Re: Guerrilla Remailers

[Adam Shostack <adam@bwh.harvard.edu>]

| Has anyone else given thought to "Guerrilla Remailers?" Basically someone
| obtains an account on one of the freenets or similar free account, sets up
| a remailer and lets it sit for a while. (Until telnet and/or phone logs
| are overwritten) After this time frame the address of the remailer is
| posted. The remailer then would be used until it is shut down by the Powers
| that be. The account would be set up under a bogus name etc. This would
| make the remailer the ideal candidate for the last hop in a remailer chain.
| (After all if they can't find Juanna DuBone or Jack Mehoff they can't apply
| any pressure to them or hold them responsible. It seems to me the extent of
| pressure in this case would be just to shut down the remailer) Just keep a
| few ahead and keep leap frogging, as one is shut down another is put on line.

	The freenet operators will, once they see their "no remailer"
policy is being abused, simply prevent people from running arbitrary
programs from accounts.  This will stop them from using some of the
most useful tools (procmail) out there.

	The way to set up remailers is on a freindly host, such as
C2.org.  Let systems managers who are our freinds shut down these fake
account remailers.

	Real remailers (with return address features) should probably
be advertised in alt.support.* and alt.recovery, in order to build a
class of "good" users for them.  Nb, I don't see this use as superior
to any other, I simply see it as being politically useful to provide
anonymous services to a group of people who society seems to think
should be anonymous.

	"But Brad, you can't shut down my remailer.  Its used to let
victims of sexual abuse post anonymously to the net!"

Adam


-- 
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once."
						       -Hume