From extropians-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Sat Apr 17 02:33:47 1993 Return-Path: Received: from usc.edu by chaph.usc.edu (4.1/SMI-4.1+ucs-3.0) id AA29436; Sat, 17 Apr 93 02:33:45 PDT Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: from albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu by usc.edu (4.1/SMI-3.0DEV3-USC+3.1) id AA00920; Sat, 17 Apr 93 02:33:41 PDT Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: by albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu (5.65/4.0) id ; Sat, 17 Apr 93 05:28:32 -0400 Message-Id: <9304170928.AA09653@albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu> To: ExI-Daily@gnu.ai.mit.edu Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 05:28:07 -0400 X-Original-Message-Id: <9304170928.AA09647@albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu> X-Original-To: Extropians@gnu.ai.mit.edu From: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Subject: Extropians Digest V93 #0200 X-Extropian-Date: Remailed on April 17, 373 P.N.O. [09:28:31 UTC] Reply-To: Extropians@gnu.ai.mit.edu Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Status: OR Extropians Digest Sat, 17 Apr 93 Volume 93 : Issue 0200 Today's Topics: "Big Brother" Proposal [2 msgs] (fwd) White House Public Encryption Management Fact Sheet [1 msgs] CRYPTO: The right to encrypt [1 msgs] CRYPTO: Useful irony [1 msgs] Contract engineering & paying the rent [1 msgs] Dorothy Denning's friends strike [1 msgs] HUMOR: Libertarian Party doomed [1 msgs] IMPORTANT! [6 msgs] Key Registration and Big Brother--Time to Fight! [2 msgs] Korzybski's "E-Prime", also NLP [2 msgs] MEDIA: Public Radio receipts [1 msgs] PRIVACY: A Further Note [1 msgs] Privacy, State, and Crypto [1 msgs] lang: differentiated plurals [1 msgs] Administrivia: This is the digested version of the Extropian mailing list. Please remember that this list is private; messages must not be forwarded without their author's permission. To send mail to the list/digest, address your posts to: extropians@gnu.ai.mit.edu To send add/drop requests for this digest, address your post to: exi-daily-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu To make a formal complaint or an administrative request, address your posts to: extropians-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu If your mail reader is operating correctly, replies to this message will be automatically addressed to the entire list [extropians@gnu.ai.mit.edu] - please avoid long quotes! The Extropian mailing list is brought to you by the Extropy Institute, through hardware, generously provided, by the Free Software Foundation - neither is responsible for its content. Forward, Onward, Outward - Harry Shapiro (habs) List Administrator. Approximate Size: 50247 bytes. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 16 Apr 93 21:34:48 CDT From: twb3@midway.uchicago.edu (Tom Morrow) Subject: CRYPTO: The right to encrypt I have already posted on why Clinton's reputed support of the right to privacy should lead him to recognize that we have a right to encryption technology. Now I would like to take a quick walk through the Bill of Rights in order to point out how it forbids the federal government from infringing on our rights to own and use encryption technology. PENUMBRA: The Bill of Rights nowhere explicitly recognizes a right to privacy. In Roe v Wade, however, the Supreme court found that such a right issued forth from a penumbra created by the Bill or Rights' explicit provisions on related topics (eg, the 4th Amendment's right against unreasonable search and seizure). But if the right to an abortion falls within this penumbra, the right to encrypt sits square in the middle. Several Amendments speak almost directly of the right to protect correspondence from the prying eyes of government authorities. 1st AMENDMENT: "Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, . . . or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, . . ." This protects our rights to send scrambled messages to one another, to swap information that will help us to keep our correspondence private (including programs), and to gather in virtual assemblies under the protective sheild of cryptography. 4th AMENDMENT: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probably cause, . . ." To be frank, this Amendment doesn't do as much for our right to encrypt as we might want. It seems to allow the government to set up reasonable means of cracking our codes. But I know of no case where government authorities have used the 4th to justify preventing citizens from taking measures to protect their privacy. Could the feds outlaw unbreakable doors and unpickable locks, for example? Though I would have to do more research to be sure, I think that banning certain modes of cyptography would be absolutely unprecedented. Furthermore, note that the 4th *does not* give the government authority to conduct searches and seizures--even reasonable ones. It only stipulates one condition under which it may *not* conduct them. See the 9th, below, for the argument that we retain the right to encrypt. 