Re: Best practices/HOWTO for key storage in small office/home of fice setting?

[Jaap-Henk Hoepman]

On Tue, 2 Oct 2001 18:41:51 +0200  Bill Stewart <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> At 07:23 PM 10/02/2001 +0300, Sampo Syreeni wrote:
> >Or integrate some computing power into those IBM thingies, and use
> >remotely keyed encryption. Enough power is available through USB so
> that
> >you don't have to end up with battery power.
> 
> Sounds like you're starting to reinvent the I-Button.
> (Dallas semiconductor's product - uses a small computer chip
> and an infrared link attached to a watch battery.)
> 

What about the Rainbow iKey, a smartcard/dongle with USB interface.

Jaap-Henk

-- 
Jaap-Henk Hoepman | Come sail your ships around me
Dept. of Computer Science | And burn your bridges down
University of Twente  |   Nick Cave - "Ship Song"
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] === WWW: www.cs.utwente.nl/~hoepman
Phone: +31 53 4893795 === Secr: +31 53 4893770 === Fax: +31 53 4894590
PGP ID: 0xF52E26DD  Fingerprint: 1AED DDEB C7F1 DBB3  0556 4732 4217 ABEF



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BXA notifier?

[Eric Rescorla]

I seem to remember that someone had set up a site to which
you could send your BXA export notification and which would
archive a copy and transmit it to BXA.

Does this sound familiar to anyone?

Thanks,
-Ekr



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NSA offers supersecure Linux

[R. A. Hettinga]

NSA offers supersecure Linux
By Deni Connor
4 October, 2001 11:20
Framingham, U.S.
http://www.computerworld.com.au/idg2.nsf/a/00043016?OpenDocument&n=e&c=CP

The National Security Agency, the government's security arm, along with
help from Network Associates, last week announced it has made a
security-enhanced version of Linux available for download.

The NSA said it realises that operating system security is necessary and
that mainstream operating systems often lack critical security features
that could enforce the confidentiality and integrity of network
communications. Dubbed Security-Enhanced (SE) Linux, the NSA's version
allows programs to have only the slimmest security permissions to run.

SE Linux has a strong, yet flexible, access control architecture
incorporated into the kernel to foil tampering and bypassing of security
mechanisms. The NSA chose Linux as a platform for this work because of
its open environment. SE Linux does not correct any flaws in Linux, but
rather serves as an example of how mandatory access controls, including
superuser access, can be added to Linux.

With SE Linux, it is possible to configure a system that meets a number
of security objectives such as roles-based access.

At present, SE Linux only supports the Intel Corp. x86 platform and has
only been tested on Red Hat Inc. Linux.

The release includes documentation and source code. Users can download it
from http://www.nsa.gov/selinux/index.html The NSA is at
http://www.nsa.gov

-- 
-
R. A. Hettinga 
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 
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'



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DECSS (qrpff) Ties

[R. A. Hettinga]

--- begin forwarded text


Status:  U
Date: Thu, 4 Oct 2001 05:49:33 -0700
Reply-To: Law & Policy of Computer Communications
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sender: Law & Policy of Computer Communications
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
From: DigitaEye Designs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject:  DECSS (qrpff) Ties
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]

I have finalized the DECSS ties. I used the perl version Qrpff
so it could fit on a tie. The ties will be available mid November
and cost $34/tie plus $4 shipping for overseas (didn't think
it was right to penalize domestic people). Proceeds will go towards
a newly forming group Digital Millennium Group, which is geared
towards consumer rights in the digital arena. I have ordered
100 ties and will take pre-orders via check (please contact me
for information). People who have previously expressed interest
will have first shot at the ties.
I will attempt to get a shopping cart online that takes paypal
for those who wish to use credit card or other payment option.
You can see an initial draft of the tie at www.digitaeye.com/qrpff.html


Drew Lehman
DigitaEye Designs
Web Design and E-commerce
http://www.digitaeye.com
(215)681-1156


**
For Listserv Instructions, see http://www.lawlists.net/cyberia
Off-Topic threads: http://www.lawlists.net/mailman/listinfo/cyberia-ot
Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
**

--- end forwarded text


-- 
-
R. A. Hettinga 
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 
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'



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NSA upgrade plans

[Arnold G. Reinhold]

There is an interesting article in Federal Computer Week 
http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2001/0910/news-nsa-09-10-01.asp that 
says NSA planning a major effort to modernize the nation's 
cryptoystems "which are rapidly growing obsolete and vulnerable." 
They quote Michael Jacobs, head of NSA's information Assurance 
Directorate as saying the the underlying encryption algorithms are 
nearing the end of their life expectancy.

