| ==Phrack Magazine== |
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| Volume Four, Issue Forty-Four, File 6 of 27 |
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| Conference News |
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| Part I |
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| **************************************************************************** |
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| [Official Announcement / Call For Participation] |
| (Distribute Freely) |
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| dFx, Phrack Magazine and cDc - Cult Of The Dead Cow proudly present : |
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| The Fourth Annual |
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| H O H O C O N |
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| "Cliff Stoll My K0DEZ!@$#!" |
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| Who: All Hackers, Journalists, Security Personnel, Federal Agents, |
| Lawyers, Authors, Cypherpunks, Virtual Realists, Modem Geeks, |
| Telco Employees, and Other Interested Parties. |
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|
| Where: Austin North Hilton & Towers and Super 8 Motel |
| 6000 Middle Fiskville Road |
| Austin, Texas 78752 |
| U.S.A. |
| Hilton : (800) 347-0330 / (512) 451-5757 |
| Super 8: (800) 800-8000 / (512) 467-8163 |
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| When: Friday December 17 through Sunday December 19, 1993 |
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| What is HoHoCon? |
| ---------------- |
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| HoHoCon is the largest annual gathering of those in, related to, or |
| wishing to know more about the computer underground. Attendees generally |
| include some of the most notable members of the "hacking" and "telecom" |
| community, journalists, authors, security professionals, lawyers, and a |
| host of others. Previous speakers include John Draper (Cap'n Crunch), Ray |
| Kaplan, Chris Goggans (Erik Bloodaxe), Bruce Sterling, and many more. The |
| conference is also one of the very few that is completely open to the |
| public and we encourage anyone who is interested to attend. |
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| Hotel Information |
| ----------------- |
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|
| The Austin North Hilton recently split its complex into two separate |
| hotels; the Hilton and the newly added Super 8. HoHoCon guests have the |
| choice of staying in either hotel. Group rates are as followed : |
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| Super 8: Single - $46.50, Double - $49.50, Triple - $52.50, Quad - $55.50 |
| Hilton : Single - $69.00, Double - $79.00, Triple - $89.00, Quad - $99.00 |
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| Once again, the hotel has set aside a block of rooms for the conference |
| and we recommend making your reservations as early as possible to |
| guarantee a room within the block, if not to just guarantee a room period. |
| Rooms for the handicapped are available upon request. To make your |
| reservations, call the number listed above that corresponds with where |
| you are and where you want to stay and make sure you tell them you are |
| with the HoHoCon conference or else you'll end up throwing more money |
| away. The hotel accepts American Express, Visa, Master Card, Discover, |
| Diner's Club, and Carte Blanche credit cards. |
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| Check-in is 3:00 p.m. and check-out is 12:00 noon. Earlier check-in is |
| available if there are unoccupied rooms available. Please note that in |
| order for the hotel to hold a room past 6:00 p.m. on the date of arrival, |
| the individual reservation must be secured by a deposit or guaranteed |
| with one of the credit cards listed above. Also, any cancellations of |
| guaranteed reservations must be made prior to 6:00 p.m. on the date of |
| arrival. You will be responsible for full payment of any guaranteed |
| reservations which are not cancelled by this time. |
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| The hotel provides transportation to and from the airport and will give |
| you full information when you make your reservations. |
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| Directions |
| ---------- |
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| For those of you who will be driving to the conference, the following |
| is a list of directions provided by the hotel (so, if they're wrong, |
| don't blame me): |
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| Dallas : Take IH 35 south to exit 238-B, the Houston exit. At the first |
| stop light, turn right on to 2222. Turn off of 2222 onto Clayton |
| Lane (by the Greyhound Station). At the stop sign, turn right |
| onto Middle Fiskville, the hotel is on the left. |
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| San Antonio : Take IH 35 north to exit 238-B, the Houston exit. At the |
| second stop light, turn left onto 2222. Turn off 2222 onto |
| Clayton Lane (by the Greyhound Station). At the stop sign, |
| turn right onto Middle Fiskville, the hotel is on the left. |
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| Houston (on 290) : Take 290 west into Austin. Exit off of 290 at the IH35 |
| exit (do not get on 35). Stay on the access road |
| heading west, you will pass two stop lights. Turn off |
| the access road onto Clayton Lane (by the Greyhound |
| Station). At the stop sign, turn right onto Middle |
| Fiskville, the hotel is on the left. |
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| Houston (on 71) : Take 71 west into Austin. Exit onto 183 north. Take |
| 183 north to 290 west. Take 290 west to the IH 35 exit. |
| Exit off of 290 at the IH 35 exit (do not get on 35). |
| Stay on the access road heading west, you will pass two |
| stop lights. Turn off the access road onto Clayton Lane |
| (by the Greyhound Station). At the stop sign, turn |
| right onto Middle Fiskville, the hotel in on the left. |
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| Airport : Exit the airport parking lot and turn right onto Manor Road. |
| Take Manor Road to Airport Boulevard and turn right. Take |
| Airport Boulevard to IH 35 north. Take IH 35 to exit 238-B. At |
| the second stop light, turn left onto 2222. Turn off of 2222 |
| onto Clayton Lane (by the Greyhound Station). At the stop sign, |
| turn right onto Middle Fiskville, the hotel is on the left. |
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| Call the hotel if these directions aren't complete enough or if you need |
| additional information. |
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| Conference Details |
| __________________ |
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|
| HoHoCon will last 3 days, with the actual conference being held on |
| Saturday, December 18 starting at 11:00 a.m. and continuing until 5 p.m. |
| or earlier depending on the number of speakers. Although a few speakers |
| have confirmed their attendance, we are still in the planning stages and |
| will wait until the next update to release a speaking schedule. We welcome |
