From: doug@OpenMind.com (Doug Cutrell)
Date: Sat, 17 Sep 94 07:34:35 PDT
To: Adam Shostack <adam@bwh.harvard.edu>
Subject: Re: Virtual assasins and lethal remailers
Message-ID: <aaa0ab5410021003003c@[198.232.141.2]>
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Adam Shostack writes:

>        The anonymous nature of the funds & contract negotiation will
>make finding this person more difficult, not impossible.

A number of people have raised this idea in one form or another when
confronted with these notions.  However, the point I think needs to be
stressed is that:

        To the extent that evidence can be found, the goals of crypto anarchy
        have failed.

It is certainly true that police can search for a motive, can point at the
usual suspects, etc.  Adam claims:

>The tracing of
>the money from payer to assassin might be difficult, but there will
>probably be a large, unaccounted for withdrawal from some back
>account.

To the extent that this is true, then it is also true that people are not
able to keep their financial status and records completely secret, and the
state can continue to enforce the collection of taxes.  Strong crypto has
the potential to completely remove these things... what if no one knows
what secret bank accounts the suspect uses?  The status of the suspect's
funds and all cash transactions can be completely private, with no way to
find them (even with all the court orders in the world).

There are, indeed, many weaknesses to such a scheme in the real world
*today*, but it is the aim of crypto anarchy to remove all such weaknesses.

Doug

___________________________________________________________________
Doug Cutrell                    General Partner
doug@OpenMind.com               Open Mind, Santa Cruz
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