There were hints in the past that NSA used 90-bit keys for some 
ciphers. I wonder if that is the issue or if they see the quantum 
computing handwriting on the wall and plan to go to 256-bit (or 
larger) keys.

Arnold Reinhold



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Re: Historical PKI resources

[Arnold G. Reinhold]

At 11:10 AM -0800 1/5/2001, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] said:
>>  I have found significant information about PKI as it exists today,
>> but am looking for some background information.  I'm looking for
>> information about the history of PKI, how and where it started, how it
> > developed, etc.
>

You might also look for information on the NSA's STU-III secure 
telephone system which I believe uses a form of PKI.  There is a fair 
amount of information about it available on the web.

Arnold Reinhold



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Zero-Knowledge Systems Discontinues "Freedom Network" Services(was Re: ExtremeTech Security: Investigation of Security Holes to beCriminalized?)

[R. A. Hettinga]

At 5:02 PM -0400 on 10/4/01, ExtremeTech Security wrote:


>
> Zero-Knowledge Systems Discontinues "Freedom Network"
> Services
>
> Zero-Knowledge Systems, a Canadian company which offered
> anonymous Web browsing and e-mail services, has announced
> that it will be curtailing and/or discontinuing these services
> as of October 11, 2001. While the company's announcement
> does not state whether it was pressured to do this due to
> the September 11, 2001, the timing of the move suggests that
> the two events may be related. The company is instead offering
> an updated version of its "Freedom Privacy and Security
> Tools" -- Internet privacy software which -- while competitive
> with similar offerings such as WebWasher, AdSubtract, and Norton
> Internet Security -- provides much less privacy than its "Freedom
> Network" once did.
>
>   Zero-Knowledge Systems Announcement
>   http://extreme.ziffdavis.com/cgi-bin10/flo?y=eLSJ0C6dwd0FBU0OGl0Ad
>
>   Freedom Privacy and Security Tools
>   http://extreme.ziffdavis.com/cgi-bin10/flo?y=eLSJ0C6dwd0FBU0OGm0Ae

-- 
-
R. A. Hettinga 
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 
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'



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Re: AGAINST ID CARDS

[Arnold G. Reinhold]

I too am very nervous about the prospect of national ID cards.  I 
have an idea for a possible compromise, but I have not made up my 
mind on it. I'm interested in hearing other people's opinions.

The idea is a federal standard for secure  drivers' licenses. These 
would be cards containing a chip that stores an electronically signed 
and time stamped data file consisting of the driver's name, date of 
birth, height, address, photo, and scanned signature, as well as 
endorsements such as truck, school bus, motorcycle and hazmat 
operator licenses. All this information is contained in existing 
drivers' licenses, but in a way that is too easy to forge.

The licenses would still be issued by the states so there would be no 
new bureaucracy.  People who don't drive could get "proof of age" 
cards using the same technology. Many states now issue such cards in 
conventional formats for liquor purchase. There would be pressure to 
expand the use of these licenses to other uses. That has already 
happened for conventional DLs with liquor purchase and airline 
boarding. Some new uses might be acceptable, e.g. using the cards to 
contain  pilot or boating licenses. Limitations on new uses could be 
included in the enabling legislation.