| any speaker or topic recommendations you might have (except for, say, "Why |
| I Luv Baked Potatos On A Stik!"), or, if you would like to speak yourself, |
| please contact us as soon as possible and let us know who you are, who you |
| represent (if anyone), the topic you wish to speak on, a rough estimate of |
| how long you will need, and whether or not you will be needing any |
| audio-visual aids. |
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| We would like to have people bring interesting items and videos again this |
| year. If you have anything you think people would enjoy having the chance |
| to see, please let us know ahead of time, and tell us if you will need any |
| help getting it to the conference. If all else fails, just bring it to the |
| con and give it to us when you arrive. Any organization or individual that |
| wants to bring flyers to distribute during the conference may do so. You |
| may also send your flyers to us ahead of time if you can not make it to |
| the conference and we will distribute them for you. Left over flyers are |
| included with information packets and orders that we send out, so if you |
| want to send extras, go ahead. |
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| Cost |
| ---- |
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| Unlike smaller, less informative conferences, we do not ask you to shell |
| out hundreds of dollars just to get in the door, nor do we take your money |
| and then make you sleep in a tent. We are maintaining the motto of "give |
| $5 if you can", but due to the incredibly high conference room rate this |
| year, we may step up to "$5 minimum required donation" or "give us $5 or |
| we'll smash your head in". Five dollars is an outrageously low price |
| compared to the suit infested industry conferences or even the new "Cons |
| are k00l and trendy, I gotta do one too!" conferences that are charging |
| up to $50 for admission alone. |
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| To encourage people to donate, we will once again be having our wonderless |
| "Raffle For The Elite" during the conference. We will issue a prize list |
| in a future update, but we can guarantee that this year there will be a |
| lot more (and better) prizes than last year, including a full system (and, |
| no, it's not a c64 or 286). Anyone who wishes to donate worthwhile items |
| to the raffle, please let us know ahead of time, or if it's a last minute |
| acquirement, just bring it to the conference. |
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| Miscellaneous Notes |
| ------------------- |
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|
| To save myself some time by mailing responses to a lot of the same |
| questions I expect to get, I'll answer a few of them here. |
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| Although I have not talked to him myself yet, Steve Ryan has told me that |
| Bruce Sterling will indeed be in attendance and may say a few words. |
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| As far as I know, there will not be any visitors from any other planets |
| at the conference. Scot Chasin is still on Earth and will be making an |
| appearance. |
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| Video cameras will *not* be allowed inside the conference room without |
| prior consent due to previous agreements made with speakers who do not |
| wish for certain parts of their speech to be rebroadcast. Still cameras |
| and Etch-A-Sketch's are fine and tape recorders are too easily hidden |
| for us to be able to control. |
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| Videos and T-Shirts from last year's conference are still available, and |
| will also be on hand during the conference. We do not handle the LoD World |
| Tour shirts, but I can tell you that the old ones are gone and a |
| *new* LoD shirt will be unveiled at the conference. The HoHoCon shirts are |
| $15 plus $3 shipping ($4.00 for two shirts). At this time, they only come |
| in extra large. We may add additional sizes if there is a demand for them. |
| The front of the shirt has the following in a white strip across the |
| chest: |
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| I LOVE FEDS |
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| (Where LOVE = a red heart, very similar to the I LOVE NY logo) |
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| And this on the back: |
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| dFx & cDc Present |
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| HOHOCON '92 |
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| December 18-20 |
| Allen Park Inn |
| Houston, Texas |
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| There is another version of the shirt available with the following: |
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| I LOVE WAREZ |
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| The video includes footage from all three days, is six hours long and |
| costs $18 plus $3 shipping ($4.00 if purchasing another item also). Please |
| note that if you are purchasing multiple items, you only need to pay one |
| shipping charge of $4.00, not a charge for each item. If you wish to send |
| an order in now, make all checks or money orders payable to O.I.S., |
| include your phone number and mail it to the street address listed below. |
| Allow a few weeks for arrival. |
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| There will be new HoHoCon '93 shirts available at the conference and a |
| video of the festivities will be out early next year. |
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| Correspondence |
| -------------- |
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| If anyone requires any additional information, needs to ask any questions, |
| wants to RSVP, wants to order anything, or would like to be added to the |
| mailing list to receive the HoHoCon updates, you may mail us at: |
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| hohocon@cypher.com |
| drunkfux@cypher.com |
| cDc@cypher.com |
| drunkfux@crimelab.com |
| dfx@nuchat.sccsi.com |
| drunkfux@5285 (WWIV Net) |
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|
| or via sluggo mail at: |
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| HoHoCon |
| 1310 Tulane, Box 2 |
| Houston, Texas |
| 77008-4106 |
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| We also have a VMB which includes all the conference information and is |
| probably the fastest way to get updated reports. The number is: |
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| 713-867-9544 |
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| You can download any of the conference announcements and related |
| materials by calling Metalland Southwest at 713-468-5802, which is the |
| offical HoHoCon BBS. The board is up 24 hours a day and all baud rates |
| are supported. |
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| Those of you with net access can ftp to cypher.com and find all the |
| HoHoCon information available in /pub/hohocon. The .gifs from previous |
| cons are *not* currently online. |
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| Conference information and updates will most likely also be found in most |
