Slashdot Mirror
Trusted Computing
derrickoswald writes "John Walker, one of the founders of Autodesk, has posted The Digital Imprimatur, a monograph on technologies such as the Trusted Computing initiative.
Some of the prognostications and conclusions reached may not be palatable to Slashdot readers."
Remember, folks. Trusted computing shouldn't be.
200k html page coming down at 5k/s. Ho hum.
Anyone who posts in the next hour or so that claims to have RTFA either just skimmed it or is lying. Happy reading!
US Democracy:The best person for the job (among These pre-selected choices...)
This is Google's cache of http://www.fourmilab.to/documents/digital-imprimat ur/
Schrödinger's cat is not amused—maybe.
You have the wrong definition of "trust" in mind.
You need to look further down on the list of definitions "trust" to find the appropriate one:
"A combination of firms or corporations for the purpose of reducing competition and controlling prices throughout a business or an industry."
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Hm, what?
Oh... so you mean... you mean you're not joking?
The article's (which is already slashdotted) main idea is that it will be possible for a cooperation of government and corporate interests to change the internet from the freewheeling, content-neutral common carrier we know and love into a strict disciplinarian.
That was the thesis of Lawrence Lessig's 5 year old book, "Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace". The internet is artificial. It's not a force of nature. Human effort built it, and human laws can change it. With sufficient financial motivation, laws will change it.
Tired quotations like "The internet treats censorship as damage, and routes around it" are at best observations of recent behavior, not guarantees that truely effective internet censorship won't happen in the future.
Those who care about freedom cannot just sit back and assume that because the net is fairly free now, it always will be. Eternal vigiliance is the price.
Actually, it was quite easy to read the whole thing...
Once you know the trick
"Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech."--Benjamin Franklin
Well, if it doesn't conclude that George W. Bush is Satan and everything should be free, then yeah, that'll pretty much put off the average Slashdot reader.
If it takes a while to load, that's because there is 200k of TEXT to download. Maybe a speed reader or the poster can maybe summarize the unpalatable conclusions...
... prognostications and conclusions reached may not be palatable...
Except I don't know what that means.
------
GWB
Best Windows Freeware
Some of the prognostications and conclusions reached may not be palatable to Slashdot readers.
:)
So I'm guessing that it has positive things to say about trusted computing
Microsoft's "Trusted Computing" is not the same as the TCPA's "Trusted Computing." Microsoft's apparent goal is DRM, while TCPA is to produce actual safe computing.
Sorta like how Microsoft's "Java" is not the same "Java" as that produced by Sun, IBM, Oracle, BEA, and everyone else on Earth.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/33391.html
s &file=article&sid=501
http://www.cryptonomicon.net/modules.php?name=New
And case taken on by the EFF: http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/20031014_eff_pr.php
This is just one person's opinion on trusted computing. Nobody really knows where it's going, but there's a lot of people trying to push their various interests into it.
My feeling is the idea of trusted computing isn't in itself bad. As a matter of fact, there's probably a lot of very good uses for it to go along with a larger system of security. Some of the ideas in Palladium, if used correctly, really could enhance and improve security. It, in itself, may not provide security, but as part of a larger system with other security geatures, it may well be useful.
The problem is not trusted computing, but some of these rogue interests. The government, Microsoft, the recording industry, the motion picture industry, and just about everyone else wants a say in where it's going. Hopefully, between the various interests will cancel each other out and we'll end up with the good that comes from trusted computing, but without most of the bad.
Groups fighting against trusted computing shouldn't fight the technology, in my opinion, but some of the uses of it. This means they should fight some of the DRM aspects of it, not the technology in general. Remember, an extra layer of security isn't a bad thing to have.
Help me. I've been modbombed by a few people with entirely too much time on their hands.
Explanation is here -- people were making those predictions for at least 20 years already, though with different reasons to support it.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
I wont claim to have read the entire article because the damn thing is large. But I believe that he has writen the article in a way that will inspire the open source comunity, if that inspiration is anger then so be it. But read between the lines and dont take things out of context.
He states at the begining of the article that he sees the internet as a genie that has been set free and that with said genie free all things are posible. When he tells us how he could put this genie back into the bottle he is pointing out the places where we have to be carefull and make "work arounds".
Like the article says information and knowledge are powerfull things that alot of ppl in the media and government dont want us to have. How do you control a population of individuals that can find "unbiased" information.
Read the article. Im finishing it now. Read between the lines and think about how usefull an article like this could have been 3 years ago before all the shit hit the fan. Think of ways to work around these obstacles.