5th AMENDMENT: "No person shall . . . be deprived of . . . property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation." PGP and related encryption software can be viewed as property, whether intellectual (the programs themselves) or physical (the diskettes and computers on which the programs are stored). Federal authorities thus cannot force us to erase such programs, or seize them, without due process. They may also be forced to pay us just compensation. This hardly guarantees our rights to encryption technology, but it might slow the feds down. 9th AMENDMENT: "The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." This means that we retain our rights to privacy, and our rights to create, own, and use encryption technology. The Constitution says nothing to limit these retained rights. The fact that the 4th Amendment protects us from unreasonable searches and seizures *shall not* be taken to deny or disparage these rights. I hope this quick review of the Bill or Rights proves useful as intellectual ammo in the struggle to protect our privacy from Bill Clinton, who is quickly becoming the "Bill or Wrongs." Permission granted to reproduce this message freely. T.O. Morrow -- twb3@midway.uchicago.edu Vice President: ExI -- The Extropy Institute Law & Politics Editor: EXTROPY -- Journal of Transhumanist Thought ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1993 19:24:44 -0700 From: George A. Gleason Subject: Key Registration and Big Brother--Time to Fight! Instead of a conference call in clear voice, how about doing it online from the various meetings, and encrypted? What would it take to set up a broadcast encryption system that will work in chat mode...? A conference call in clear voice is almost certain to be monitored, and I would bet that it would yield a whole lot more high-grade intelligence than we would usually expect: first of all, voices of all participants (for later use in voiceprint recognition surveillance), second, all the background discussions, and third, a lot of the kind of deliberation and working-through-things that ordinarily gets filtered out by the process of posting things to this list. Yes, they can theoretically send visitors to our meetings. But realistically this is more labor intensive and potentially risky than recording a conference call which has all the meetings on line. Let's not go leaving any huge holes, please...! -gg ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 93 23:28:24 EDT From: eisrael@suneast.East.Sun.COM (Elias Israel - SunSelect Engineering) Subject: CRYPTO: Useful irony Actually, I think it must be clear that various government agencies have been cooking up this scheme since well before the Clinton presidency. Certainly, it can't possibly have been the case the Billary Clodham walked into the Oval Office on his first day and said: "Listen boys, we gotta stop all this encrypted traffic right now. Get on it." No, the development time on the hardware alone, let alone the theoretical work for the encryption algorithms with (at least) one trapdoor would have required far more time than he's been around. This is a problem much bigger than the President of the United States. We ought to give serious and immediate consideration to taking these discussions underground. Although I have no *@#$-ing idea how to do that. Moreover, although some on this list have exhorted others to "join the battle," I think one might be wise to consider what or whom one is fighting. Perhaps keeping one's head down is the wiser path. Modern life has become a science fiction novel. Unfortunately, the novel is "Alongside Night." Elias Israel eisrael@east.sun.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 93 22:36:22 CDT From: twb3@midway.uchicago.edu (Tom Morrow) Subject: MEDIA: Public Radio receipts You may recall that in my "Challenge Public Radio" post I criticized Public Radio stations for accepting statist funding. I acted on my own advice, and called up a local station during their pledge drive to challenge them to admit to using tax dollars and to publically recognize that we taxpayers were *already* contributing to their operations. That station (WBEZ) graciously responded by sending me their fiscal 1991 report. From it I learned that matters are even worse than I had imagined! Consider this breakdown of their revenue: Membership contributions $1,598,933 Government grants 949,696 Private gifts and grants 191,932 Program underwriting 240,238 Investment income 38,764 Special events 15,460 Satellite and other 35,087 In-kind services and other contributions 145,241 TOTAL REVENUE (fiscal 1991) $3,215,351 It is almost certainly the case that government grants, which resulted in nearly a third of WBEZ's revenues, were the single largest source of the station's income. Though membership contributions resulted in more income overall, these probably came from many, many individual sources. How can WBEZ claim to address issues related to proper range and size of government programs objectively while it depends on tax funds for its very survival? T.O. Morrow -- twb3@midway.uchicago.edu Vice President: ExI -- The Extropy Institute Law & Politics Editor: EXTROPY -- Journal of Transhumanist Thought ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 93 23:37:44 EDT From: eisrael@suneast.East.Sun.COM (Elias Israel - SunSelect Engineering) Subject: (fwd) White House Public Encryption Management Fact Sheet George Gleason writes: >I don't see an implication that crypto gear makers will be facing forfeiture >for failing to comply with the "request" to incorporate key escrow. Simple scenario: Company XYZ is making crypto gear that the government cannot break without inordinate expenditures of computer resources. Solution? An "anonymous tip" that the company is involved in drug trafficking is all you need to bust down the doors and shut them down. Take all of the assets you can sell off and force them to fight for them in court. Don't want them to defend themselves? Freeze any accounts you can't automatically drain. This would probably work against just about any company that didn't have large resources available abroad. Couldn't happen here? Yea, and religious persecution never happens either. Elias Israel eisrael@east.sun.com ------------------------------ Date: 16 Apr 93 23:41:42 EDT From: Duncan Frissell <76630.3577@CompuServe.COM> Subject: IMPORTANT! Boy, those guys (and gals) in Washington have really been smoking (and inhaling) something. I agree with Perry, we should go to the mattresses on this one. Why we will win, though -- 1) I disagree with Tim about the First Amendment. I consider it unlikely that the courts will permit a restriction of my right to transmit the zeros and ones that I choose unless they are provably obscene or within one of the other recognized exceptions. 2) Imposing a "technical standard" on electronic equipment may violate GATT rules if the standard has the effect of reducing the sales of foreign equip- ment. BTW, the most significant phrase in the press release is the following: "The keys shall be released only to government agencies that have established their authority to acquire the content of those communications that have been encrypted" Translation - "The keys shall be released to any government agency that submits the proper paperwork." Read this language from the Privacy Act of 1974 governing the inter-agency transfer of information about individuals: "Sec. #200, 255 - Conditions of Disclosure. No agency shall disclose any record which is contained in a system of records to any person or to another agency, except pursuant to a written request by, or with the prior written consent of, the individual to whom the record pertains, unless the disclosure of the record would be..." [whole bunch of exceptions, including] "(7) To another agency or to an instrumentality of any governmental jurisdiction...for a civil or criminal law enforcement activity if the activity is authorized by law, and if the head of the agency...has made a written request..." In other words they get the escrowed key if they say "pretty please with sugar on top." Duncan Frissell ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1993 23:20:06 -0400 (EDT) From: Carol Moore Subject: PRIVACY: A Further Note I assume you mean width of columns. I use an IBM compatible; set the margins on 1" and 1 1/2" if I am uploading; but if I am just typing in like now I automatically throw the enter key right about here > If the columns are too wide, please tell me and I'll readjust. On Fri, 16 Apr 1993 rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu wrote: > > Carol, no flame intended, but I have a curious question. Do you happen > to be using an old 8-bit computer? The reason I ask is because a lot of > your messages are in 40-columns, ala Commodore 64/Atari/Spectrum. > > -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- > -- EE/Math Student | politics is the implementation of faith. -- > -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | - Zetetic Commentaries -- ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 93 21:16:17 +0100 From: Eric Watt Forste Subject: "Big Brother" Proposal Hal Finney wrote: HF> Their emphasis is on voice communication, and AT&T has already HF> announced (according to an AP story) that they are looking HF> forward to designing in the Clipper so that they will have a HF> standard encryption method across their whole range of products. One way to fight this that I haven't yet seen suggested is to write letters and make phone calls to anyone you know who may reasonably be considered a decision maker (or a provider of consumer opinion to decision makers) for AT&T, Sprint, MCI, and any other large companies you know who manufacture voice-communications equipment. Let them know that you do not wish to patronize any communications company that standardizes on an insecure "communications security" scheme. Let them know that if they standardize on the Clipper Chip system, you will seek out the services of another company which is not as subservient to the government's wishes. Let them know that the Clinton Administration's encryption initiative is bad public policy which will fail without industry support, and which ought to fail, as quickly as possible. Ask them