| computer underground related publications and mailing lists, including |
| CuD, CSP, Mondo 2000, 2600, Phrack, TUC, phn0rd, cypherpunks, etc. They |
| should also appear in a number of newsgroups including comp.dcom.telecom, |
| alt.security, comp.org.eff.talk, and sci.crypt. We completely encourage |
| people to use, reprint, and distribute any information in this file. |
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| Same stupid ending statement from last year to make us look good |
| ---------------------------------------------------------------- |
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| HoHoCon '93 will be a priceless learning experience for professionals and |
| gives journalists a chance to gather information and ideas direct from the |
| source. It is also one of the very few times when all the members of the |
| computer underground can come together for a realistic purpose. We urge |
| people not to miss out on an event of this caliber, which doesn't happen |
| very often. If you've ever wanted to meet some of the most famous people |
| from the hacking community, this may be your one and only chance. Don't |
| wait to read about it in all the magazines and then wish you had been |
| there, make your plans to attend now! Be a part of what we hope to be our |
| largest and greatest conference ever. |
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| ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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| COMPUTERS, FREEDOM, AND PRIVACY '94 |
| Conference Announcement |
| Scholarships, Writing Competition Notice |
| 23-26 March 1994, Chicago, Il. |
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|
| The fourth annual conference, "Computers, Freedom, and |
| Privacy," (CFP'94) will be held in Chicago, Il., March 23-26, 1994. |
| The conference is hosted by The John Marshall Law School; George B. |
| Trubow, professor of law and director of the Center for Informatics |
| Law at John Marshall, is general chair of the conference. The |
| program is sponsored jointly by these Association for Computing |
| Machinery (ACM) Special Interest Groups: Communications (SIGCOMM); |
| Computers and Society (SIGCAS); Security, Audit and Control |
| (SIGSAC). |
|
|
| The advance of computer and communications technologies holds |
| great promise for individuals and society. From conveniences for |
| consumers and efficiencies in commerce to improved public health |
| and safety and increased participation in government and community, |
| these technologies are fundamentally transforming our environment |
| and our lives. |
|
|
| At the same time, these technologies present challenges to the |
| idea of a free and open society. Personal privacy and corporate |
| security is at risk from invasions by high-tech surveillance and |
| monitoring; a myriad of personal information data bases expose |
| private life to constant scrutiny; new forms of illegal activity |
| may threaten the traditional barriers between citizen and state and |
| present new tests of Constitutional protection; geographic |
| boundaries of state and nation may be recast by information |
| exchange that knows no boundaries in global data networks. |
|
|
| CFP'94 will assemble experts, advocates and interest groups |
| from diverse perspectives and disciplines to consider freedom and |
| privacy in today's "information society. Tutorials will be offered |
| on March 23, 1994, from 9:00 a.m. - noon and 2:00 - 500 p.m. The |
| conference program is Thursday, March 24, through Saturday, March |
| 26, 1994, and will examine the potential benefits and burdens of |
| new information and communications technologies and consider ways |
| in which society can enjoy the benefits while minimizing negative |
| implications. |
|
|
| STUDENT PAPER COMPETITION |
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|
| Full time college or graduate students may enter the student |
| paper competition. Papers must not exceed 3000 words and should |
| address the impact of computer and telecommunications technologies |
| on freedom and privacy in society. Winners will receive financial |
| support to attend the conference and present their papers. All |
| papers should be submitted by December 15, 1993, (either as |
| straight text via e-mail or 6 printed copies) to: Prof. Eugene |
| Spafford, Department of Computer Science, Purdue University, West |
| Lafeyette, IN 47907-2004. E-Mail: spaf@cs.purdue.edu; Voice: |
| 317-494-7825 |
|
|
|
|
| CONFERENCE REGISTRATION INFORMATION |
|
|
| Registration fees are as follows: |
| If paid by: 1/31/94 3/15/94 4/23/94 |
| Early Regular Late |
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|
| Tutorial $145 $175 $210 |
| Conference 315 370 420 |
|
|
| NOTE: ACM members (give membership number) and John Marshall Alumni |
| (give graduation date) receive a $10 discount from Tutorial and $15 |
| discount from Conference fees. |
|
|
| CONFERENCE REGISTRATION: Inquiries regarding registration should be |
| directed to RoseMarie Knight, Registration Chair, at the JMLS |
| address above; her voice number is 312-987-1420; E-mail, |
| 6rknight@jmls.edu. |
|
|
| CONFERENCE INFORMATION: Communications regarding the conference |
| should be sent to: CFP'94, The John Marshall Law School, 315 S. |
| Plymouth Ct., Chicago, IL 60604-3907 |
| (Voice: 312-987-1419; Fax: 312-427-8307; E-mail: CFP94@jmls.edu) |
|
|
| ROOM RESERVATIONS: The Palmer House Hilton, located in Chicago's |
| "loop," and only about a block from The John Marshall Law School, |
| is the conference headquarters. Room reservations only should be |
| made directly with the hotel, mentioning "CFP'94" to get the |
| special conference rate of $99.00, plus tax. (17 E. Monroe., |
| Chicago, Il., 60603, Tel: 312-726-7500; 1-800-HILTONS; Fax |
| 312-263-2556) |
|
|
|
|
| NOTE: More specific information about conference program |
| content will be available December 1, 1993. |
|
|
| *********** |
| George B. Trubow, Professor of Law |
| Director, Center for Informatics Law |
| The John Marshall Law School |
| 315 S. Plymouth Ct. |
| Chicago, IL 60604-3907 |
| Fax: 312-427-8307; Voice: 312-987-1445 |
| E-mail: 7trubow@jmls.edu |
|
|
| ......SCHOLARSHIPS |
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|
| The Conference on Computers, Freedom & Privacy (CFP'94) is pleased to |
| announce that it will once again provide a number of full tuition |
| scholarships for attendance at the conference. The conference will be held |
| in Chicago, IL from March 23rd through March 26th, 1995 and will be hosted |
| by the John Marshall Law School under the chairmanship of George Trubow. |
|
|
| The conference traditionally attracts an extremely diverse group of |
| persons concerned with issues relating to the rapid development of the |
| "information society"; civil libertarians, information providers, law |
| enforcement personnel, privacy advocates, "hackers", sociologists, |
| educators and students, computer professionals, cryptography advocates, |
| government policy makers and other interested parties have all played |
| major roles in the three previous conference. |
|
|
| Speakers at previous conferences have included Electronic Frontier |