Sorry for the spelling. I suck.
If I were only smart enough to accomplish the things I dream about.. Or maybe too dumb to care.
You mean trusted computing might just be a good thing as long as the user has control of what is trusted?
I woulda had first post if slashdot was so fucking broken lately! I blame mySQL!
I can confirm the firewall problem. The high schools in the country where I live do not have library catalog servers. I wanted to get a sample server up and running, and maybe let them start using it to record their books.
Of course, I had a firewalled ISP. I went ahead and asked them to get me connected with IPCHAINS to mysite.theirsite.lt, and they said sure.
Well, long story short, I asked and asked and asked for about 6-7 months, and nothing happened aside from more statements "yes, immediately. Yes, tomorrow". Meanwhile, I had my KOHA catalog server up and running. Eventually, the time for which it would have been useful passed, and they still hadn't done anything, so I stopped asking. Two months later, as I was packing up our stuff to leave the country, I got an email "oh, do you still need to be connected?".
Well, more and more, this is starting to be standard. As the author stated, broadcasters get privileged sites, and those designated "consumers" cannot get a broadcastable site no matter what they do.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Come one, hardware keys didn't work in the past. Now they are getting all hot and bothered because Microsoft wants to write them into the OS.
This is a company with a vested interest and a hard-on. It is not an independent futurist looking at the big picture.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
Barbossa: There be a lot of long words in there, miss. We're naught but humble pirates. What is it that you want?
Elizabeth: I want you to leave and never come back.
Barbossa: I'm disinclined to acquiesce to your request. Means "no"!
-- Language is a virus from outer space.
we're all big boys and girls here (well, never enough girls, sigh). i'm sure the article is wonderful, but i would prefer to see either a more insightful comment on the posting or none at all.
"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste." - Rahm Emanuel
Well, duh . . . of course not! But this is where we are going, unless we change course, and soon. Every single technology I discuss in this paper is either already deployed in a limited fashion, planned for adoption in the future, or under active development. Many of these technologies are beneficial if used wisely. But only Panglossian optimists will neglect the potential downside. Each of these technologies can be easily sold, either to individuals based on their obvious benefits ("No more spam", "Safe surfing for your kids") or to lawmakers in a position to mandate them due to their perceived societal benefits ("Close the Internet to terrorism", "Torpedo the copyright pirates", "Track down the child pornographers and lock up their customers").
In discussing these issues with numerous people over the last two years, I have been amazed at how few comprehended how all the pieces fit together in the way I saw them inevitably converging. Once I explained the end-point I envisioned, which I hope I've conveyed to you in this document, the general reaction was shock and horror, especially when I explained how every single component was already being developed or deployed.
[snip]
If I thought there were the slightest possibility that refraining from publishing this document would reduce the probability of the advent of the Digital Imprimatur, you would not be reading it. But I don't; in fact, I'm convinced that the only hope for preserving the Internet as we presently know it is to alert as many technologically literate people as quickly as possible to where we're going and the consequences once we arrive. As in my Unicard paper, I've cast the bulk of this document as a seductive sales pitch in favour of the technologies I fear, since that is how they will be sold to those whose liberty they will eventually restrict. To counter such arguments, one must fully appreciate how persuasive they can be when presented only in the light of their obvious benefits.
Quoted from the article:
"The typical home user never notices NAT; it just works. But that user is no longer a peer of all other Internet users as the original architecture of the network intended. In particular, the home user behind a NAT box has been relegated to the role of a consumer of Internet services. Such a user cannot create a Web site on their broadband connection, since the NAT box will not permit inbound connections from external sites. Nor can the user set up true peer to peer connections with other users behind NAT boxes, as there's an insuperable chicken and egg problem creating a bidirectional connection between them."
Ok, Here is my suggestion: Somebody sets up an Intermediary Site where two isolated users can connect, and indicate that they want to Go Private. A modification to the users' browsers is also required. The software at that site analyzes the packets coming from the two users, and sends special packets to each of the two browsers, so that they can simultaneously switch to communcations with each other, automatically cutting the Intermediary Site out of the connection.
Can this be made to work, or am I dreaming? Thanks!
>Some of the prognostications and conclusions reached may not be palatable to Slashdot readers.
Do we really need a warning to protect our fragile view of the world?
Just post it with a quick, brief summary of his points and drop the dramatics/trollish statements.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
The article's author repeats something that I guess sounds like an idealistic misconception of the 'trust' that supposedly would be 'implemented' by 'trusted computing'.