to withhold their support from this initiative. Even if the government plans to make compliance mandatory rather than voluntary, if the telcos are made as uncomfortable about this as possible as early as possible, they may be willing to start spending some lobbying funds to stop it. Eric Watt Forste arkuat@joes.garage.com 1800 Market St #243 San Francisco CA 94102 Expectation foils perception. -- Pamela C. Dean ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 93 21:18:52 +0100 From: Eric Watt Forste Subject: "Big Brother" Proposal Eli Brandt wrote: EB> Unlikely, I think. It's a bit too slanted to be accepted as a EB> neutral term for a government proposal Well, I think "Star Wars" was a bit too slanted to be accepted as a neutral term for SDI, and that didn't stop anyone ten years ago. Eric Watt Forste arkuat@joes.garage.com 1800 Market St #243 San Francisco CA 94102 "Expectation foils perception." -- Pamela C. Dean ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 00:04:52 EDT From: eisrael@suneast.East.Sun.COM (Elias Israel - SunSelect Engineering) Subject: Korzybski's "E-Prime", also NLP Eric S. Raymond writes: >Sure. In the real world, Aristotelian logic is in general false. Neither the >"Law of the Excluded Middle" (A | ~A), nor noncontradiction ~(A & ~A) holds. > >It's become a cliche to trot out QM in support of this, but it's true even >classically (as proponents of fuzzy logic and the related "fudgy logic" in >AI have realized). To see this for yourself, think carefully about the >predicates "hot" and "cold". Having met Eric and seen his writings for some time, I've come to respect him quite a bit. I think he's frightfully clever. However, while I understand and appreciate the point he's making here, I'd have to regard it at least a little bit as a kind of sophistry. First of all, it is certainly true that two-value logic, while useful for lots of different kinds of analyses, isn't really the way the human brain works, let alone how the universe works. A common computer science exercise is the creation of "neural nets", essentially great taxonomies: "Is it a chair? Is it a dinosaur?" But taxonomies are fundmentally flawed because individual objects don't have intrinsic categories any more than goods have intrinsic value. The "category" of a thing depends on what you're doing with it. I call this the "Yew Tree" principle. The yew tree is a deciduous conifer. (Which breaks the typical notion of conifers as evergreens.) However, notice how I started my previous paragraph and look at Eric's statement above: "... is generally false." Both he and I inevitably resorted to true-false statements to describe what we think. While I would agree that it is a mental error to apply two-value logic in cases that allow for a wider interpretation of the facts, I don't necessarily consider this a refutation of the non-contradiction axiom. Rather, I consider it a reminder that where the non-contradiction axiom seems to be violated, I must have missed some of the facts of the situation. (e.g. that an object can be both "hot" and "cold" depending on what one compares it to.) Additionally, it's probably worthwhile to note that the non-contradiction axiom seems to be violated more often than not when one is dealing loosely with the facts. Probably, Eric doesn't intend to "do away with" the non-contradiction axiom, but I get the feeling that at least some people are hearing it that way. I know I did when I first heard about the yew tree. Elias Israel eisrael@east.sun.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1993 23:37:47 -0700 (PDT) From: dorsey@lila.com (Bill Dorsey) Subject: IMPORTANT! > On a side note, a friend of mine and I have been designing > v32bis voice encryption software. It's crude, but it should work. > I'm designing my end for an Amiga + cheap sampler, he is designing his > end on a 486 + Sound Blaster pro. > Interesting. I'm working on the same deal. I have (at home) a 486 with a Soundblaster Pro, and a Sun Sparcstation. Along with another friend, we're developing software to run under DOS, Linux, and 386BSD on the 386/ 486 and SunOS on the Sparc. We'll be requiring V.32bis modems. Right now, we're experimenting with the European GSM voice compression algorithm. It presently uses up about 85% of the CPU bandwidth on a 33MHZ 486, but by hacking the code, we hope to reduce this substantially. It still probably won't be possible to achieve full duplex communication with anything slower than a 50MHZ 486, but we expect high-quality half- duplex communications. I'm talking quality similar to what you got about 10 years ago on long distance lines -- pretty damn clear. Extra CPU cycles needed for DES and packetizing the communications are negligible next to the time required to compress the speech. Your approach is interesting, but rather brute force. There is an excellent book on speech compression called "Digital Coding of Waveforms" by Jayant and Noll. It details techniques considerably more efficient at compressing speech than what you're using, though some may require more CPU cycles. I'd suggest looking into CVSD (continuously variable