| Foundation (EFF) co-founders John Perry Barlow and Mitch Kapor, FBI Deputy |
| Director William A. "Al" Bayse, writer Bruce Sterling, privacy advocate |
| Simon Davies, Harvard University law professor Lawrence Tribe, hacker |
| "Phiber Optik", Georgetown University's Dorothy Denning, "Cuckoo's Egg" |
| author Clifford Stoll, Prodigy counsel George Perry, USA Today founder Al |
| Neuwith, former FCC Chairman Nicholas Johnson, Computer Professionals for |
| Social Responsibility (CPSR)'s Marc Rotenberg, Arizona prosecutor Gail |
| Thackeray, and Bay Area Women in Computing's Judi Clark. |
|
|
| The scholarships are intended to provide access to the conference to those |
| that would like to attend the conference but are unable to afford the |
| tuition. They are available to undergraduate and graduate students in any |
| discipline (previous student attendees have come from computer science, |
| law, sociology, liberal arts, journalism, and womens' studies |
| backgrounds), law enforcement personnel, hackers, social scientists, and |
| others interested in the future of the information society. |
|
|
| Persons interested in a scholarship should send the following information |
| (e-mail greatly preferred) to: |
|
|
| John F. McMullen |
| Perry Street |
| Jefferson Valley, NY 10535 |
|
|
| mcmullen@panix.com |
| (914) 245-2734 (voice) |
| (914) 245-8464 (fax) |
|
|
| 1. Personal Information -- Name, Addresses (including e-mail), Phone |
| Numbers, School and/or Business Affiliation |
|
|
| 2. Short Statement explaining what the applicant helps to get from CFP'94 |
| and what impact that attendance may have in the applicant's community or |
| future work. |
|
|
| 3. Stipulation that the applicant understands that he/she is responsible |
| for transportation and lodging expenses related to the conference. The |
| scholarship includes tuition and those meals included with the conference. |
|
|
| 4. Stipulation that the applicant would not be able to attend the |
| conference if a scholarship is not granted. The applicant stipulates |
| that, if granted a scholarship, he /she will attend the conference. |
|
|
| 6. Stipulation that the applicant, if granted a scholarship, will provide |
| a contact John McMullen at the above e-mail address or phone numbers with |
| any questions. |
|
|
| The number of available scholarships will be determined by funding available. |
|
|
| ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
|
|
| Notes from the Austin Crypto Conference, September 22, 1993 |
|
|
| by Gregory W. Kamen |
|
|
| --- Dinosaur Warning --- |
|
|
| Disclaimer: A lot of people here noted disclaimed what they said as "not |
| legal advice". In addition, this was prepared from notes which were not |
| necessarily legible or complete, therefore I disclaim any responsibility |
| for misquoting or mistranscribing this information. (If you don't like |
| it, you try typing "cypherpunks" over and over again :P). Please note |
| that in Q & A sessions, the answers were relevant, though not always |
| responsive to the questions. In addition, I state that this information |
| does not represent legal advice from me or solicitation of legal |
| representation, and does not necessarily represent the position of EFH, |
| EFF, EFF-Austin, the individual conference participants, or any living |
| person. |
|
|
| ----------- |
|
|
| The room was set up to seat approximately 180 people. It was essentially |
| full, and there were a few people standing--not bad for a Wednesday |
| afternoon. |
|
|
| There was a large (about 14 people) contingent from EFH present. |
|
|
| Steve Jackson opened the meeting with a few introductory remarks, among |
| which were that a subpoena had been served on Austin Code Works, a |
| publisher of cryptographic software. |
|
|
| We can expect to hear about the case in news magazines of general |
| circulation in about two months. |
|
|
| Bruce Sterling delivered the keynote address. |
|
|
| He began by establishing a context by defining cryptography: |
|
|
| -- as secret coding to avoid the scrutiny of a long list of entities, |
| -- as a way to confine knowledge to those initiated and trusted, |
| -- as a means to ensure the privacy of digital communication, and |
| -- as a new form of information economics |
|
|
| Sterling then noted that crypto is "out of the closet" |
|
|
| -- it is heard of on the streets |
| -- the government acknowledges it by bringing forth its Clipper chip |
| -- it is in the hands of the people |
| -- public key crypto is out there and commercially available |
| -- the typical time to market from first publication of a new idea is |
| 20 years. Diffie published the first public key crypto algorithm in 1975, |
| thus the target date for mass crypto would be 1995. Bringing it to market |
| will require bringing of political pressure, lawsuits, and money. |
|
|
| Next, Sterling moved to the subject of the grand jury proceedings in San |
| Jose on 9/22. |
|
|
| -- Export law violations have been alleged. Whatever the outcome, |
| this proceeding is certainly not the end of the subject. |
|
|
| Finally, before closing by noting that EFF-Austin is not EFF, Sterling |
| shared a brief background of the panelists: |
|
|
| -- they are people who can tell us about the future |
| -- they are directors of national EFF and can share information |
| Panelists on First Panel |
| -- Mitch Kapor - co-founder of EFF, software designer, entrepreneur, |
| journalist, philanthropist, activist. He spoke out on obscure issues in |
| the beginning and made them seem less obscure. He has done good deeds for |
| the public. |
| -- Jerry Berman - President of EFF, activist background, published |
| widely on security and privacy issues, formerly active with ACLU, and is |
| on Clinton administration's National Information Infrastructure team. |
| Panelists on Second Panel |
| -- Esther Dyson - journalist, has widely read project "Release 1.0", |
| is a guru in Europe. |
| -- Mike Godwin - lawyer for EFF, veteran public speaker, attended UT- |
| Austin, on the board of EFF-Austin as well as EFF. |
| Panelists on Third Panel |
| -- Eric Hughes - not EFF member, started cypherpunks mailing list, |
| from California |
| -- John Gilmore - 20 year programmer, pioneer at Sun, civil |
| libertarian |
| -- John Perry Barlow - co-founder of EFF, media junkie, and author. |
|
|
| PANEL #1: POLICY |
|
|
| Kapor - Opening remarks: Framing the issue |
|
|
| a. Series of conferences in Washington, briefed EFF on how laws are |
| made, at a technical level of the process. Berman was instrumental in |
| passing the ECPA, which was later used successfully in Steve Jackson Games |
| case. |
| b. ECPA is a good thing: it says Email should be as private as postal |
| mail. However, it doesn't go far enough because it is easy to listen in |
| on cell phones. |
| c. Kapor felt need technology to protect privacy. Laws alone are not |
| enough. Berman stated view (at that time. He has since changed his mind) |
| widely held within the Beltway that laws were sufficient. |
| d. Survey: 20 percent of those present use PGP. 80 percent have |
| heard of PGP. |
|
|
| Berman - |
|
|
| a. Following on Kapor's point that ECPA was soft, Berman says the |
| politicians will remain clueless until we educate them. If it is |