He says "users are also protected against corruption of data on their own computers". I haven't seen anywhere any account of how 'trusted computing' would actually improve reliability.
The most it appears to promise, is simply to block any material that the 'trust' mechanism diagnoses to be unreliable.
If that's right, then it sounds as if (e.g.) the slightest corruption of a word-processor document would render it unreadable and unprocessable.
Data loss at a stroke? Some trust!
Another manifesto/thesis/rant, "World of Ends", raised similar problems, although from a more limited, technical perspective. And it was a shorter document overall. There was a Slashdot discussion of it too.
Have these people like John Walker, that are advocating these "control schemes" ever looked in a history book? have they ever read something like a tale of two cities?
There is an simple lesson to be learned, one that has been repeated countless times over our history... People rebel.
In an economic system it is much easier to "rebel": some competitor will come along that will not employ "trusted computing", perhaps a company like Apple or a flavor of Linux will force their inferior competitor (perhaps Microsoft) out of the market.
I will not deal with a company that has control issues... I pay for a legal system, and I try to believe that works-- it might not be lightening fast- but it seems pretty good, and for the most part fair (I am in Canada, so no DMCA to deal with).
I would feel more comfortable if Microsoft or whoever just came out and accused me of being a criminal rather than coming up with some ridiculous solution to a slow legal system, and to piracy. I don't need a company dictating their perception of my rights as a consumer to me, and as a consumer I will not be using "trusted computing" products.
I took a gander at his Speak Freely website to check out the reason behind his dropping maintenance to Speak Freely.
It mostly revolves around his contention that NAT'd LANs block peer to peer traffic. However, while he does concede that you can do port mapping to overcome this issue, he doesn't give people credence to make it work.
I have to call bullshit on this one; all you need to do is set up your network with static IPs on all of your machines, and then set up your firewall to pass traffic to specific machines based on functionality.
If you really need connectivity for multiple machines on your network, why not go to a VOIP (H.323) solution? This way call routing can take place inside of your network regardless of NAT.
I think he is just using this as an excuse to give up, and while I have no right to say he can't give up, I certainly can say his excuse is very lame.
Lodragan Draoidh
The more you explain it, the more I don't understand it. - Mark Twain
thank god
Note the illustration of the consumer vs the producer. This characterizes the RIAA's tactics as well. They are going after those independants that make their product available to others. Are they going after windowsmedia.com? No, because they're one of the authorized producers.
don't trust our new trusted computing overlords
how long until
How big brother and big media can put the Internet genie back in the bottle.
by John Walker
September 13th, 2003
Revision 3 -- October 9th, 2003
imprimatur 1. The formula (=`let it be printed'), signed by an official licenser of the press, authorizing the printing of a book; hence as sb. an official license to print.
The Oxford English Dictionary (2nd. ed.)
Introduction
Over the last two years I have become deeply and increasingly pessimistic about the future of liberty and freedom of speech, particularly in regard to the Internet. This is a complete reversal of the almost unbounded optimism I felt during the 1994-1999 period when public access to the Internet burgeoned and innovative new forms of communication appeared in rapid succession. In that epoch I was firmly convinced that universal access to the Internet would provide a countervailing force against the centralisation and concentration in government and the mass media which act to constrain freedom of expression and unrestricted access to information. Further, the Internet, properly used, could actually roll back government and corporate encroachment on individual freedom by allowing information to flow past the barriers erected by totalitarian or authoritarian governments and around the gatekeepers of the mainstream media.
So convinced was I of the potential of the Internet as a means of global unregulated person-to-person communication that I spent the better part of three years developing Speak Freely for Unix and Windows, a free (public domain) Internet telephone with military-grade encryption. Why did I do it? Because I believed that a world in which anybody with Internet access could talk to anybody else so equipped in total privacy and at a fraction of the cost of a telephone call would be a better place to live than a world without such communication.
Computers and the Internet, like all technologies, are a double-edged sword: whether they improve or degrade the human condition depends on who controls them and how they're used. A large majority of computer-related science fiction from the 1950's through the dawn of the personal computer in the 1970's focused on the potential for centralised computer-administered societies to manifest forms of tyranny worse than any in human history, and the risk that computers and centralised databases, adopted with the best of intentions, might inadvertently lead to the emergence of just such a dystopia.
