Ask Cryptome's John Young Whatever You'd Like

John Young of Cryptome, though trained as an architect, has garnered recognition in another field entirely. Since 1996, he's been publishing timely, trenchant news online as the mind behind crypto jya.com and Cryptome. ("Our goal is to be the most disreputable publisher on the Net, just after the world's governments and other highly reputable bullshitters." ) This has put him on the forefront of various online liberty issues, from the MPAA's DeCSS crackdown on DeCSS (he fought the lawyers -- and won), to Carnivore, to Dmitry Sklyarov's continuing imprisonment, and now the several fronts along which electronic communications are threatened by current and upcoming legislation. He recently posted this to the front page: "Cryptome and a host of other crypto resources are likely to be shutdown if the war panic continues. What methods could be used to assure continued access to crypto for homeland and self-defense by citizens of all nations against communication transgressors?" Now's your chance to ask him about the fight for online freedom. Please pose just one question per post; we'll send 10-15 of the highest moderated ones on to John for his answers.

Comments

Mirroring, now and in the future

[Roundeye]

Your efforts (and your unwillingness to flinch in the face of 800-lb. corporate and governmental gorillas) have made cryptome an invaluable resource, for which I certainly thank you. At least once in recent memory you've made a call for mirroring sensitive software and information.

1. What can normal people do to help out with mirroring important information (e.g., crypto information, documentation on civil liberties threats, reverse engineering and Fair Use securing tools, etc.)? How can we stay out of trouble with the law while we're helping out?

2. Have you ever considered providing a mirroring clearing house? That is, devoting a section of cryptome to listing, in an up-to-date manner, resources which need mirroring in various parts of the world?

Thanks!

Re:Question:

[Steve B]

Supporters of this program claim that such a program will allow day-to-day communications among law-abiding citizens to remain private, whilst still allowing the FBI and CIA to monitor the communications of suspected terrorists(with a warrant, of course).

A backdoor which does not require anyone outside the agency to assist, or even know about, the tap makes the warrant requirement unenforceable, of course.

The liberal media opposition to this initiative

What color is the sky in your world? If anything, the opposition to increased government snooping is from the conservative and libertarian factions of US politics.

For the purposes of this post, I'm going to ignore the fact that nowhere in our Constitution or Bill of Rights, are we guaranteed anonimity or absolute privacy.

That's good, because the Constitution specifically requires that position.

It seems to me that if we cannot trust our policing agencies to be responsible with the power they have been given, the problem is not with the cryptography, but the government itself, and this problem needs to be addressed as such.

The obvious first step in addressing the problem of government abuse is to avoid aggrivating the situation by giving the abusers additional powers.

Re:I don't do anything illegal

[Negadecimal]

I do nothing illegal in my life (okay, a little speeding)

That's because you happen to agree with the government's book definition of "illegal"... you're assuming that there are no corrupt politicians or vague laws waiting to be twisted against the common man (like Dmitry). Thomas Jefferson recognized the fallibility of government - if politicians were perfect, we wouldn't have referendum, jury nullification, judicial review, vetos, appointments, recall, and legislative override.