slope detection) as one possible means of compressing speech and still keeping it somewhat recognisable. Motorola uses this technology on their DVP radios which are limited to NBFM bandwidths (3KHZ). Excellent idea, though. There is a definite need for secure communication among citizens, and this could fill that gap. For a couple of thousand dollars, companies like Cylink make black boxes that do this (using DES), but few people are going to be willing to spend the money. On the other hand, lots of people will spend the money to buy a PC and modem. If you'd like to share ideas further, don't hesitate to reply. -- Bill Dorsey "Most people mistake law for justice and authority for dorsey@lila.com liberty. You will hear them talk of 'liberty under law,' PGP 2.X public and they are content to see it so deep under the law that key on request it is completely obliterated." -- Herbert Spencer ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 1:16:16 MDT From: Stanton McCandlish Subject: HUMOR: Libertarian Party doomed > (This is not to say that libertarians are all drug using homosexual > republicans: it is to say that the Libertarian Party is pretty much > going nowhere.) Hmm...being new to the list, I am wondering what is the opinion in here of the Natural Law Party? FOR POLITICIANS, I think they are pretty "cool" (meaning intelligent, diverse, open minded, forward thinking, and could potentially do a LOT of good.) They certainly got my vote last goaround. Note that your opinions are not likely to sway mine, but I would just the same be interested in hearing them. Are there any other parties that are supported (or not slammed into the dirt at least) by Extropia-at-large? What about the idea of partyless independat candidates, eh? -- Testes saxi solidi! ********************** Podex opacus gravedinosus est! Stanton McCandlish, SysOp: Noise in the Void Data Center BBS IndraNet: 369:1/1 FidoNet: 1:301/2 Internet: anton@hydra.unm.edu Snail: 8020 Central SE #405, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87108 USA Data phone: +1-505-246-8515 (24hr, 1200-14400 v32bis, N-8-1) Vox phone: +1-505-247-3402 (bps rate varies, depends on if you woke me up...:) ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 1:21:58 MDT From: Stanton McCandlish Subject: Dorothy Denning's friends strike > According to a front page article in today's New York Times, the > Clinton Administration is going to be releasing a standard encryption > technology that commercial users will be encouraged to adopt that > involves having the government keep copies of "back door" keys What exactly does "releasing a standard encryption technology" mean? Is this software written by some agency? Is it a hardware device? Is it a paper technical proposal?? What does "commercial users" mean? That is awfully general... > The implications are obvious. No kidding. Digital telephony bill out one orofice, White House BackDoor scheme shoved into another. Great. I see why some people are tempted to believe in conspiracy theories... -- Testes saxi solidi! ********************** Podex opacus gravedinosus est! Stanton McCandlish, SysOp: Noise in the Void Data Center BBS IndraNet: 369:1/1 FidoNet: 1:301/2 Internet: anton@hydra.unm.edu Snail: 8020 Central SE #405, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87108 USA Data phone: +1-505-246-8515 (24hr, 1200-14400 v32bis, N-8-1) Vox phone: +1-505-247-3402 (bps rate varies, depends on if you woke me up...:) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 93 18:19:18 PDT From: Bruce.Baugh@p23.f40.n105.z1.fidonet.org (Bruce Baugh) Subject: Contract engineering & paying the rent U > From: david@WAL6000B.UDC.UPENN.EDU (R. David Murray) U > Date: Mon, 12 Apr 93 20:22:34 EDT U > U > Romana and Dani talk about contract engineering, and Duncan talks U > about U > contract technical writing. What other kinds of contract employment U > exist? Are there agencies specializing in contract programming? In Try talking to temporary agencies; I'm having very good experiences with Western. No programming jobs yet, but some work involving a goodly quantity of computer experience on the user end. And no, relocation isn't called for if you live in a metropolitan area--Portland Metro is about 400,000 people and is generating all the work I can handle with no travel beyond local bus rides. You can also try what I did: simply hang out your shingle. Post some ads at local computer shops and bookstores. If you've got a local computer freebie magazine, computer ad rag, or something similar, run a small ad in it. Leave info on local BBSes (and don't neglect local/regional newsgroups, FidoNet echoes, and the like). One thing can lead to another, and you can get started (and build up a portfolio) without giving up your current work just yet. A true-life example: When I started making the rounds of temp agencies, I did up a very spiffy-looking resume. It was a practical necessity that I arrange things so as to not draw too much attention to several years of little or no work experience during which I was convalescing from severe health problems, and to present skills acquired