrow. But perobich(a)ingr.com | watch your ass today." - aaron(a)halcyon.com Intergraph Federal Systems | Be a cryptography user- ask me how. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQCVAgUBLGv2eyA78To+806NAQGeVgQAoHyolj84XGw5vIwl4+SxUCEGrdk7oKwo YQ+1qmI5bYcc8ldNDBxawg5vlLpfcBa1mMydazS8grJznos8SwkAz0xsh0rqxEy7 7QpOGXFFPj+z7fInK8yNmh5X58ZVAxC7VRrfyrXP4KUc+779N3VL/dTgsz9ct9MF BjejuvMxMp4= =vloB -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: Beepers can also be used to track you down!
by hkhenson＠cup.portal.com 13 Aug '93

13 Aug '93

I may be out of date on beepers, but the ones I know about are recievers only, no transmitters. Cell phones *can* be used to track, though. Keith

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No Subject
by koontzd＠lrcs.loral.com 13 Aug '93

13 Aug '93

Subject:Beepers can also be used to track you down! I had heard that Motorola was talking about pagers based on the cellular phone system, with hand off between cells, etc. That would imply XMIT. As far as local detection, I understand that in Britain vans go around with sniffing gear looking for IF freqs to find unlicensed TVs. When in the Air Force, we used to leave our pagers in Faraday cages when going into some of the SCFs, which were built with the copper mesh in the walls etc. The idea being that you didn't want any being carried on IF from the pager. As far as the microwave oven, fine you can hide in there, but watch out for them.. one of THEM may come by and turn it on...

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