The security model of the card would be privacy oriented, i.e. 
limiting who could access the cards to authorized users and the 
owner. The integrity of the information would come from the 
electronic signatures.  As I understand it, much of the forgery of 
DLs that now takes place involves unauthorized use of the equipment 
that produces legitimate cards. The secure DL would cut down on this 
because the information on the card would be signed by by the 
operator of the equipment, making the forgery more traceable. The 
data would also be signed using a key that is only available at a 
central location and a copy of the signed info would be retained in 
the driver database (this information is already collected anyway). 
This would make it more difficult to change just the photo on the 
license, for example.

The main difference between a secure driver's license and a national 
ID is that there would be no new requirement to obtain or carry the 
card.  One can look at it as the nose in the camel's tent or as a way 
to deflect pressure for more Draconian solutions.

Thoughts?

Arnold Reinhold


At 1:47 PM -0400 10/3/2001, R. A. Hettinga wrote:
>--- begin forwarded text
>
>
>Status:  U
>To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>From: "National Review D.C." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: AGAINST ID CARDS
>Date: Wed,  3 Oct 2001 13:58:40 +
>Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>List-Help: 
>List-Subscribe: 
>List-Archive: 
>
>Washington Bulletin: National Review's Internet Update for
>October 3, 2001
>http://www.nationalreview.com
>
>AGAINST ID CARDS
>[The worse way to fight terrorism]
>
>Only a bare majority of Americans--51 percent--support the creation of a
>national identity card, according to a new poll by Fabrizio, McLaughlin
>& Associates. This is a substantial loss of support since the Pew
>Research Center found 70 percent endorsing the concept in a survey it
>conducted immediately after the September 11 attacks.
>
>Yet plenty of warning signs remain. Westerners are only demographic
>group with a majority opposing ID cards (53 percent) and senior citizens
>are the only segment with a plurality against it (47 percent).
>Republicans and men are evenly split on the issue, with Democrats and
>women likely to favor it. Most troubling, however, may be that the poll
>shows overall support jumping to 61 percent when the ID card is
>described as ìa measure to combat terrorism and make the use of false
>identities more difficult.î
>
>If ever the American public was primed to accept an ID card, the time is
>now. A recent Washington Post survey reports that 64 percent of
>Americans say they trust the federal government to do the right thing
>ìnearly alwaysî or ìmost of the timeî--the highest level of trust
>recorded since 1966 and twice the level measured just a year ago. ìThis
>is the most collective mood weíve seen in America for a long time,î
>Democratic pollster Celinda Lake told the New York Times. ìAnd itís
>coming off one of the most individualistic eras in American history.î
>
>The Bush administration already has signaled through a spokesman that it
>does not support the idea, though several members of Congress have
>embraced it and House immigration subcommittee chairman George Gekas, a
>Pennsylvania Republican, says ID cards will definitely receive
>consideration. Oracle CEO Larry Ellison has said his company, a leader
>in databases, would donate the software to make it happen.
>
>Conservatives must oppose these internal passports with vigor. They may
>be promoted now as tools for combating terrorism, but their potential
>for abuse is enormous. How long before the federal government a

Re: AGAINST ID CARDS

[R. A. Hettinga]

At 6:41 PM -0400 on 10/4/01, Arnold G. Reinhold wrote:


> Thoughts?

See the work of Stephan Brands, and others, on capabability based credentials.

You don't need anything but the proof of a permission to drive, and
linkability of that proof-token to driving offenses in the database. Nobody
needs to see the identity credentials in the database unless you have to go
to trial.

Poof. No ID card. You can do this for all kinds of stuff, proof of age,
right to carry a concealed weapon on an aircraft, :-), or anything else.

Cheers,
RAH


-- 
-
R. A. Hettinga 
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 
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'



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/.: Ian Goldberg Re: ZeroKnowledge to Discontinue AnonymityService

[R. A. Hettinga]

ZeroKnowledge to Discontinue Anonymity Service | Preferences | Top | 294
comments | Search Discussion


Threshold: Save:
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We
are not responsible for them in any way.
Re:Ian Goldberg, Bruce Schneier & Whitfield Di (Score:5, Informative)
by Ian Goldberg on Thursday October 04, @01:38PM (#2388977)
(User #526438 Info | http://slashdot.org/)
Believe me, no one is more disappointed about this than I am, but right now
there simply isn't enough market buy-in on the premium services to justify
the network's operating costs. :-(

As a business, we are focusing on the product that customers and partners
want. Here's an official Zero-Knowledge Systems statement on the matter:

With the release of Freedom 3.0 [zeroknowledge.com] and the discontinuation
of the Freedom Network (our anonymous browsing and encrypted pseudonym
service) there have been a number of questions for more details about the
decision to stop offering the Freedom Network services. Hopefully this will
help clarify things.

When we released Freedom 1.0 close to 2 years ago we saw a significant
percentage of our users subscribe to the premium Freedom Network services.
This was anticipated as our early adopters were very privacy and technology
aware and had expressed strong interest in the Freedom Network offering.

As we began to increase the distribution of Freedom into the mass market
with the release of Freedom 2.0 & 2.2, we saw a disproportionately high
percentage of users who subscribed to the standard features (and not
Freedom Network services). The initial interest in the premium (FN)
services amongst our early adopters simply didn't carry over to the
mainstream and as our user numbers grew, we began to realize that the
market was looking for the kind of features we are now offering in Freedom
3.0.

As we began our feature triage for Freedom 3.0 (almost 9 months ago) we
heard from customers and focus groups of users, as well as channel partners
[zeroknowledge.com], and reflected on the statistics from our existing user
base, and decided that there was not enough mass market demand for the
premium services to justify continuing the service.

This was entirely a market related decision. The market demand for consumer
Internet security and safety tools has grown considerably in the 4 years
our company has been in business. Freedom 3.0 is a strong competitor to
security offerings from companies such as Symantec and McAfee and we have
gotten very positive market support and a warm reception from channel
partners to this new version of our suite of privacy and security tools.

There has been speculation that this decision was somehow related to
government pressure or was made in the wake of the tragedies of September
11. This is simply untrue. For the past 3 months we have been beta-testing
this version with partners, getting certification from Microsoft for our
drivers and completing our Alpha and Beta cycles with our beta users.
Support for the Freedom network offering was removed from the client code
base well before the recent tragedies of September 11.

Our research team is continuing work in the area of privacy enhanced
network protocols, and we are open to any suggestions the research
community offers on how we can leverage the work that went into the Freedom
Network design and operation to advance this area of computer science. If
you have suggestions or interest in this, please contact us at
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto].

Zero-Knowledge continues to offer our consumer protection utility Freedom
3.0 and we are very excited by the prospects for this product. We also have
a division that is addressing the market need of enterprise privacy
technologies that stem from managing consumer data that require strong
security and policy frameworks to adhere to privacy regulations and
customer preference management (Healthcare; Financial and other consumer
data that is subject to new security, privacy restrictions relating to
legislation like HIPAA, GLB, PIPEDA, EU privacy directive).

Our company continues to evolve and focus our efforts on market needs and
customer demands and we remain very confident of our prospects in these
markets.

[ Reply to This | Parent ]

Re:Ian Goldberg, Bruce Schneier & Whitfield Di by Ian Goldberg (Score:5)
Moderation Totals: Informative=4, Underrated=1, Total=5.

* 2 replies beneath your current threshold.

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44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and ant

Opening shots in the war on Steganography

[nnburk]

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/primetime/DailyNews/PRIMETIME_011004_steganography.html


A Secret Language

Hijackers May Have Used Secret Internet Messaging Technique

By Brian Ross


Oct. 4 — The terrorists responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks may have
communicated over the Internet using a computer version of invisible ink
that allows secret messages to be concealed in image and music files. 

Western intelligence officials say they have learned that instructors at
Osama bin Laden's camps in remote Afghanistan train his followers in the
high-tech secret-messaging technique.

And French investigators believe that suspects arrested in an alleged
plot to blow up the U.S. Embassy in Paris were to get the go-ahead for
the attack via a message hidden in a picture posted on the Internet,
former French defense official Alexis Debat told ABCNEWS. 

One of the men in custody, described by French officials as a computer
nerd well-versed in the messaging technique, was captured with a
notebook full of secret codes. "This code book is major breakthrough in
the investigation," said Debat. 

