From: dlv@bwalk.dm.com (Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM)
Date: Wed, 26 Mar 1997 11:37:27 -0800 (PST)
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: [Proposal:] Revolving Web Mirrors
In-Reply-To: <v03007808af5f0eb17780@[207.167.93.63]>
Message-ID: <J4s74D23w165w@bwalk.dm.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


"Timothy C. May" <tcmay@got.net> writes:

> At 9:00 AM -0600 3/26/97, William H. Geiger III wrote:
>
> >>How does this actually provide any benefit to anyone?  Search engines ala
> >>Altavista etc. are entirely too unreliable and too slow to pick up on
> >>these magical mirrors, especially if they are as dynamic as they would
> >>appear to be.  And if there's a central "come here and get all the
> >>mirrors!" page, the Bad Guys can simply block that page too.
> ...
> >Does Altavista, ...ect accept notification of new URL's and if so what is
> >the average lag time between receiving notice and the URL making it into
> >the search engine?
> >
> >The problem that I am trying to address is that a determined State could
> >block all static mirrors over a period of time. By making these sites
> >dynamic it makes the job much more difficult for them.
>
> Why not have e-mail notification about mirrors?

To whom?

> (Like Raph's remailer list, where an e-mail version is sent out in tandem
> with the Web site update.)
>
> Sure, some Big Mommy filtering services will block the Web sites, but they
> probably are completely unequipped to try to interfere with e-mail.

It's a piece of cake to scan all incoming e-mail and to see who's
getting notifications of the new locations of the "banned pages".
It doesn't matter if the "authorities" are the local gubmint or
a corporation... If the incoming e-mail is encrypted then the
authorities can scrutinize all incoming encryped e-mail and ask
the recipients what's in it, why it's encrypted, and whether it's
solicited or not.  If the notofications of the "banned pages"
locations are unsolicited, they have good grounds for a complaint
to your ISP.  If they're solicited... the recipient's in trouble.

But if the notifications are a small part of traffic on a large-
volume mailing list, like this one, then the recipient can claim
that they've subscribed to the mailing list for the other content
(like the ASCII art :-).

---

Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM
Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps