1994-01-31 - Re: Read-Once Messages?

Header Data

From: “Perry E. Metzger” <pmetzger@lehman.com>
To: lefty@apple.com (Lefty)
Message Hash: ebae7b12bb0d3846f163a8c55f499d41143e5eda8941ba80d659af12ad687ca3
Message ID: <199401311832.NAA02403@snark>
Reply To: <9401311747.AA12799@federal-excess.apple.com>
UTC Datetime: 1994-01-31 18:33:07 UTC
Raw Date: Mon, 31 Jan 94 10:33:07 PST

Raw message

From: "Perry E. Metzger" <pmetzger@lehman.com>
Date: Mon, 31 Jan 94 10:33:07 PST
To: lefty@apple.com (Lefty)
Subject: Re: Read-Once Messages?
In-Reply-To: <9401311747.AA12799@federal-excess.apple.com>
Message-ID: <199401311832.NAA02403@snark>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Lefty says:
> Has there been any work done on messages that can be read a single time,
> preferably only by a designated recipient, and is not amenable to being
> captured as it is "played"?  I know that Gibson's poem _Agrippa_ had some
> sort of self-destruct feature built into it, but I don't know what
> mechanism was used to implement this.
> 
> Any pointers or suggestions would be appreciated...

It might be possible, but only using hardware that can be broken. Any
algorithm can obviously be run as often as the recipient desires, and
in any case the recipient could simply save the output somehow (at
worst via videotape.) There are many things one would like to be able
to do like this that are sadly not possible.

Perry






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