From: "Perry E. Metzger" <perry@piermont.com>
Date: Thu, 21 Mar 1996 04:39:15 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Keep the pressure! Cryptographers Against Cryptography EXPOSED!
In-Reply-To: <199603201016.CAA09094@jobe.shell.portal.com>
Message-ID: <199603201726.MAA01438@jekyll.piermont.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



anonymous-remailer@shell.portal.com writes:
> THEY MUST BE STOPPED.

Yup, really evil folks. Lets go over some of the people on your list.

> THE LIST OF SHAME:
> B. Schneier: bs208@newton.cam.ac.uk, schneier@counterpane.com

Bruce Schneier, cryptographic privacy advocate, cryptographer,
publisher of "Applied Cryptography", the book that signaled the end of
the NSA's ability to keep information on how to build cryptosystems
out of the hands of most people. A smart 14 year old, armed with a C
compiler and Applied Cryptography, cannot be prevented from writing
good cryptographic software. Is this the NSA enemies list, by chance?

> M. Blaze: mab@crypto.com, mab@research.att.com

Matt Blaze, cryptographer, privacy advocate, anti-authoritarian. The
guy who showed that Tessera/Fortezza cards were flawed and embarassed
the NSA in public with it. Regularly releases strong cryptographic
tools to the public. Participated strongly with me and others in early
efforts to build software only "voice crypto" systems. Tirelessly
criticizes control on cryptographic software. Is your list of
"enemies" supplied by the NSA?

> J. Bizdos: jim@rsa.com

Well, I'm not going to defend Jim. Besides, he can take care of
himself. However, although he isn't necessarily a friend of
cypherpunks, he's no friend of control of cryptography by the
government, which would put him out of business.

> S. Safaddar: shabbir@vtw.org

Shabbir: creator of voters telecom watch; privacy advocate, tireless
opponent of the CDA, free speech restrictions, network regulation, and
any other attempt at stopping freedom on the net. Shabbir is not a guy
you would call an advocate of authoritarianism.

> B. Stewart: stewarts@ix.netcom.com

Bill Stewart: "Hippie Anarchist"; he and his wife, Laura, are about
the most anti-government folks I think you are likely to find this
side of Alpha Centauri. Bill is as libertarian as they come, and
unconditionally opposes any attempts at restricting anyone's freedom
to live peacefully. The idea that he'd advocate anything that
increased the power of government is absurd. One of the nicest people
I know.

> P. Karn: karn@unix.ka9q.ampr.org

Phil Karn: Engineer's Engineer, crypto-hacker, privacy advocate. Phil
is suing the government right now to get the right to export
cryptographic software freely -- he has gone through a lot of trouble
to try to prove you have a constitutional right to distribute
cryptographic software and to prove that if you can ship it in print
you can ship it on disk. Phil ceaselessly advocates the use of strong
cryptography by everyone, and is one of the people who built the
predecessor of the current IETF IPsec standard. Phil worked very hard
on creating the Photuris key exchange protocol, which takes care to
make sure that all parties remain anonymous to eavesdroppers. Phil has
released large amounts of strong cryptographic code to the public,
including the fastest implementation of DES ever seen in
software. After an NSA flack spoke about his nightmare of every $80
digital phone on earth having unbreakable crypto in it, Phil quipped
something like "well, folks, now we know our design goal." Phil
tirelessly spreads the gospel of PGP. In short, he isn't on anyone's
short list of "friends of the NSA".

> D. McCullagh: declan@well.com
Declan is a tireless advocate of free speech, going so far as to work
hard to distribute speech he highly disagrees with if it is being
censored. I don't know him personally, but he hardly fits the profile
of "Friends of the NSA" or some such.


In short, Mr. Anonymous, you couldn't have picked a bigger bunch of
"Enemies of the NSA" for your "Friends of the NSA" list if you had
been explicitly instructed to pick the biggest opponents of
controls on cryptographic software and write them down. My question to
you is this: are you just stupid or ornery, or is the NSA paying you
for this?

Perry
Who is disappointed that he didn't make the "LIST OF SHAME", but
understands that perhaps he hasn't done enough to oppose controls on
cryptography. I'll work harder, and hopefully you will denounce me
soon.