The advent of the personal computer turned these dark scenarios inside-out. With the relentless progression of Moore's Law doubling the power of computers at constant cost every two years or so, in a matter of a few years the vast majority of the computer power on Earth was in the hands of individuals. Indeed, the large organisations which previously had a near monopoly on computers often found themselves using antiquated equipment inferior in performance to systems used by teenagers to play games. In less than five years, computers became as decentralised as television sets.
But there's a big difference between a computer and a television set--the television can receive only what broadcasters choose to air, but the computer can be used to create content--programs, documents, images--media of any kind, which can be exchanged (once issues of file compatibility are sorted out, perhaps sometime in the next fifty centuries) with any other computer user, anywhere.
Personal computers, originally isolated, almost immediately began to self-organise into means of communication as well as computation--indeed it is the former, rather than the latter, which is their principal destiny. Online services such as CompuServe and GEnie provided archives of files, access to data, and discussion fora where personal computer users with a subscription and modem could meet, communicate, and exchange files. Computer bulletin board systems, FidoNet, and UUCP/USENET store and forward mail and news systems decentralised communication among personal computer
The aroma of that argument reminds me a bit of Haldane soup.
Trusted computing? Trust yourself.
"Obviously, I'm not an IBM computer any more than I'm an ashtray" (Bob Dylan)
Here's what to me seemed like a key excerpt that makes his point that so-called "trusted" computing is something we should be extremely wary of. It's worth reading this one longish excerpt, if you don't have time to read the entire article, to get an idea of the danger:
...these document registries [...] will, collectively, know when any page is published or an existing page is modified, and can provide this information to operators of search engines, as will be discussed in the next section. Since the registries compute a document's signature by examining it and all embedded content, they might, for example, compare those signatures with those of existing documents (aggregated from all document registries) and check for matches against documents flagged as copyright protected. A match might alert the copyright holder of a potential violation by your page. The document registry might, in the interest of compiling a comprehensive archive of the Web or, perhaps, encouraged by a government mandate, make an archival copy of all documents for which it granted certificates; imagine how useful such an archive could be in resolving subsequent disputes regarding their content. Why, the document registry could even, in the interest of wholesomeness or, perhaps, inspired by a public law, examine the contents of the document and match it against profiles of prohibited content, flagging it for possible scrutiny by those who occupy themselves with such matters.
(begin excerpt)
Since a document cannot be transmitted across the Internet without a certificate validated by its document registry, nor can a user who has received a copy of such a document access it once its certificate has been revoked (except on a machine which is never again connected to the Internet after receiving the document), should the document be found to infringe the rights of another party or violate the law in some manner, after this is established through due process of law, the document registry may be ordered to revoke the document's certificate, un-publishing it.
Some might even fantasise that document registries could, based on signature comparison and heuristic examination of document contents, even refuse to grant a certificate for a suspicious document unless the publisher provided proof it did not violate copyright or laws regarding its content. But that would constitute prior restraint on publication, which is unthinkable in a free society.
This, then, is the digital imprimatur; the right to publish as, in olden times, was granted by church or state. A document's certificate, its imprimatur, identifies the person (individual or legal entity) responsible for its publication, provides a signature which permits verifying its contents have not been corrupted or subsequently modified, and identifies the document registry which granted the imprimatur and which, on demand, will validate it and confirm that it has not been revoked.
(end excerpt)
The emergence of Weblogs ("blogs") and other forms of independent Internet journalism has raised a variety of issues regarding free use of copyright protected material. To what extent may a blog excerpt a document published on the Web (with or without a link to the original source)? Is it permissible for a Web document on one site to link directly to a document deep within another site's archives, potentially bypassing advertisements on the site's main page which fund its operation?
.Net Plans Are About
Micropayment provides solutions for many of these problems. As envisioned by Ted Nelson almost 40 years ago in his original exposition of Xanadu, the problem with copyright isn't the concept but rather its granularity. (I'd add, in the present day, the absurd notion that copyright should be eternal, but that's another debate for a different document.) Once micropayment becomes as universal as E-mail, a blog will simply quote content from a Web site using an "excerpt URL" (I'll leave the design as an exercise for the reader) or provide a link to the entire document. Readers of the blog will, if the excerpt is below their threshold of paying (and the total of all excerpts in the blog is also below the threshold), see it automatically. Otherwise, they'll have to click on an icon to fetch it, approving the payment, before it is displayed. Similarly, when following a link to a document licensed under one of the Digital Rights Management (see below) terms of use, you'll automatically pay the fee and see the document unless it exceeds your threshold, in which case you'll have to confirm before retrieving it.
Micropayment and Ubiquitous Wireless Internet Access
Micropayment will greatly facilitate the deployment of wireless Internet access (Wi-Fi and its descendants). Wireless access today has a unsettled business model; some coffee shops and bookstores provide free access to their clients (and, constrained by Maxwell's equations, those in the parking lot outside) as an added value, while hotels, airline lounges, and soon long distance flights en-route provide access for a fee. With micropayment, your wireless network interface will simply listen for bids of access and choose based on bandwidth and cost, normally accepting the best offer below the cost threshold you set. If it's higher than your threshold, or there's an extreme tradeoff between cost and performance, you may be asked to choose, but usually you'll just light up your laptop, wait a few seconds, and you're online. No mess, no fuss, and it's guaranteed to cost less than your "threshold of paying".
Micropayment and Internet Taxation
According to folklore, Michael Faraday, who discovered the principle of electromagnetic induction in the 1830's, was asked by a British politician to what conceivable use electricity might be put. Faraday replied, "Sir, I do not know what it is good for. But of one thing I am quite certain--someday you will tax it." This quotation is, in all likelihood, a myth, but nonetheless there is truth therein applicable to our times. For electricity, a laboratory curiosity in Faraday's time, was eventually taxed and, in many unfortunate jurisdictions, made a government monopoly or regulated to such an extent it was indistinguishable from one, inevitably becoming scarce, expensive, and unreliable.
Like electricity, the Internet will eventually be taxed. As long as there are governments, this is inescapable. While taxation is never without pain, micropayment can at least eliminate most of the bookkeeping headaches for both merchants and customers, with taxes due for Internet use and commerce collected automatically and remitted electronically to the jurisdiction they are owed to.
Digital Rights Management
Microsoft also warned today that the era of "open computing," the free exchange of digital information that has defined the personal computer industry, is ending.
Microsoft Tries to Explain What Its
by John Markoff, The New York Times, July 24, 2002.
Digital Rig
Wasn't he the wanker that got terminated by one of Arnie's buds in the T movies?
Commercial publishing houses, news media, and other organisations which publish large volumes of information or frequently-changing content (for example, a newspaper's site) may be delegated the authority to act as their own publication registry in the interest of efficiency and quick reaction. This is analogous to commercial broadcast stations which keep their own program logs. As with a program log, the publisher's document registry is subject to audit and must be publicly accessible to verify document certificates and provide notification of new publications. Evidence of abuse of self-registry will result in withdrawal of the privilege.
Truth, and Consequences
It is a well-known fact that no other section of the population avail themselves more readily and speedily of the latest triumphs of science than the criminal class.
Inspector John Bonfield,
Chicago Police Department, 1888
The accountability and security the technologies described in the previous section will provide once fully deployed will put an end to a wide variety of poster child problems of the present day Internet. Here's a brief survey of some of the most obvious,
Does "Computer Crime" Exist?
Every time an egregious crime is committed by means of, or with the assistance of a computer, the chattering classes become abuzz with the challenges posed by "computer crime" and politicians unveil draconian measures to restore law and order on the digital frontier. But does "computer crime" actually exist, and is there a need for extensive new legislation and regulations to come to terms with it? I believe the answer to this question is no, and that whatever adjustments are required are minor definitional changes to already existing laws.
Here's a mental exercise to illustrate this point. Think of some offence which is usually considered to be a "computer crime". Now, see if the very same crime could have been committed without the aid of a computer (albeit, perhaps, with more difficulty or with greater risk to the perpetrator). If this is the case, then the use of a computer is entirely incidental to the crime--if it's a crime without a computer, how does employing a computer to commit it make it any different? If a burglar breaks into a house with the aid of a crowbar, that is not an instance of "crowbar crime" requiring new laws regulating crowbars--it is breaking and entering, already a crime, which can be committed with a wide variety of tools. The worked examples in this section illustrate how, once accountability is present, existing laws suffice to punish misbehaviour on the Internet.
each pitched as I expect it to be toward the constituencies concerned with each problem.
Copyright Violation
Digital Rights Management and Trusted Computing resolve most of the current problems with copyright violation on individual computers, and the Secure Internet will extend these protections to the entire network through document certificates. Copyright holders can monitor newly published documents for violations and, if detected, begin a procedure which will result in the offending document's certificate being revoked, un-publishing it on any machine which has stored a copy and is subsequently connected to the Internet. The added security, plus the ability to make copyright protected documents available under a variety of license terms including pay per view with micropayment, will encourage owners of documents to make them available on the Internet where before they were hesitant due to fear of piracy.
