Nicholas Thompson wrote: > NOW LET'S TAKE ANOTHER CASE. THE CIA HEARS THAT PERHAPS A DIRTY BOMB > IS BEING ASSEMBLED IN SOMEWHERE IN THE WORLD FROM APPARENTLY INNOCENT > MATERIALS BEING PURCHASED IN NEWARK, NEW JERSEY. IT HAS NO IDEA WHO > IS DOING IT, BUT KNOWS THAT ANYBODY WHO IS DOING IT MUST LEAVE A > PARTICULAR COMMUNICATIONS "SIGNaTURE" BEHIND. THE CIA WANTS TO SEND A > BOT LOOKING FOR THAT SIGNATURE, WHICH MIGHT REQUIRE "TAPPING" EVERY > PHONE IN NEWARK IN A SINGLE DAY. What's the signature of a ssh-tunneled VOIP connection? Oh wait it's a encrypted channel that looks to a network protocol analyzer like any other one. There is no signature. In one of those Afghanistan camps they couldn't spend a few minutes to teach their buddies in martyrdom how to do a port forward? (Or too busy on the jungle gym and praying and all that?!)
What we should worry about is being pressured into accepting far more prescriptive measures. The gist of it will be to make everything illegal and only opening up special use cases one at a time, e.g. using the internet to pay creditors, go shopping, and take instructions from your employer. As for data mining of essentially public transaction records (they are for sale), there may be some birds eye view of international social networks that is useful for intelligence analysts to have, but it's not a wiretap. > WOULDN'T WE LIKE SPECIAL JUDICIARY, SOPHISTICATED BOTH IN > CONSTITUTIONAL LAW AND IN COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY WHOSE JOB IT WAS TO > EVALUATE THE GOVERNMENT'S PROGRAMS OF INFORMATION GATHERING? If the NSA spooks developed a quantum code breaking technology, you seriously think that information would ever find its way to a judiciary? Short of that, ubiquitous encryption technology will prevent information gathering efforts from accomplishing much. It would just be another redundant government organization to pacify confused citizens with lip service. ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