Covered Writing

To transmit a hidden message, the sender uses specialized software to
hide a text message — or a graphical file such as a building plan —
inside another file, such as an image file or an MP3 music file. 

"Criminal organizations, terrorist organizations around the world use
this," said Chet Hosmer, an Internet security expert who has been
helping the FBI and military intelligence since Sept. 11 track down
hidden communications on the Internet. 

"Images that might be in an e-mail message that I send to you, that has
a picture of my dog or my cat — I hide an actual secret message inside
that image that no one else would be able to detect or see," Hosmer
said.

For example, with a few clicks and the right password, a terrorist could
use a picture of the Mona Lisa, or an MP3 of the U.S. national anthem,
to carry a secret coded message, such as a seating chart for an airliner
or a list of flights out of Boston.

The technique is known as "steganography," meaning covered writing.

"It actually goes back to Roman times when they used to shave the head
of messengers, and tattoo secret messages on their scalp," said Hosmer.
"It really doesn't have very many legitimate purposes. The purpose is to
actually hide the fact that you are communicating." 

Instructions Via E-mail

In addition to low-tech equipment like box-cutters, the alleged
hijackers in the Sept. 11 attacks also had e-mail accounts at Yahoo! and
Hotmail.

Suspected ringleader Mohamed Atta was seen repeatedly by witnesses using
his Hotmail account at public libraries in Florida to surf the Internet,
downloading what appeared to be pictures of children and scenes of the
Middle East. 

Special FBI squads are working full-time on the Internet connections of
the 19 alleged hijackers, going through accounts at America Online and
other service providers.

Investigators are also searching cyberspace for more deadly messages and
warnings that could help them take precautions against future terrorist
attacks.



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Re: Best practices/HOWTO for key storage in small office/home

[Bill Manning]

> floppy
>> pccard
>>> ibutton
 USB (et.al.)

Make sure that you keep a working system around so that
when you want/need to use/reuse the key, you can still
get to it.

--bill (who has some data on 7track tape that -REALLY- should be migrated
to something else... like CD-RW?  :)




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Re: BXA notifier?

[M Taylor]

On Thu, Oct 04, 2001 at 08:33:50AM -0700, Eric Rescorla wrote:
> I seem to remember that someone had set up a site to which
> you could send your BXA export notification and which would
> archive a copy and transmit it to BXA.
> 
> Does this sound familiar to anyone?

Matt Blaze's http://www.crypto.com/exports/mail.txt



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Re: dejavu, Re: Hijackers' e-mails were unencrypted

[Ed Gerck]

"Jay D. Dyson" wrote:

> On Wed, 3 Oct 2001, Ed Gerck wrote:
>
> > With all due respect to the need to vent our fears, may I remind this
> > list that we have all seen this before (that is, governments trying to
> > control crypto), from key-escrow to GAK, and we all know that it will
> > not work -- and for many reasons.  A main one IMO is that it is simply
> > impossible to prevent anyone from sending an encrypted message to anyone
> > else except by controlling the receivers and the transmitters (as done
> > in WWII, for example).
>
> Like you, I once believed that our government would follow
> sensible courses of action with respect to technology.  That time has
> passed.
>
> The advent of DMCA should have served as a wake-up call to the
> reality that our government no longer even operates under the *pretense*
> of sanity or rationality with respect to technology laws.

My point is not that a government would not, but that a government
could not control the use of crypto.  It would not work.

My suggestion was that controlling routing and addresses would
be much more efficient and would NOT require new laws and
ersosion of communication privacy.

>And anyone who dares to insist that I'm being alarmist can go
>reverse engineer the latest commercial "security solution," publish the
>results, and see just how "free" they remain.

Maybe it's time to put sanity back into the DMCA crying.

In the infamous case of Microsoft vs. Stacker many years ago, when MS
was found guilty of using Stacker's code in a MS product, Stacker was
nonetheless found guilty of proving it by reverse engineering -- in a
notion similar to trespassing.