| knowledge that can alter the political process, it must be done. |
| b. EFF established a Washington presence because policy is being made |
| to design and govern the electronic frontier by the big commercial |
| players. The public and the consumer are not represented. |
| c. We're working on a goal that the national information |
| infrastructure serve the public interest. For example, if the big players |
| are allowed to dominate the process, they will control access and the NII |
| will look like 500 cable channels rather than a point-to-point switched |
| network like Internet. |
| d. There's a big battle coming: computers and communication are in |
| abundance such that everyone can be a publisher. This raises at the very |
| least a First Amendment issue. |
| e. The Clipper Chip |
| -- has great potential for the net; however, government agencies are |
| not sure of control |
| -- privacy and security are essential for development of the national |
| information infrastructure. This is a threat to the law enforcement |
| community. |
| -- the response of the law enforcement community has been to attempt |
| to throttle the technology. |
| -- in order to capture the future, they want to develop the |
| technology themselves. |
| -- EFF's role has been to say that we shouldn't go ahead with the |
| Clipper chip proposal. |
| -- the ultimate big question: What to do when all communications are |
| encrypted. |
| -- Clinton led off with a study of cryptography policy and introduced |
| the Clipper chip at the same time, which demonstrates that the policy was |
| already determined in the opinions of many. It was introduced not as |
| something being studied, but as a fait accompli. |
| -- Clipper proposal is bad because it is based on a secret algorithm |
| which has not been subjected to adequate scrutiny, it is counterintuitive |
| to interoperability because stronger crypto is being developed outside the |
| United States, and it includes a key escrow provision that includes only |
| "insiders" who developed the technology. |
| -- We don't prescreen the content of communications. The law |
| enforcement community needs a warrant. That is fundamental to the First, |
| Fourth, and Fifth Amendments. |
| f. We oppose the Clipper/Skipjack chip |
| -- there's no evidence showing that law enforcement will be unduly |
| hampered in its efforts to stop crime if crypto is available. |
| -- the positive and negative implications of widespread crypto have |
| not been considered. |
| -- law enforcement may have a problem, but if they have a warrant |
| they should be able to get access. |
| -- as long as Clipper is not mandated, people can use other types of |
| crypto. |
| g. Conclusions |
| -- if Clipper is voluntary, it doesn't work, because people who want |
| to encrypt safely will use other products. |
| -- if Clipper is mandated, there are serious constitutional issues. |
| -- Even if the Clipper chip proposal fails, we still lose under the |
| current scheme, because the export control laws guarantee that we will not |
| have crypto interoperable with the rest of the world. |
| h. EFF chairs a large coalition including representatives of |
| Microsoft, IBM, and ACLU to work against this. |
| i. Congress only needs one bad case, like a terrorist attack, to go |
| the other way. |
|
|
| Q & A - |
|
|
| Q. Is the key in the hardware or software with Clipper? |
|
|
| A. It's in the hardware, therefore the instrument is permanently |
| compromised once the keys are released from escrow. The law enforcement |
| arguments are really fronts for NSA and their religious commitment to |
| prevent the spread of crypto. It's NSA's mission to make sure it "busts" |
| every communication in the world, therefore why would they propose any |
| encryption without a "back door" through which they could decipher all |
| transmissions. |
|
|
| Q. What is the current state of the law between NIST and NSA? |
|
|
| A. NSA was selling "secure" phones. They wanted a new classification of |
| information. Responsibility for classified systems rests with NSA. NIST |
| is brought in to handle domestic crypto. In terms of budget and |
| experience, however, NSA is dominant, and NIST relies on them. |
|
|
| Q. How does GATT relate to the Clipper proposal |
|
|
| A. It's not dealt with in GATT. There's no agreement on an international |
| standard. |
|
|
| Q. What's going on with PGP? |
|
|
| A. Pretty Good Privacy is the people's crypto. It was independently |
| developed, and has been widely distributed for our information and |
| security. There are two current controversies regarding PGP. First is |
| whether it is subject to export controls, and second is its intellectual |
| property status. |
|
|
| Q. What facts do we have regarding the history of Clipper? |
|
|
| A. The project began during the Bush administration after AT&T introduced |
| phones implementing DES, the Data Encryption Standard. Clinton looked at |
| it early in his administration. NSA pushed the program, and the staff |
| wanted to "do something". A worst-case scenario about the introduction of |
| Clipper is that it was leaked to the press, and the story about a study |
| was cooked up to cover the leak. People might be surprised about how |
| little expertise and thought about issues goes on. Policy makers operate |
| under severe time constraints, handling the crisis of the moment. Most of |
| them are reasonable people trying to do the best thing under the |
| circumstances. If we push certain ideas long enough and hard enough we |
| can affect the outcome. |
|
|
| Q. Following the _AMD v. Intel_ case, there's nothing stating you cannot |
| clone the Clipper chips to circumvent the law enforcement field, correct? |
|
|
| A. It's difficult to say. The chips have not yet been delivered. There |
| have been technical problems with the chip. At NIST hearing a couple |
| weeks ago, Dorothy Denning revealed that she had reviewed the Skipjack |
| algorithm alone because the other four cryptographers selected to review |
| the algorithm were on vacation. There's a certain degree of cynicism |
| because the government has said it will twist people's arms using its |
| purchasing power and the threat of prosecution to establish Skipjack as a |
| de facto standard. EFF is trying to get AT&T and Motorola to do |
| something. Maybe the chip cannot easily be cloned. John Gilmore wants to |
| see how easy it is to reverse engineer. |
|
|
| Q. What are specific steps that can be taken? |
|
|
| A. Send Email to the White House, and cc to EFF. Also, focus on the |
| debate concerning ownership and leasing of the national information |
| infrastructure. Southwestern Bell wants authority to own and lease the |
| net and isn't quite sure whether government should be involved. This is |
| the other longest-running EFF policy concern: the owner of the electronic |
| highways shouldn't be able to control content. Bandwidth should be |
| provided based on the principles of common carriage and universal access. |
| Construction of the NII should be done by the private sector because |
| government doesn't have the resources available. We can't allow ourselves |
| to be limited to upstream bandwidth. The net should retain those of its |
| characteristics equivalent to BBS's. |
|
|