in a variety of haphazard ways. But I also wanted to strut my word processing/ desktop publishing skills. The receptionist was impressed enough to ask me if I'd do up one for her, too. In the course of conversation we made arrangements for me to give her a few hours of tutoring in word-processing and spreadsheet use. Word of mouth from her in turn generated another couple of jobs... And so it goes. It's very, very spontaneous order. -- uucp: uunet!m2xenix!puddle!40.23!Bruce.Baugh Internet: Bruce.Baugh@p23.f40.n105.z1.fidonet.org ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 1993 00:38:26 -0700 From: D Anton Sherwood Subject: lang: differentiated plurals Eli asks: > (Are there any other examples of a word pair, like "iris" the flower > and "iris" the thing in your eye, in which the words are identical > in the singular but have different plurals?) A few. The classic example is MEDIA / MEDIUMS. An example in pure Latin is LIBER : LIBRI / LIBERI, of which the first means `books' and the second means `free men'. Anton Sherwood dasher@well.sf.ca.us +1 415 267 0685 1800 Market St #207, San Francisco 94102 USA "Don't forget, your mind only *simulates* logic." -- Glen C. Perkins ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 1:49:30 MDT From: Stanton McCandlish Subject: IMPORTANT! > The White House cryptography initiative I've posted about today is in > my opinion the most important threat to freedom of the last twenty > years, possibly the biggest since the end of world war II. I urge > everyone who has not done so to read the press release I forwarded by > way of Tim May. No. Don't just read it. DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT NOW! Email the White House immediately! If you do not know how to do this, I will be happy to post in- structions -- Testes saxi solidi! ********************** Podex opacus gravedinosus est! Stanton McCandlish, SysOp: Noise in the Void Data Center BBS IndraNet: 369:1/1 FidoNet: 1:301/2 Internet: anton@hydra.unm.edu Snail: 8020 Central SE #405, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87108 USA Data phone: +1-505-246-8515 (24hr, 1200-14400 v32bis, N-8-1) Vox phone: +1-505-247-3402 (bps rate varies, depends on if you woke me up...:) ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 1:54:21 MDT From: Stanton McCandlish Subject: Korzybski's "E-Prime", also NLP > Part of "conscious of abstracting" is the awareness that natural language > tends to impose on our thinking a two-valuedness which is unsane. GS teaches > this insight not just as an intellectual bagatelle but as an active, constant > corrective towards sanity. I'd hardly call it "unsane". It is quite sane. It is the natural process of the human mind. This is not to say it is good, only sane. By calling it unsane are you not making a value judgement? Would it not be better to suggest instead that it is not the best mode of thinking? Personally I dislike the sound of "corrective towards sanity". Who gets to define "sanity"? You? Me? The govt? Korzybsky? ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 1:59:20 MDT From: Stanton McCandlish Subject: IMPORTANT! > Hmm. On the other hand, I could see the "broad policy review" > coming up with awful legislation banning non-government-decryptable > data transmissions, and this idiotic "Clipper chip" thing being used > as a justification; but I can scarcely believe that it would have a > major impact on the fundamental privacy issue. I think that is indeed what the issue is. > dear mr. president: > You do not seem to realize that one of the major reasons > we the people want encryption technology is that we do > not trust your thugs to behave honorably and within their > rules, nor do we recognize the justice or legitimacy of > those rules. Must I also write all correspondence in 6th > grade english so that the FBI can not only read but understand > my private communications? Clinton doesn't (likely) read this list. Don't post it here, send it to the White House! I mean it! -- Testes saxi solidi! ********************** Podex opacus gravedinosus est! Stanton McCandlish, SysOp: Noise in the Void Data Center BBS IndraNet: 369:1/1 FidoNet: 1:301/2 Internet: anton@hydra.unm.edu Snail: 8020 Central SE #405, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87108 USA Data phone: +1-505-246-8515 (24hr, 1200-14400 v32bis, N-8-1) Vox phone: +1-505-247-3402 (bps rate varies, depends on if you woke me up...:) ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 2:18:20 MDT From: Stanton McCandlish Subject: IMPORTANT! > > Thats what it is all about! Read it again! > > I did. Four times so far. Here's part of it: Are you blind?! > Q: If the Administration were unable to find a technological > solution like the one proposed, would the Administration be > willing to use legal remedies to restrict access to more > powerful encryption devices? > > A: This is a fundamental policy question which will be > considered during the broad policy review. The key escrow ^^^^^^^^^ If they are "considering" it, this is NOT a Good Thing. It is a very very BAD Thing. When the govt. "considers" taking away our