So, as stressed in that judicial case that predates DMCA, if I would get a
court order to reverse engineer the latest commercial "security solution"
and be allowed to publish the results, I would remain free and within
the legal limits. Otherwise, I would not -- DMCA or not.

Comments?

Cheers,

Ed Gerck




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Re: NSA offers supersecure Linux

[Paul Krumviede]

well, they still call it a prototype, and the first version of the prototype
was released in december.

-paul

--On Thursday, 04 October, 2001 10:14 -0400 "R. A. Hettinga" 
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> NSA offers supersecure Linux
> By Deni Connor
> 4 October, 2001 11:20
> Framingham, U.S.
> http://www.computerworld.com.au/idg2.nsf/a/00043016?OpenDocument&n=e&c=CP
>
> The National Security Agency, the government's security arm, along with
> help from Network Associates, last week announced it has made a
> security-enhanced version of Linux available for download.




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Re: dejavu, Re: Hijackers' e-mails were unencrypted

[Adam Fields]

Ed Gerck says:
> In addition, we also need to avoid to add fuel to that misconception,
> that  encryption is somehow  "dangerous" or should be controlled
> as weapons are. The only function of a weapon is to inflict harm.
> The only function of encryption is to  provide privacy.

But that's not true - encryption has many other functions. Chief among
these is secrecy, which is not by a long shot the same as privacy. The
issue is not whether encryption can be used for criminal purposes or
not, or whether encryption is "dangerous" (it can and it is - like any
other technology, it crosses the boundaries of intent) - the issue is
whether perceived restriction on the use of "illegitimate" uses of
encryption is worth the limitations on the "legitimate" ones, and
whether doing so will indeed solve the problem or simply make it
worse.




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Stew Baker Stands in Rain, Stripes Bleed Through Whitewash...

[R. A. Hettinga]

--- begin forwarded text


Status:  U
Date: Fri, 05 Oct 2001 13:52:38 -0500
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: Robert Huddleston <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (by way of
[EMAIL PROTECTED])
Subject: ip: Don't give up security for a false sense of liberty BY
  STEWART  BAKER

http://opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=95001279
OpinionJournal
Extra

TRADE-OFFS
Dangerous Secrets
Don't give up security for a false sense of liberty.
BY STEWART BAKER
Friday, October 5, 2001 12:01 a.m. EDT

For weeks, pundits have been warning us against new legislation that would
sacrifice essential liberties in the name of a false security. Judging by
the reaction to the Bush administration's antiterrorism bill, the real
question is whether we'll be sacrificing essential security in the name of
false civil-liberties concerns.

Perhaps the most pointed example of this is Congress's handling of the
administration proposal to let law-enforcement authorities share grand jury
information with national security and intelligence agencies. Senate
negotiators stalled the entire bill over this issue, and the House has
already modified the proposal in a way that renders it nearly meaningless.

The concerted opposition to this proposal is hard to justify. Barriers to
information-sharing between intelligence and law-enforcement agencies have
already cost us dearly in the fight against terror.

Information about the activities of terrorists abroad is usually gathered
by our intelligence agencies, most notably the Central Intelligence Agency.
Inside the U.S., the information is gathered by the Federal Bureau of
Investigation. Since terrorist acts are crimes, the FBI often uses criminal
tools, such as grand-jury subpoenas, to gather that information.

Obviously, this information needs to be shared by both agencies. We need to
be able to analyze a conversation overheard in Hamburg, Germany, in the
light of a series of bank deposits in New Jersey. But right now, most of
the sharing runs only one way. FBI agents can see the intelligence from
Hamburg, but CIA analysts aren't allowed to see the New Jersey bank
records--if those records were gathered with a grand jury subpoena. Since
it's the CIA, not the FBI, that has the capability to really analyze
terrorists' future plans (as opposed to catching them afterward), this
restriction is an invitation to more attacks.

This is not just a theoretical risk. In fact, grand jury secrecy rules may
be one reason we didn't anticipate the Sept. 11 attack. Start with the
proposition that whoever dreamed up the first World Trade Center bombing
was probably also behind the second attack. Who conceived and organized
that first attack? We can't be sure, in part because the CIA was hobbled in
its review of the first attack--by grand jury secrecy.

