From: Tim May <tcmay@got.net>
Date: Fri, 16 May 1997 09:25:16 +0800
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
Subject: Re: Reporting threshold for NY money transfers lowered
In-Reply-To: <5lfvc8$2m0@joseph.cs.berkeley.edu>
Message-ID: <v03007804afa16db7e323@[207.167.93.63]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 1:31 PM -0800 5/15/97, David Wagner wrote:

>*  Mexico City, April 12 - United States officials said today that
>*  $5.6 million discovered this week in a truck about to cross into
>*  Mexico from El Paso was the largest cash seizure in memory along
>*  the southwest border.
>*  [snip]
>*
>*  ...probably the proceeds of street drug sales...
>*  [snip]
...
>*  Although the order was not announced, word spread quickly
>*  among traffickers, and a dramatic drop in money wires to
>*  Colombia followed, along with a sharp increase in seizures
>*  of cash along the eastern seaboard.

Yet more reasons to get "smart cards" of even less than perfect
cryptographic quality deployed.

If persons planning to buy drugs and other illegal substances could set up
offshore accounts (perhaps by taking a day trip to Anguilla, even declaring
the $10K cash they are taking with them, or using conventional checks in
Anguilla, etc.) and then use the resulting "cash cards" (details left vague
here...maybe Mondex, maybe Mark Twain anonymous bank cards...), the dealers
could then simply have their Anguilla accounts increased by the transaction.

(I use "Anguilla" as my stand in here, as Vince Cate says such things will
be perfectly legal in Anguilla, given that no Anguillan laws are being
violated (e.g., no drugs are being shipped in or out of Anguilla). Of
course, I strongly doubt the Ruling Families of Anguilla will allow this,
so another country may have to be picked.)

This whole exercise is why, of course, the fatuous rhetoric about SAFE and
Pro-CODE, etc., making financial cryptography readily exportable is just
that, fatuous. No way will such anonymous transfer mechanisms be
exportable. And probably not importable, either, given the import
restrictions being planned for the Grand Compromise Omnibus Safe Cyberspace
and Child Protection Act of 1997, co-sponsored by Goodlatte, Kerrey, Burns,
and Feinstein.

--Tim May

There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of laws.
Only one response to the key grabbers is warranted: "Death to Tyrants!"
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^1398269     | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."