Louis Freeh calls for communication crackdown

[nobody@neva.org (Neva Remailer)]

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Robert Hettinga wrote that David Kaufman wrote that Reuters wrote:
>``It could take a $30 million supercomputer a year to figure out the
>simplest encrypted message without this feature,'' Freeh said. ``And
>that message might be 'we have the victim and will kill him in an
>hour'.''

This seems like a good time to try out The Cypherpunk War Cry: Shine
Shine!! Bakayarou!! Aho!! Manuke!! Anpontan!!

(Hope it means something bad!)

Jonathan Wienke correctly pointed out the absurdity of Freeh's
example.

But, there are two ways Louis and his supporters can wriggle out of
this point.

One is that the friends and relatives of the kidnap victime are
sometimes tempted to conceal the crime as they may believe that a
quiet negotiation and ransom payment will be more likely to secure the
hostage's release than involving the authorities.  (In many countries
it is illegal to do this.)

However, if the all knowing and all seeing secret police agency can
intercept all communications they will be able to find out and
interfere with plans to make ransom payments and jail the friends of
the victim.  That might be a little rough on the trophy, it is true,
but it will be said that this will generally discourage other
kidnappings in the future.

The second is that encryption makes remailers possible.  Remailers
make it possible for kidnappers to untraceably send messages.

What Louis and his supporters are neglecting is that kidnappers are
already able to do this without encryption.  The unabomber, while not
a kidnapper, is an especially good example.  For the at least a decade
he was communicating with the FBI itself on a regular basis without
facing any consequences.

Monty Cantsin
Editor in Chief
Smile Magazine
http://www.neoism.org/squares/smile_index.html
http://www.neoism.org/squares/cantsin_10.htm

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