From: Seth Morris <Seth.Morris@lambada.oit.unc.edu>
Date: Tue, 22 Feb 94 21:36:50 PST
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Education needed, but what specifics?
Message-ID: <9402230536.AA28829@lambada.oit.unc.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text



 I think we all agree that the public needs education on crypto and
crypto politics. What specific issues need to be addressed?
 
 For some time now, I have been kicking around ideas for games related to
crypto, and I have decided that it may be an excellent education/propoganda
tool. What I'm thinking of is a BBS door that incorporates encryption
ideas (probably without using any actual excryption, to make sysops
more comfortable with it -- I'm co-sysop of a local BBS and my
"real" sysop refuses to allow crypto software on it, for the same reason
he's reluctant to house an adult area, no matter how much he personally
would like both (although, admittedly, he's primarily interested in the
adult area)).
 Originally I had thought of a game where encryption was used to transmit
messages to units (a space-war-game, perhaps?), and capturing and 
decrypting your opponents messages was paramount. Ultimately, as your
"cryptotech level" increased, you'd get stronger cyphers and develope
public-key tech, etc., but this seemed pretty limited in its educational
potential and pretty derivative of existing games.

 My current idea is something more based on the net. Players take the role
of corporations pet punks, or freelancers, and use encryption to
cover their butts while following traffic analysis trails of opponents 
(digital) money, setting up services for profit (and perhaps to
follow the traffic opponents pass through them... leading to more
encryption, etc), leading to ratings services and digital reputations,
leading to denial-of-service attacks, etc.
 This could get exciting to play, and would lead to a cypherpunks-agreeable
position in the game, perhaps facilitating "market penetration" of
EFF, CPSR, and other cypherpunks-friendly literature.
 Perhaps the game should make frequent mention of PGP, RSA, Chaum and
other sources in the literature (a door with a bibliography!)?

 What do y'all think of the idea? I think gaming is a wonderful way to
spread ideas, and have been looking for a way to use it for some time.
What elements of cypherpunks' philosophy and methods should/could be
incorporated? I think emphasising the cyBerpunk-like aspects of the
game (spoofing to get information, copyiong mail logs to follow
message traffic, etc) would make the game more popular, and while it
might hurt the game's reputation as a propoganda tool (wow-- a game
that's a manual on attacking services on the net... how is that good
for people?), it should increase the player's awareness of the
_need_ for signatures, reputations, untraceablility, etc.
 Besides, who wouldn't want to infiltrate Denning Associates Corporation
and Stern & Light Pharmaceuticals to funnel money and information
to Mayday Publishing or somesuch?

 Seth Morris (seth.morris@launchpad.unc.edu)
PS- I'm still having problems with PGP Tools 1.0c. The ptd.exe locks
in fifo_destroy when trying to find a private key on the ring. Any
suggestions? My first applet to test the library (an MD5 hasher for
files on the command line) works fine, though.