From: Mats Bergstrom <asgaard@sos.sll.se>
Date: Tue, 7 Feb 95 11:14:35 PST
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Is the remailer crisis over?
In-Reply-To: <199502071708.JAA17106@tower.techwood.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.HPP.3.91.950207184635.26403A@cor.sos.sll.se>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Anonymous wrote:

> The remailer crisis is far from over.

And the other kind of remailer - Julf style - might possibly be
in a crisis too. One of the Horsemen (Pedo) hit Sweden in a
heavier way than ever before, yesterday. Top front page article
in a leding newspaper followed up in the evening news on a main
national TV channel. Another newspaper article today but still
beginning on the front page ('Intermediary admits to computer porno'). 
Guess who is the intermediary. Both newspaper (with big picture)
and TV interviews with Johan Helsingius (Julf), who belongs to the
minority in Finland having Swedish as their mother's tounge.
The story starts with some joker at Stockholm University, dep of
Computer Science, who has made a study of alt.binary.pictures.erotica
and have found that one percent of the material is 'nude pictures of
girls and boys 8-10 years of age' and that 'most of the child-pictures
have bounced through Johan Helsingius' computer in Helsingfors'. 
Mr Helsingius says that he is very concerned and (picture subtitle:) 
'lies awake at night'. The big fat hedline on top of his picture 
says: 'This is where the kiddie porn is spreading from'. I guess
this is big "news" in Finland also, there are close media connections
between our countries. 'I don't want to reveal their addresses, only
that it concerns people in Germany and a multi-national organization
in the US' says Mr Helsingius about who are responsible for the kiddie
porn. But then he also gets a chance to talk about the benefits (abused,
political dissidents - the usual). Todays article also mention cypherpunks
remailers (although not by name).

I don't know - this just might be yesterdays news tomorrow. Kiddie porn
per se whistle-blowing is slowly getting out of fashion here, it's only
the net connection that makes it headline news. But there is a chance
some politician will try to score on this story and, as mentioned above,
the ties on that level between Helsingfors and Stockholm are strong.
We have to wait and see.

I'm getting to think that SAFE anonymous posting will need IP spoofing,
or worse (things that I know nothing about, please correct me if I'm
totally out in the blue here).

Mats