| Q. If NIST is to be an escrow agent, why are they not secure? |
|
|
| A. This is a source of moral outrage, but moral outrage only goes so far. |
| We need to swallow our distaste for dealing with the government to |
| compromise. It is worthwhile to get involved in the decision-making |
| _process_. |
|
|
| Q. What is the position of the ACLU and Republican think tanks on Clipper? |
|
|
| A. A lot of organizations have bumped into NII. ACLU is fighting the |
| Clipper chip. For other organizations, it's not a top priority item. |
|
|
| Q. With regard to DES: Export restrictions apply to scramblers, but they |
| are exported anyway. Why this policy of selective enforcement? |
|
|
| A. Don't look for consistency. SPA has recognized that there are 231 DES- |
| equivalent products. The genie is out of the bottle. DES source is |
| widely available, but more so inside the US than outside. |
|
|
| Q. If the government has their way, what good products are out there for |
| us? |
|
|
| A. The government can only have its way by mandating use of Skipjack. If |
| it holds up, legally and politically, there _is_ no alternative. The |
| government is saying that it is considering banning the use of crypto |
| other than Skipjack, but has not yet adopted such a policy. |
|
|
| Q. If crypto is a munition, is it protected under the Second Amendment? |
|
|
| A. The Second Amendment probably doesn't affect the export question. |
|
|
| Q. Are there any legal weaknesses in the public key cryptography patents? |
|
|
| A. EFF has its hands full with other issues and hasn't really formulated |
| an answer to this, but believes there's a fatal weakness as to all |
| software patents. However, it would be prohibitively expensive to make |
| such a case at this time. |
|
|
| Q. Do we need different copyright laws because of encryption? |
|
|
| A. Recognize that without changes in the copyright law, it will be |
| difficult to get a true net economy going. Producers want a way to make |
| money from the net. Consumers want the equivalent of home taping. It's |
| tough to cover all the bases. |
|
|
| Q. How do law enforcement issues in civil cases relate? |
|
|
| A. This is an interesting point because the line between a commercial |
| dispute and a criminal act are fuzzy. There are dangers in obtaining a |
| wiretap. The law enforcement community shouldn't have a case to tap a |
| line in the event of a two-party dispute. There is a danger of misuse for |
| traffic analysis of calls. |
|
|
| Q. ECPA could have been used to regulate access to the airwaves. Has it |
| been tested against the First Amendment? |
|
|
| A. This demonstrates that technological security measures, rather than |
| merely laws, are needed. People have listened to cell phone calls with |
| scanners, and they made scanners illegal to manufacture, but cell phones |
| can be modified to act as scanners. Experimentation of privacy with |
| encryption shifts the balance. RSA is available outside the US. RICO is |
| being overused. |
|
|
| PANEL #2: INDUSTRIAL AND LEGAL ISSUES |
|
|
| Dyson - Beyond commercial people being citizens, there are three big |
| issues: |
|
|
| 1. Protection of trade secrets |
| 2. Intellectual property protection for net businesses and database |
| information |
| 3. Exporting encryption devices: US businesses like to do business |
| overseas. It is cost ineffective to develop a US-only standard. There is |
| better encryption available in Russia and Bulgaria on BBS's. |
|
|
| Godwin - Talking about law enforcement arguments government makes. There |
| are general issues regarding computers, communication, and privacy greater |
| than just Clipper. |
|
|
| -- Godwin is the first person people talk to when they call EFF in |
| trouble. In addition to giving a lot of general information regarding |
| liability, he monitors the intake of cases for EFF. He talks at |
| conventions about criminal and constitutional issues. |
| -- This effort has produced at least one change already: law |
| enforcement personnel are no longer completely incompetent and clueless |
| about computers. |
| -- the most interesting are issues dealing with hackers and crypto. |
| FBI's involvement with digital telephony: they wanted to make it more |
| wiretap friendly. They discovered it is worthless without a restriction |
| on encryption, and Clipper was introduced a short time later. |
|
|
| Legal History |
|
|
| The right to communications privacy is a fairly new thing. The |
| Supreme Court faced it in the 1928 _Olmstead_ case, and held that |
| there was no Fourth Amendment interest to be protected at all because |
| there was no physical intrusion on the property. The doctrine has bee |
| reveisited a number of times since then. |
| -- a suction cup mike next door to the defendant's apartment produced |
| the same holding. |
| -- In a later case of a "spike mike" penetrating the heating duct of |
| the defendant's apartment, the Court held that the Fourth Amendment |
| applied but did not extend general Fourth Amendment protection. |
| Finally in the _Katz_ case in the late 60's the Court formulated its |
| present doctrine in holding that the defendant has a reasonable |
| expectation of privacy in a phone booth. The Court said that the Fourth |
| Amendment protects people, not places. Justice Brandeis, in dissent, |
| cited Olmstead, but also noted that "The right most prized by civilized |
| men is the right to be let alone." |
|
|
| Arguments regularly advanced by law enforcement types in favor of Clipper: |
|
|
| 1. Wiretapping has been essential in making many cases. |
| -- this argument seems reasonable. |
|
|
| 2. Even if they can't point to a case now, they are taking a proactive |
| approach, trying to anticipate problems rather than reacting. |
| -- Dorothy Denning was involved early on in framing the issues. Now |
| she's in favor of the government line. Point is that an attitude of "us |
| vs. them" is counterproductive. |
|
|
| 3) There are nuclear terrorists out there |
| -- this argument is the result of false reasoning. Like Pascal's |
| wager, the price of guessing wrong is so high that the rational person |
| chooses to be a believer, even where the probability is very low. |
| -- the problem with it is that you can't live that way. There's not |
| necessarily one single right answer. Also there is a substantial |
| opportunity cost. Whenever you empower individual rights, there's a |
| tradeoff against government efficiency. As an example, take the case of |
| compelled confession. It would be very efficient for the government to be |
| able to compel a confession, but the cost in individual rights is too |
| high. There is no constitutional precedent on which to base the outlawing |
| of encryption. The way it ought to be, the law enforcement types should |
| have the right to try to intercept communications under certain |
| circumstances, but they should have no guarantee of success. |
|
|
| 4) Wiretapping has created an entitlement to have access to the |
| communications: this argument is blatantly ridiculous. |
|
|
| Q & A |
|
|
| Q. Before the A-bomb was built, proponents said that it would cost $1 |
| million to build. The eventual cost was $1 billion. Congress asked what |
| was the probability that it could work, and was told 1 in 10. Thus the |
