From: Matthew J Ghio <mg5n+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Date: Fri, 29 Oct 93 16:29:07 PDT
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: ID of anonymous posters via word analysis?
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.87.9310291722.A1566-0100000@world.std.com>
Message-ID: <ggoOPMG00awJE=M1Ad@andrew.cmu.edu>
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E. Jay O'Connell <ejo@world.std.com> wrote:

> It might just be a huge lookup table of canned phrases that get
> swapped in to replace your 'unique,' identifiable sentences. It seems
> like a dedicated global search and replace, combined with some sort
> of die throw to dictate sentence structure might be enough to screw
> up word analysis, actually...
>
> Actually, the scrambler wouldn't have to be random--it could
> always produce output with the same word analysis signature. As
> long as a bunch of people were using it, or had access to it, you'd
> have deniability.

I've seen a few programs which do this, but they were mostly for humor
value.  The program would pick out certain words or phrases and swap the
with other words of phrases in its database, mostly cliches and other
strange word usage.  (such as "Like, wow, gag me with a spoon" etc...)  
The output was rather humorus, but most of the meaning was still
preserved.  I saw several of them used awhile ago during the Jon Fether
fiasco on the usenet (If any of you saw that - a little 14-year old got
daddy's modem and found a free internet site, and then started flamewars
on several usenet groups.  A few people took his flame posts and ran
then thru their "filters" and then re-posted them.)

Anyway, it probably wouldn't be too hard to just swap words with
synonyms or reorder or replace certain prepositional phrases.