Writing in The New Republic two weeks ago, former CIA director Jim Woolsey
explained: "No one other than the prosecutors, the Clinton Justice
Department, and the FBI had access to the materials surrounding that case
until they were presented in court, because they were virtually all
obtained by a federal grand jury and hence kept not only from the public
but from the rest of the government."

When the administration tried to ease these restrictions, the Senate
Judiciary Committee insisted that any such sharing be approved by a judge
"upon a showing that the matters pertain to international or domestic
terrorism or national security." But asking judges to review every
document--or even every class of documents--is unworkable. Certainly no
such restriction applies when prosecutors share the same information with
investigative agencies.

Is grand jury secrecy so important to our liberty and privacy that the
nation has to pay for it in crippled intelligence capability? Maybe, but
it's hard to see why.

Sure, the privacy of suspects under investigation is important. The
accusations made against them before the grand jury shouldn't be publicized
until the government has actually decided that a good case can be made. But
no one is talking about making grand-jury information public. Rather, the
administration has proposed that it be shared with those government
agencies that play a vital role in stopping terrorism.

Under the current grand jury rules, a criminal prosecutor can share jury
information freely with his secretary, with other lawyers in the office,
with the FBI, with Justice Department paralegals--indeed, with any other
official the prosecutor thinks will help him to enforce the criminal law.
Do we really think that all these personnel will do a better job of
protecting a suspect's privacy than CIA analysts--who, after all, are in
the business of keeping far more important secrets than that?

The real question is not whether this trade-off between civil liberties and
security is justified. The real question is why Bush administration
negotiators didn't work harder to push through the change. Here, I can only
speculate that the Justice Department, at least at the start, wasn't
wholeheartedly 

Re: dejavu, Re: Hijackers' e-mails were unencrypted

[Dan Riley]

Ed Gerck <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> Maybe it's time to put sanity back into the DMCA crying.
> 
> In the infamous case of Microsoft vs. Stacker many years ago, when MS
> was found guilty of using Stacker's code in a MS product, Stacker was
> nonetheless found guilty of proving it by reverse engineering -- in a
> notion similar to trespassing.

Nitpick: according to the meager references I could find, the
counterclaim Microsoft won was that Stac had reverse engineered DOS to
find the undocumented system calls used in the original Stacker
product.

Significant point: both the Stac suit and the Microsoft counterlcaim
were civil actions.  The DMCA makes "circumvention of technological
measures" for financial gain or competive advantage a *criminal*
offense.  This is a big difference.  Furthermore, the DMCA prohibition
of "circumvention of technological measures" is quite broad, applying
to far more than classic reverse engineering (for example, Felten et
al., where all Felten's group had access to were the results of an
"oracle" indicating whether the "watermark" was still detectable).
-- 
Dan Riley [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Wilson Lab, Cornell University  http://www.lns.cornell.edu/~dsr/>
  "A new life awaits you in the off-world colonies"



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Re: Passport Passwords Stored in Plaintext

[Hadmut Danisch]

On Fri, Oct 05, 2001 at 01:22:31PM -0500, Joseph Ashwood wrote:
>
> [ Greate description of M$ ... ]
> I am unaware of anything microsoft has ever written
> that could be considered secure and there is evidence that they plan

Outlook once offered me the choice between "no encryption" and
a so called "compressible encryption".

:-D

Hadmut







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Re: Passport Passwords Stored in Plaintext

[Joseph Ashwood]

- Original Message -
From: "bernie" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

> Some of the people here wants to use the .NET for critical applications.

I'm sorry.

> How secure is the .NET?