| nuclear terrorist argument works, right? |
|
|
| A. Terrorists won't use Clipper |
|
|
| Q. NSA has had scramblers working. Why does it hurt for us to have the |
| devices? |
|
|
| A. We're not opening Pandora's Box. Encryption is already out there. |
| They think the majority of communications are not encrypted now. |
| Encryption will create a bottleneck, which will change the way law |
| enforcement does its job. |
|
|
| Q. What about the Davis case in Oklahoma? If convicted is there any chance |
| for parole? |
|
|
| A. Davis was a BBS owner prosecuted because he allegedly had obscene |
| material on his board. I don't know about Oklahoma parole law. |
|
|
| Q. What is the current legal status of PGP? |
|
|
| A. That will be answered later. |
|
|
| Q. If "only outlaws will have crypto", how effectively can the clamp down? |
|
|
| A. It will probably be very easy for them to chill nonstandard crypto if |
| -- they investigate for another crime and find it, or |
| -- it may itself be probable cause for a search. |
|
|
| Q. Doesn't a lot of this boil down to "you wouldn't be encrypting if you |
| had nothing to hide"? |
|
|
| A. There's not any probable cause for law enforcement taking that |
| position. Business likes crypto. In a scenario where only certain types |
| of crypto are allowed, there could presumably arise a presumption from |
| nonstandard crypto. The more people who encrypt, the more will say it is |
| all right. |
|
|
| Q. Do you get the sense that there is a political will to protect privacy |
| in this country? |
|
|
| A. It is not clear that is the case. There is a real education hurdle to |
| teach the importance of technology. |
|
|
| Q. The law enforcement aspect is not important to NSA, right? |
|
|
| A. The Russians and the Japanese have done more theoretical work. Read |
| "The Puzzle Palace" |
|
|
| Q. Virtual communities and net businesses need crypto on all systems to |
| validate digital signatures. |
|
|
| A. It is not required universally. It will become cheaper as digital |
| signatures take off. The Clipper proposal does not address digital |
| signatures. NIST is also talking to IRS about helping implement Clipper |
| by extending the ability to file tax returns electronically to those using |
| Clipper. |
|
|
| Q. What restrictions are there right now on the IMPORT of crypto? |
|
|
| A. None right now. |
|
|
| Q. Is law enforcement misuse of commercial information anticipated? |
|
|
| A. It is a wash. There are laws available to protect against such things, |
| like the Electronic Funds Transfer laws, and also that the wiretap law |
| requires eventual notification of the tap. That's why they have called |
| for two escrow agents. The weakness is that people can be compromised. |
| The answer to law enforcement is that you could have more than two escrow |
| agents to make the bribe prohibitively expensive. Also the problem of |
| human weakness is not unique to the Clipper chip or key escrow systems. |
|
|
| Q. There's no mapping between the chip and the phone, correct? |
|
|
| A. The only link is the word of the officer seeking a warrant. There is |
| no provision right now for a database containing identities of all chips. |
|
|
| Q. Can the President or Congress outlaw encryption by Executive Order? |
|
|
| A. The president cannot by Executive Order. It's not clear whether |
| Congress could constitutionally. |
|
|
| Q. What about steganography? |
|
|
| A. Steganography is defined as a message appearing to be unencrypted but |
| containing a code. There's a constant competition between the law |
| enforcement community and the criminal element to stay ahead on the |
| technology. |
|
|
| Q. Are one time pads illegal, or covered by export regulations? |
|
|
| A. No. Few policymakers have ever heard of them. |
|
|
| Q. What's a vision of what we would like to see? |
|
|
| A. Try to give people a technological means to protect their own privacy. |
| Freedom to exchange information. Communities conforming to a standard |
| without oversight, so that we can export. |
| Godwin - more mystical approach. In person, you can be sure of someone's |
| identity. This creates intimacy. Technology has the potential to free |
| intimacy from the accident of geography. With crypto, you know the |
| identity of the other person, and that you're not being overheard. |
|
|
| Q. Who are the law enforcement people you've been dealing with? Do they |
| represent the highest levels of their organizations? |
|
|
| A. (Godwin) I don't claim to know what NSA thinks. I have talked to FBI, |
| state and local law enforcement authorities, and they all say the same |
| things. |
|
|
| PANEL #3: CYPHERPUNKS |
|
|
| Barlow - Doesn't have the I/O bandwidth to be a cypherpunk. Doesn't know |
| how they do it. The net is the biggest technological development since |
| fire. There's a very difficult choice to be made, and it may already be |
| made: Either anything is visible to anyone who is curious, or nothing is |
| visible. Barlow comes from a small town. He's not bothered by privacy |
| invasions at that level. But there's a difference between locals and the |
| possessors of a database. |
| The problem of giving up privacy (which without encryption will |
| happen), is that it allows "them" to protect us from ourselves. Also, no |
| matter how benevolent the current government may be, there will always be |
| a corrupt one down the road. Hidden crypto economies could break most |
| governments. It's not necessarily good to have no government either. |
| What drives the cypherpunks is a law of nature: Anarchy is breaking |
| out, and Barlow is one. However, the libertarian impulse begs a few |
| questions about crypto: What are we trying to hide, from whom, and why? |
| There are a lot of victimless crimes out there for which no one wants |
| to take responsibility. |
| Barlow wants crypto to create trust in identity. The real cypherpunk |
| question is: The war is over, and we have won. How do we make the |
| transition of power graceful? Human nature is to acquire some power |
| structure of some kind. It is critical to acquaint friends and those who |
| could care less with crypto. |
|
|
| Gilmore - There are too many laws, and they make the wrong things illegal; |
| We need to explain. In the existing system, the natural outgrowth has |
| been for cypherpunks to be labeled as "them". Gilmore's vision is |
| unprecedented mobility by creating privacy and authenticity at a distance. |
| Thus you don't have to live near work, or play near home. By focusing on |
| conspirators, the law enforcement community loses the focus on business |
| use. The formal topic of the panel is cypherpunks. |
| -- Crypto is not all that hard. Denning's book shows how to |
| implement DES and RSA. |
| -- Cypherpunks push the limits - taking cryptography from theory into |
| the realm of the practical. |
| -- Trying to put crypto in the hands of the people, so that the |
| government cannot take it back. That's why PGP is freely distributed. |
| -- Also working on anonymity and digital money schemes. |
| The areas the cypherpunk group has worked on are: |
| 1) Anonymity - anonymous Email. What is the impact on how we |
| communicate? Most of the debate has been relatively uninformed. The |
