At 6:15 AM -0800 on 10/29/00, Phil Agre wrote: > It is often held that Internet privacy problems will be eliminated by > a new class of online third parties called "trusted intermediaries". > The idea is that, instead of visiting Amazon.com directly, you would > visit Trustme.com, and then you would go "through" that site to get to > Amazon. Now, this scheme can work at a basic level if Amazon doesn't > have to know anything about it. That's what Zero Knowledge Systems > <http://www.zeroknowledge.com/> is doing. But that only works if the > relationship between the customer and the vendor is relatively simple. > A third party that requires Amazon's cooperation, for example because > of its distinctive interface for processing pseudonymous requests for > sensitive personal information, seems much less plausible to me. What > company is going to allow an intermediary to get between it and its > customers? Amazon? Bank of America? It doesn't seem likely. They'd > have to worry that the intermediary would add its own services or take > money to redirect the customer to competitors. Those firms could feel > compelled to cooperate with an intermediary if the intermediary became > well-established, but if most online marketplaces become monopolies > or near-monopolies then this isn't likely. Trusted intermediaries > are not an entirely useless idea. But like most companies pioneering > new technologies they will have to establish themselves niches in the > short term before they can even understand the nature of the problem > in the long term. -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED]> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
