Re: "Forward Privacy" for ISPs and Customers

[attila <attila@primenet.com>]

In <v03007802ae819385a300@[207.167.93.63]>, on 10/09/96 
   at 10:13 AM, "Timothy C. May" <tcmay@got.net> said:

.However, there are certain things my phone company does *not* do. They don't
.keep _copies_ (recordings) of my phone conversations. 
.
        true, so far

.This means a court
.order can't yield copies of past conversations.
.
        true, so far

.They also don't track
.incoming phone calls to me. (I don't believe such records of incoming phone
.calls are kept; maybe I'm wrong. Certainly with Caller ID, storing incoming
.phone numbers is possible....I just don't think local or regional phone
.companies care about such records, and hence don't bother to accumulate
.them.)
.
        Not true.  they *do* track incoming calls, including caller ID, etc
    even if blocked by the originating customer; even pay phones give
    out their ID which means if the callee is tapped, they have the caller's
    location in a flash by reverse reference. 

    Caller ID of blocked senders is available to anyone who wants to 
    read it.  the  "disable" bit can be programmed out of existence if
    anti-privacy snooping is your business ( you can modify software 
    and/or firmware in most of the the WinTel hardware platform 
    add-ons for phones to do so).

.Now, should the phone company keep such records, they would be accessible via
.court order.
.
        Sure are; and they are there.

.My point? ISPs are currently in a position to turn over *far* more
.information than phone companies are able to turn over. It's as if the phone
.companies kept audio recordings of all conversations, without even the need
.for law enforcement to do a wiretap or pen register or whatnot. It would be
.trivial for law enforcement to say: "Phone Company, here's a subpoena/court
.order for the last 6 months of phone conversations Tim May has had. Please
.ship the tapes via FedEx."
.
        exactly;  recording of calls is not done without a court order
    --or an LEO operative having a buddy or bribee in the switch room.

        besides, LEOs do not wiretap suspects without a court order 
    (really)  --but they *do* just happen to talk loud enough in certain
    places about wanting that information (including inbound CallerID),
    that whatever information is desired is handed over by a snitch for
    the usual 30 shekals, or more.

.This makes the ISP case a bit different. Not legally, but technologically.
.
        Unfortunately, the same "problem" applies here --the ISPs can be
    ordered to keep logs of mail traffic.  So far, the fact this is not 
    current Fed policy is what permits our remailer networks to 
    operate at all.  If remailers were required to keep logs --of what
    value would remailers be?

        Obviously, this not mean that some brain-dead Fed, Jamie Gorelick
    for example, will not ask Congress to attach a rider to some other bill
    which will pass with high numbers  --remember the "manager's mark"
    which added the CDA provisions we object to after the House voted
    410-2 for no-CDA?

.There are some fixes.
.
        valid only until the Feds order ISPs to log, and to whatever level.

. [snip]
.(Recall that Ollie North thought he had deleted his incriminating White House
.PROFS messsages, but that they were faithfully preserved on backup tapes, and
.could be retrieved.)
.
        sure makes a good argument for ZIP drives does it not?

            --of course, supposing PRZ did not sell out to get off,  
    the messages should have started our with PGP --you can always
    lose a keyring <g>  

        or, have a second internal file which is non-incriminating 
    which pops up with the dummy key --talks about your kids or 
    whatever.  that and pray your recipient gets the decoded message
    off his disks pronto.  would not take much to modify PGP to be
    two (or split) keyed.  of course, we might as well shift over to
    the newer lattice crypto theories and up the price to play.

        or, interleaving which is a particularly nasty means of playing
    the game  -it gets their attention real fast;  been there and seen
    the two grey suits at the door at 5 am a few times --unpleasant
    men.

        or, as I do with all mail, despite the small fraction I consider 
    sensitive:   all inbound mail goes to a ZIP disk --decoding, 
    including tmp files, is on the ZIP --I may even switch to JAZ and
    keep the archives on optical (which is also a lot faster).

.[snip...] 
.(* Prepaid phone cards, paid for in cash, and payphones, tell us that True
.Names are not needed with the phone companies. And so on.)

        so far, this is one of the few freebies we have, but is it a
    freebie long? 

        with the new digital wiretap provisions and sophisticated 
    speech reconition, the Feds can scan and monitor active payphones
    and still have their cake after they have eaten your rights.

.We don't have to make it easy for them.
.
.--Tim May
.
        how?  revolution per the Thomas Jefferson rationalization?

        nor must "they" make it easy for us.  <g>
--
  I'll get a life when it is proven
    and substantiated to be better
      than what I am currently experiencing.