The short answer is that it isn't secure. There are two main problems with
it being secure. The first is the password vulnerability that you replied
to. The second is that it uses a custom blended Kerberos-esque
implementation. I say Kerberos-esque because it has some significant
problems. First it uses RC4, a cipher which is increasingly being considered
insecure, and in using it windows doesn't take the precautions necessary to
make it secure. They are the only company foolish enough to have embedded
access control information in the kerberos ticket, this adds even more
leaking information, and just enough of it to determine the users password.
Basicly they have made nearly every effort to eliminate the security of the
system while making it appear secure to a layman. For further evidence that
Microsoft can't do anything secure I point to (in no particular order) IIS,
pptp, pptp2, Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, Windows 95, Windows98,
WindowsME, WindowsNT, Windows2000, and while I haven't verified it yet I
believe also WindowsXP. Some of these probably need some explaination, IIS
is the script kiddie choice it has more holes than a pound of Swiss cheese.
pptp was severely broken, pptp2 was slightly less severely broken. Internet
Explorer has had so many security vulnerabilities I can't even count that
high. Outlook Express is a virus writers dream. Windows95 offered no
security, same with 98 and ME. WindowsNT is subject to extremely basic
attacks on the password system that Microsoft refused to recognise, same
with 2000, and probably the same with XP. In 2000 MS introduced a "secure"
encrypted filesystem which lacked any reasonable ability to encrypt
documents securely (it put the keys in a file in plaintext, the file is
easily readable). Even the cryptoAPI that Microsoft designed and offered has
holes in it, allowing arbitrary code to be run in the place of what the
programmer intended. I am unaware of anything microsoft has ever written
that could be considered secure and there is evidence that they plan to
continue this less than stellar performance with .NET.
Joe




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Re: Passport Passwords Stored in Plaintext

[P.J. Ponder]

The original proposal for dot-net was to *centralize* all of the personal
information on at one location.  This part may be changing with recent
capitulations regarding, of all things, interoperability.  This idea of
centralizing everyone's personal information is the scary part of all this
to me, even recognizing how permeable and abuse-ready the company's
software seems to be.


on another topic -
Has anyone thought about how a scheme like .Net could be aided by
'reasonable and non-discriminatory (RAND)' licensing terms creeping into
W3C Recommendations?  Now there is a scary thought

IIS (Ignorance Is Strength)


On Fri, 5 Oct 2001, Joseph Ashwood wrote:

> - Original Message -
> From: "bernie" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
> > Some of the people here wants to use the .NET for critical applications.
>
> I'm sorry.
>
> > How secure is the .NET?
>
> The short answer is that it isn't secure. There are two main problems with
> it being secure. The first is the password vulnerability that you replied
> to. The second is that it uses a custom blended Kerberos-esque
> implementation. I say Kerberos-esque because it has some significant
> problems. First it uses RC4, a cipher which is increasingly being considered
> insecure, and in using it windows doesn't take the precautions necessary to
> make it secure. They are the only company foolish enough to have embedded
> access control information in the kerberos ticket, this adds even more
> leaking information, and just enough of it to determine the users password.
> Basicly they have made nearly every effort to eliminate the security of the
> system while making it appear secure to a layman. For further evidence that
> Microsoft can't do anything secure I point to (in no particular order) IIS,
> pptp, pptp2, Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, Windows 95, Windows98,
> WindowsME, WindowsNT, Windows2000, and while I haven't verified it yet I
> believe also WindowsXP. Some of these probably need some explaination, IIS
> is the script kiddie choice it has more holes than a pound of Swiss cheese.
> pptp was severely broken, pptp2 was slightly less severely broken. Internet
> Explorer has had so many security vulnerabilities I can't even count that
> high. Outlook Express is a virus writers dream. Windows95 offered no
> security, same with 98 and ME. WindowsNT is subject to extremely basic
> attacks on the password system that Microsoft refused to recognise, same
> with 2000, and probably the same with XP. In 2000 MS introduced a "secure"
> encrypted filesystem which lacked any reasonable ability to encrypt
> documents securely (it put the keys in a file in plaintext, the file is
> easily readable). Even the cryptoAPI that Microsoft designed and offered has
> holes in it, allowing arbitrary code to be run in the place of what the
> programmer intended. I am unaware of anything microsoft has ever written
> that could be considered secure and there is evidence that they plan to
> continue this less than stellar performance with .NET.
> Joe
>
>
>
>
> -
> The Cryptography Mailing List
> Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>




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