From: frissell@panix.com (Duncan Frissell)
Date: Fri, 19 Aug 94 09:20:17 PDT
To: Brad Huntting <matsb@sos.sll.se>
Subject: Re: 15 years!
Message-ID: <199408191618.AA19897@panix.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 08:29 AM 8/19/94 -0600, Brad Huntting wrote:

>In America cops often use armored battering rams to execute knock
>warrants.  Similarly, they can use court orders to obtain keys to
>decode encrypted transmissions or files.  If a person is ordered
>to turn over their password to unlock their documents, they can be
>held in contempt if they don't, and they can demand their right to
>not have any of the documents used against them if they do.
>
>In America at least, there are no new civil liberties to be found
>in the use of strong crypto.  The legitimate, constitutional use
>of police power cannot be thwarted by using this new technology.

Brad -- perhaps you haven't grasped the full range of possibilities arising
from the deployment of modern crypto technology.

By the use of Stego and anonymous networking and operating system software,
it will be possible to block the authorities from even identifying you as
the target of an investigation.  

While it is true that they may be able to try and force you to reveal the
contents of a "secret message", they can succeed only if:

1)  They know that a secret message exists
2)  They know that you exist
3)  They know (and can prove) that you possess the key material necessary to
decode the message.
4)  You are capable of being coerced -- i.e. you are a human being and not a
software agent or an institutional entity controlled by humans outside of
the jurisdiction.
5)  You are within their jurisdiction.
6)  You have not used an encoding scheme that kicks out two alternative
plaintexts (the 'real message' and the 'duress message') depending on what
key material you use.
7)  You decide not to take advantage of their offer of one or two years of
free room and board rather than submit to their demands.

Modern crypto techniques can make it very difficult in practice to extract
any useful information from people's computer files or communication
streams.  At the least, crypto can make "fishing expeditions" impossible.

When you combine crypto with the fact that on a network, people inside and
outside the "jurisdiction" are equal, enforcement capabilities are reduced.

DCF
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