| Supreme Court thinks there is a right of anonymity. A Los Angeles law |
| requiring that demonstrators who handed out flyers put their name and |
| address on the flyers was overturned on the grounds that it chilled free |
| speech. In other media, telephones are anonymous. There has been a big |
| ruckus with Caller ID. The postal service does not enforce return address |
| requirements. Telegrams and radio are similarly anonymous. |
| 2) Privacy - Have been implementing key exchange systems for PGP, |
| experimenting with encrypted audio. Digital cash systems - so many |
| businesses would pop up on the net if it was possible to spend electronic |
| money. There are people working on the legal aspects of it now. |
| 3) Outreach - a mailing list, contributing articles to Village Voice, |
| Wired, Whole Earth News. |
| 4) Government interaction - Sent a list of questions regarding |
| Clipper to NIST. Made several requests under the Freedom of Information |
| Act. Someone searched the dumpsters at Mykotronx. In a recent FOIA |
| request to an Assistant Secretary of Defense, we learned that the law |
| enforcement and intelligence communities advocate making Clipper |
| mandatory. There's a FOIA request in now on Clipper. FBI returned a |
| clipping file, but says it will take 3 1/2 years to process and release |
| all the documents requested. |
| 5) Future projects - Building encrypted phones using PGP. Real |
| digital banking. Automating anonymity and making an easier to use |
| interface for anonymized mail. Tightening security from machine to |
| machine protocols - Right now they transmit cleartext. At Gilmore's home |
| machine at Cygnus recently, a hacker monitored a session remotely, then |
| installed a daemon to monitor the first 200 bytes of ethernet traffic from |
| each connection. The daemon was removed, and the problem fixed using |
| kerberos. |
|
|
| Hughes - Cypherpunks was created by Hughes and Tim May. It's surprising |
| how much media attention we have gotten. They knew what they were doing |
| was significant, but not that so many people thought so. They are now |
| shooting a pilot for a TV show based on cypherpunks, and Hughes has held |
| himself out as a media expert. Here are a few obvious things that |
| nonetheless need to be stated: |
|
|
| 1) In order to have a private key, you need to have your own CPU. To |
| put your key online where someone else has physical access is dumb. |
| Therefore, one of the consequences is that digital privacy is only for the |
| rich. |
| 2) Cypherpunks is not a "hacker privacy league", but rather seeks to |
| ensure privacy for all. Crypto must be easy to use. It is just now |
| feasible to have an anonymous remailer. The user interface _must_ be |
| easy. The layperson's concept of security is that if the computer is not |
| networked, it is secure. They don't see how much of a disadvantage it is |
| not to be networked. Gibson calls non-networked computers "dead silicon". |
| Therefore, encryption needs to be transparent to the user. The |
| cypherpunks mailing list reached critical mass about 2 months ago with |
| enough people understanding the concepts to move forward. We're at a |
| crossroads historically now. |
| 3) If you're the only one using crypto, it must be you who sent the |
| cryptographic message. Anonymity is a social construct, and it doesn't |
| work unless many people do it. The government is good at suppressing |
| small things, but bad at suppressing big things. Therefore the best |
| course of action is to spread the word. In the end, most of us will be |
| private or most will not. If encryption is available to you, use it. |
|
|
| In response to Dyson on the question of copyright: Copyright is dead, or |
| at least moribund. It will not exist as we know it in 100 years. It is |
| a means of using the government's power to suppress expression. You still |
| will be able to sell the timeliness of information, indexing, delivery, |
| etc. |
|
|
| Gilmore - If we decide to be private, the only limit to secrecy is |
| individual conscience. |
|
|
| Comments from the audience: |
|
|
| -- As it becomes less possible to hold on to information, marketing |
| shifts toward a relationship rather than a product. |
| -- If we want to make encryption easy, put out a mailer which |
| supports it. (Response: We're working on it) |
|
|
| Q & A |
|
|
| Q. Can public keys be made available through the Domain Name Servers? |
|
|
| A. PGP developers are working on it. Internet is an information motel. |
| Data checks in, but it doesn't check out. |
|
|
| Q. Is it possible to keep secrets at all? |
|
|
| A. The larger an organization is, the tougher it is to keep a secret. |
| Secrecy and digital signatures are not exactly related. One thing we may |
| see if pointers to specific documents which contain self-verifying |
| information. These will change the balance of power. |
|
|
| Q. Can we sell strong crypto to Clinton as part of his national ID card |
| for health care program? |
|
|
| A. There's a problem in dealing with the administration right now, because |
| they are currently defending a position and it will be tough to change. |
| A parallel development may make the difference. Congress is getting |
| Email. Seven or eight congressmen have access. A push to implement |
| crypto to determine who is from the districts represented should come |
| soon. A lot of this type application is based on the blind signature work |
| of David Chaum. |
|
|
| Q. What's the status with the legality of PGP vs. RSA? |
|
|
| A. It is unsettled. There are two issues: patent infringement and export. |
| RIPEM uses RSAREF, which is a watered down version of RSA. They're |
| working on PGP using RSAREF for noncommercial users. |
|
|
| Q. Compare the strength and security of PGP and RIPEM? |
|
|
| A. PGP uses a longer key. RIPEM uses DES, but will probably go to Triple- |
| DES. |
|
|
| Q. How are blind signatures used? |
|
|
| A. Voter cards, digital signatures, digital money. The government won't |
| do it if they feel it's not in their best interest. Push it. |
|
|
| Q. Can NSA break DES & PGP? |
|
|
| A. Of course. |
| Q. How long must a key be to slow NSA down? |
|
|
| A. We estimate they can break one 512 bit RSA modulus per day. |
|
|
| Q. Is PGP illegal, and if so, how? |
|
|
| A. Patent infringement issue is whether PGP infringes RSA. If you use a |
| product that infringes, you are civilly liable. If they were to enforce |
| against a random user, worst case is that the user might be tied up in the |
| courts for a while. Worse is copyright - it is a felony to engage in |
| software piracy, which means making over 10 copies with a value over |
| $2500. This poses a potential problem for sysadmins, and now companies |
| use the threat of criminal charges to force licensing. Kapor is willing |
| to take the case of whether or not there could ever be a valid software |
| patent to the Supreme Court. Godwin says prosecutors will use other laws: |
| Wire fraud, conspiracy, RICO. |
|
|
| Hughes - there should be a local cypherpunks chapter. It should meet on |
| the second Saturday of the month. Hughes is pursuing the idea of |
| teleconferencing. |
|
|
| Hughes concludes: "There's plenty of arguing to do. I'll see you online." |
|
|