privacy, it is time to kick the govt. in the ass. VERY hard. > mechanism will provide Americans with an encryption product > that is more secure, more convenient, and less expensive ^^^^^^ Wow, just love how they make up their own defintions... Secure: 1. Adj. Possessing a backdoor that can be used by the govt, and anyone who figures out how. 2. removes right to privacy, and allows govt to examine anything it wants to. 3. totally full of shit. > than others readily available today, but it is just one > piece of what must be the comprehensive approach to > encryption technology, which the Administration is > developing. Oh I just can't WAIT to see the rest of this plan! > The Administration is not saying, "since encryption > threatens the public safety and effective law enforcement, > we will prohibit it outright" (as some countries have > effectively done); nor is the U.S. saying that "every > American, as a matter of right, is entitled to an > unbreakable commercial encryption product." There is a > false "tension" created in the assessment that this issue is > an "either-or" proposition. Rather, both concerns can be, > and in fact are, harmoniously balanced through a reasoned, > balanced approach such as is proposed with the "Clipper > Chip" and similar encryption techniques. Sure if you live in Disneyland. Sorry if this qualifies as a flame. It is not meant as one. Just trying to make it VERY clear what is at stake here. > Where does it say anywhere that this proposal would make unbreakable > private encryption illegal? That document is not "all about" > such regulations -- it doesn't even mention them! Sure it does. The question was asked if the govt. would illegalize other encryption methods. The govt. said it was thinking about it. Sheesh. -- Testes saxi solidi! ********************** Podex opacus gravedinosus est! Stanton McCandlish, SysOp: Noise in the Void Data Center BBS IndraNet: 369:1/1 FidoNet: 1:301/2 Internet: anton@hydra.unm.edu Snail: 8020 Central SE #405, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87108 USA Data phone: +1-505-246-8515 (24hr, 1200-14400 v32bis, N-8-1) Vox phone: +1-505-247-3402 (bps rate varies, depends on if you woke me up...:) ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 2:21:48 MDT From: Stanton McCandlish Subject: IMPORTANT! > I'm not defending this typical clownish government lunacy; just > trying to clarify what it is actually saying, rather than what > others project onto it. Oh I see. Pardon us for considering the possible ramifications, and deciding to act to prevent the ones we forsee and don't like. I agree with you that it does not NECESSARILY mean that the govt will out- law other encryption methods, but it is POSSIBLE, and therefore must be prevented (unless of course you WANT them to.) That's all. -- Testes saxi solidi! ********************** Podex opacus gravedinosus est! Stanton McCandlish, SysOp: Noise in the Void Data Center BBS IndraNet: 369:1/1 FidoNet: 1:301/2 Internet: anton@hydra.unm.edu Snail: 8020 Central SE #405, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87108 USA Data phone: +1-505-246-8515 (24hr, 1200-14400 v32bis, N-8-1) Vox phone: +1-505-247-3402 (bps rate varies, depends on if you woke me up...:) ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 1993 04:37:28 -0500 (EDT) From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu Subject: Key Registration and Big Brother--Time to Fight! KMOSTA01@ULKYVX.LOUISVILLE.EDU writes: > > > May I please ask that someone posts info on how I can learn the basics > of encryption keys for my Mac (before it is too late). I welcome private > mail, but others may also use reading on the subject. Thank you. > Krzys' > kmosta01@ulkyvx.louisville.edu > You can ftp macpgp from soda.berkeley.edu in directory pub/cypherpunks/pgp. RSA works like this. Given A relatively prime to M (no common divisors except 1), and X and Y such that X * Y = 1 (mod phi(M)) (where phi(m) is euler's totient function meaning the number of integers less than or equal to m which have no divisors in common with m. E.g. phi(7) = 6 because out of 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 there is only 7 which has a commoner divisor with 7). A^(X*Y) = A (mod M). This says that if you take A and raise it to X, and then raise THAT integer to Y, modulo with M, you get A back. Encryption is simply raising A^X (mod M). Decryption is raising cyphertext^Y (mod M). Example: Pick two primes, P=5, Q=11. M=P*Q=55. phi(55)=40. Pick X=3 Solve 3*Y = 1 (mod 40). Using the well known extended euclidian algorithm you get Y=27. (3 * 27 = 81 = 1 (mod 40)). Now let's say Alice wants to send us a message consisting of a single number which is the day of the month when the cypherpunks will strike at the NSA base. Since we don't want to use Clipper-Chip (tm NSA) phones, and we can't trade DES keys over a tapped phone line, what should we do? Alice wants to send me "7" meaning to attack on the 7th day of the month. So I call up Alice and tell her "X=3, M=55". That's all she needs to know. Alice writes down that A=7, and A^X=A^3 = 7^3 = 343. She then mods it with 55 and gets 13. Alice calls you up and says "13". You compute 13 ^ 27 (mod 55). Since 13^27 is a pretty big number (~30 digits) we need a trick and that trick is modular exponentation. Write 27 as a sum of powers of 2. 27 = 16 + 8 + 2 + 1. Using the properties of exponents, we can write 13^27 = 13 ^ 16 * 13^8 * 13^2 * 13 (mod 55). 13 ^ 2 = 169 (mod 55) = 4 13 ^ 8 = (13 ^ 2)^4 = 4^4 = 256 (mod 55) = 36 13 ^ 16 = (13 ^ 8)^2 = 36 ^ 2 (mod 55) = 31 13^27 = 31 * 36 * 4 * 13 = 58032 (mod 55) = 7 (tada!) So we know that Alice wants us to attack the NSA's Clipper Chip foundry on the 7th. From the NSA's point of view, they can only see (X=3, M=55, cyphertext=13) go across the telephone. Why is RSA secure? The NSA's job is to find Y such that X * Y = 1 mod phi(55) or a Y such that phi(55) would divide 3 * Y - 1. Why is this so hard? Because they have to compute phi(55). Now 55 is a small number so it wouldn't take much work to write out the numbers less than 55 and cross out those which have common divisors with 55 to arrive at 40. But what if M=16225927682921336462961629249502496267774021849840901. Already with are talking about a list of numbers which would take up a large fraction of the matter in the universe. If M is composed of two primes P*Q, then phi(M) = phi(P)*phi(Q), and phi(x)=x - 1 if x is prime. Therefore, if you can factor M, you can figure out phi(M) very quickly, and get Y in ~log(phi(M)) time. All you need to do to be reasonably safe is to pick two gigantic primes (about 200 digits each), compute M=P*Q, pick an X, give out X and M, compute Y, keep Y, P, Q, M private. Hope this helps. (any number theory book will give you the tooks needed to prove the RSA algorithm within the first 70 pages. All it takes is a knowledge of congruences, Euler's generalization of fermat's theorem, and solving of linear congruences. These principles in turn can be reduced to knowledge of divisibility of integers. It's so simple, it shouldn't have been patented, period.) -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- EE/Math Student | politics is the implementation of faith. -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | - Zetetic Commentaries -- ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Apr 93 8:56:19 GMT From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu Subject: Privacy, State, and Crypto I suspected that the news about the State's new crypto standard was bad. Denning does seem to have been put up to it. All she did was hash through some fairly superficial arguments, repeatedly, as far as I could see. One of the most recent Playboy's had an article on threats to privacy. It was clear from that that the greatest threat to privacy is the government, although some nasy comments about corporations were made to appease the Left. The best thing that could be done to protect privacy would be for the State to stop giving out information about people that it coerces out of them. We know the EFF's good on this issue; who else? The ACLU? Not only does this proposal contradict Bill's campaign rhetoric, it also contradicts Hilary's comments about the undesirability of an Orwellian totalitarian State in last Sunday's Parade magazine. I tend to agree with Kryz more and more: the rhetoric is the means, power over others the end. Combine this with the prospect of a State "data highway" system. Recall the attempt a while back in New Jersey to pass legislation imposing licensure for software programmers. What composite is implied? I fear that what we're witnessing is the enslavement of the freest industry left in the USA and the world: information technology. If "the nets" are replaced with "Ma Net," a coercive monopoly, then it would be easy to prohibit unlicensed programmers from access to Ma Net. It would be easy to prohibit unregistered crypto keys. For too long, the culture of information technology has had an amoral ring to it - one of anarchists and cowboys. It would be all too easy for the State to claim that it's got to "clean up Dodge City," and impose law & order. And don't worry - they'll only go after those bad other guys, not good people like you - law-abiding, honest, taxpaying, voting citizens of the USA. As Colorado was in Atlas Shrugged, so, too, has information technology been in the USA of the 1980s. It was the freest industry. It raised productivity and output enormously. It helped the State stay in tax-financing. It was the outlet for tremendous human creativity and progress. And it may all be coming to an end. Anti-trust suits will be filed against Microsoft, too. I'm pessimistic, but mad enough to do something about it anyways. This may even be enough to get me to call Dellums, my congressvermin. Tim Starr - Renaissance Now! Assistant Editor: Freedom Network News, the newsletter of ISIL, The International Society for Individual Liberty, 1800 Market St., San Francisco, CA 94102 (415) 864-0952; FAX: (415) 864-7506; 71034.2711@compuserve.com Think Universally, Act Selfishly - starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu ------------------------------ End of Extropians Digest V93 Issue #0200 ****************************************