From: rishab@dxm.ernet.in
Date: Tue, 13 Dec 94 13:21:36 PST
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Transport layer security in a Freeh country
Message-ID: <gate.mkcBXc1w165w@dxm.ernet.in>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



It's nice to see some technical discussion for a change.

I guess one reason transport layer security seems irrelevant to Cypherpunks
is that it isn't secure. Not necessarily from a cryptographic point of view,
but in its procedure. For example, the Digital Telephony Bill avoided acting
against Internet providers _this_ time. Being provided by the carrier,
transport-layer security is succeptable to LEA arm-twisting. It may be so
even now despite DT's current form.

Such sabotaging of end-to-end security is much tougher, if not impossible,
and with end-to-end security, transport security is redundant and possibly
a painful overhead.

(This is quite apart from the other hassles - proxies need to be changed etc -
which only exist with transport security.)

As for James Donald's criticism of the IETF for not extending HTML to support
end-to-end security, well, MIME already exists.


"We know everything about you that we need to know" - Coleta Brueck, IRS
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