Re: getting netscape to support the remailers

[Ray Cromwell <rjc@clark.net>]

> sameer writes:
> > 	I think that in order to get netscape to support the remailers
> > the remailers will have to:
> > 
> > A) Support S/MIME
> > B) Have a documented protocol, MIME-related
> > 
> > 	Did Ray Cromwell do some work towards MIMEifiying the
> > remailers? My impression of his work back when he posted was that it
> > trusted the remailers too much, but perhaps my memory is flawed-- in
> > any case his work may be helpful towards developing a remailer
> > standard, which could then help get support incorporated into
> > MIME agents.

  Yes, a while ago I was working on this, but I dropped it as people
didn't seem interested. It was part of my whole "Remailer 2.0" proposal
(before mixmaster was written)

  I was studying ways to make it easier for mail readers to interact with
remailers, in particular, messages which were split, padded, packetized,
and sent along separate chains. All this without some kind of special 
client. I wanted to use the multipart/partial part of MIME to have
the pieces combined at the recipient end and decoded using an
application/remailer or application/pgp type. (this was also
before PEM was worked on) So I had a lot of work to do in standardizing
stuff. I started working on a remailer which combined those facets,
and also

1) a remailer network which had strong authentication between remailers
so that untrusted remailers could not get in the network (web of trust
for remailers)
2) my virtual handle idea
3) strict addressing for virtual handles on the remailer network
(e.g. set up an explicit chain to anonymous bob by mailing to
remailer1#remailer2#....#remailerN#anonymous_bob. Also, if you add
a '*' in the path, it means for the remailer to choose a random
remailer as the next in the chain)
4) padding, packetizing, delayed delivery, creating artificial traffic to 
   thwart traffic analysis
5) a built in keyserver and "list of active remailers" server. 
   The list of active remailers server would also contain flags
   for each remailer detailing what it supports and special
   flags like if the machine is multiuser, single, firewalled, offline (UUCP 
   connection only), etc. I wanted as standard, that every remailer
   could serve keys or atleast tell you what other remailers were active
6) socket connection for commanding the remailer so that you can bypass
   sendmail logging and get error/status on the message
7) direct SMTP delivery bypassing local sendmail logging



I wanted to use multipart MIME to allow remailers in a network
to be run from user accounts in such a way that they wouldn't accidently get
mail intended for the remailer and they wouldn't have to bear
responsibility for the mail sent (only the whole machine would, as it would
be delivered via SMTP direct, not sendmail, so no local logs)

Nevertheless, like many things, I completed about 60% of it and it got
put on the back burner never to emerge. Mixmaster came along and I 
figured there's no point continuing.

 
-Ray