From: kkirksey@appstate.campus.mci.net (Ken Kirksey)
Date: Sat, 23 Mar 1996 01:26:52 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Mac Keystroke Capture
Message-ID: <v02130501ad78532989bb@[206.24.84.96]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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I've always warned my network users and other clients against using software
that "protects" you from data loss by capturing your keystrokes, e.g.
NowSave, Last Resort, and Thunder 7's Ghostwriter feature.

NowSave 6.0 adds a new wrinkle to the problem, as I discovered yesterday
when I installed the Now Utilities 6.0 public beta.  NowSave 6.0 has
a new feature:  when you re-start your machine after a system crash, NowSave
automatically opens at startup a SimpleText file containing all the keystrokes
it captured before the crash.  My machine crashed yesterday during an
internet session, and when it re-started I was greeted with a SimpleText
window containing my internet account password, two CryptDisk passphrases,
and my PGP passphrase.  This is not a good thing.

But it could be a good thing, IMHO.  Most people install these programs
without realizing exactly what they do.  With this new version of Now Utilities,
users are likely to be greeted with a screenful of information, as I was,
that they would just as soon not have saved anywhere on their hard drive.
This kind of incident would, hopefully, encourage them not to use key capture
software.  One can only hope...

Ken

= Ken Kirksey             | If Pat Buchanan is elected President of the   =
= Mac Developer &         | United States, at least the trains will run   =
=  Resident Cypherpunk    | run on time.                                  =
= kkirksey@appstate.campus.mci.net                             - Me       =