At 2:22 PM -0800 2/29/00, Eric Cordian wrote:
>I'm a great believer that if something isn't robust enough to protect
>Presidential Assassination Plans, Methamphetamine Formulas, Money
>Laundering, Nuke Simulation Codes, and Streaming Lolita/Donkey Videos,
>then it probably isn't properly implemented strong crypto. I'd rather
>know that before I start using it to protect my privacy.
>
>Any financial entity that uses the words "freeze" and "customer account"
>in the same sentence is a joke, if they are suggesting that assets in
>their institution are equivalent to metal in your fist.
Indeed, and some of these online services are even more willing to turn
over records and freeze accounts than their physical world traditional
counterparts are willing to do.
For example, online services like AOL maintain special liason offices in
their Northern Virginia headquarters for quickly facillitating customer
account inquiries. No warrants are even needed in most cases. (The Fourth
Amendment, as we should all remind ourselves, does not generally apply to
third parties. If a third party, like AOL, does not mind turning over
account info on Joe User, then Joe cannot cite his Fourth Amendment rights.
AOL may have their _own_ objections, and require a warrant for _their_
owned records, but Joe User cannot cite _his_ Fourth A. rights. And some
courts are even deciding (wrongly) that AOL cannot object by citing even
its own Fourth A. rights.)
Outfits like AOL are making themselves "regulator-friendly," without even
so much as putting up a fight to keep their customer's accounts private.
A customer _may_ have contractual rights negotiated in advance about when
and how his account information may be turned over to investigators, but
usually not. And, as I said, courts are increasingly saying that government
can get those records without a warrant and without the ISP even notifying
the customer. (As with banking situations, it may even be a crime to even
_notify_ the customer. Probably already is in some cases.)
The centralization of online banks will make such warrantless searches even
more of a tool than today. That E-Gold has even said they'll freeze an
account based on _suspicion_ is unsurprising.
Imagine a local bank, the First Bank of Bumfuck, Murdoch County, Georgia,
freezing the accounts of customers for nebulous, unsubstantiated reasons.
Make no mistake--this is NOT about a bank's right to choose its customers,
as Ian Gregg argue in his note this morning: this is about an online bank
attempting to make itself regulator-friendly and government-friendly by
agreeing to freeze accounts based on mere rumor and suspicion.
What's wrong with "Let a court decide, based on the rule of law, that the
severe step of freezing assets is legally justified."?
E-Gold is a disgrace.
--Tim May
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
ComSec 3DES: 831-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
"Cyphernomicon" | black markets, collapse of governments.