Identity Theft and Fraud
Remember the story about the miscreant who hung a sign on an automatic teller machine that said "Out of order--please use temporary ATM" and set up his own bogus ATM next to it which simply read credit card stripes, recorded PINs, and flashed "Temporarily out of order" on its display? He collected the machine at the end of the day and did the obvious thing with the information it had obtained. That was a crime. Or how about the waiters in restaurants who make an extra
The anti-trust act was an act to curtail the behavior of trusts. Hence, it was an ANTI- trust act.
Good googly moogly, you are amazingly dense!
When forecasting trends in technology and society, it is often easier to predict the destination than estimate the time of arrival. This is certainly the case with a collection of technologies as disparate as those discussed here, deployed across a geometrically growing global network connecting more than a hundred million computers and five hundred million people. Such a large installed base, and the compromises required to keep up with its ongoing growth, create great hysteresis in the system. And yet new technologies can be rapidly adopted; one need only look at broadband to the home or Wi-Fi for examples.
Deployment of Trusted Computing, Digital Rights Management, and the Secure Internet are, by their nature, primarily a "vendor (or government) push" effort rather than "market pull", so matters of strategy on the part of those who wish to see these technologies deployed must be taken into account. It is likely they will be introduced in conjunction with desirable new features which induce customers to accept them. (For example, Version 9 of Microsoft's Windows Media Player incorporates some Digital Rights Management technology, but users upgrade to it not because they're hungry for DRM, but to obtain other features it includes.)
Trusted Computing Deployment
Work is already underway to develop and deploy Trusted Computing systems. In their August 2002 business overview, Microsoft said of their own project, then codenamed "Palladium", since renamed the "Next-Generation Secure Computing Base for Windows":
"Palladium" is a long-term endeavor. The first "Palladium"-enhanced personal computers will not appear on the market for several years, and Microsoft does not foresee widespread adoption for some years after the introduction. However, now is the time to begin planning for--and working on--"Palladium."
BIOS manufacturers are already at work on chipsets to support Trusted Computing operating systems, and hardware manufacturers are designing the "sealed storage" such systems will use to prevent unauthorised access to protected data. As with the roll-out of any technology, it will be a protracted process, probably taking longer than even conservative estimates, and there will doubtless be stumbles and changes in direction along the way. Yet the destination is clearly defined, and the key technological players are investing heavily in the effort to get there. Barring surprises, I expect the overwhelming majority of new computer systems sold in the year 2010 to include Trusted Computing functionality.
Digital Rights Management Deployment
Digital Rights Management deployment is presently underway; current mass market multimedia players are beginning to support various schemes, and as online commercial sales of multimedia content as exemplified by Apple's iTunes Music Store expand, increasingly more secure and restrictive implementations will follow, culminating in the eventual integration of Digital Rights Management with Trusted Computing.
Secure Internet Deployment
A logical point at which one might expect implementation of the Secure Internet to begin in earnest is concurrent with the mass deployment of the IPv6 protocol. Observers of the Internet scene may immediately heave a sigh of relief, since IPv6 is one of those technologies of tomorrow which remains securely anchored in tomorrow no how many tomorrows pass into yesterdays. It is ironic that had IPv6 been aggressively adopted starting in 1995, some of the accountability problems of today's Internet would not have become as serious as they are today (see Appendix 1 for details). Still, there is nothing in the architecture of the Secure Internet as I have described it in this paper which requires IPv6 in any way; should IPv6 be indefinitely delayed or supplanted by a different design, the introduction of the Secure Internet need not be delayed.
The consequences of the Secure Internet will only fully be realised when most machines connected to it incorporate Digital Rights Management and Trusted Computing technology
It seems that nobody knows what Trusted Computing actually will be and some people are using devine methods of defining it. Some people believe that it will be a good thing and define it much as they would define Heaven, others consider it evil and so make it a hell and define it in the same way as some people define hell, as being the sum of your worst fears. I sit on the Hell side of the fence when defining Trusted Computing.
I have yet to encounter an Internet Prognosticator who gets it right about the history of worldwide communication, and the formation of worldwide communities. Ham Radio operators communicated around the world, drove technological advances and formed virtual communities based upon radio communication, throughout much of the 20th century. In addition there were numerous folks who merely "surfed" the shortwave bands with receivers only, partaking of the worldwide shortwave radio "content." My point here is merely that these prognosticators should spend less time trying to prove that the Internet was the first medium to enable these activities, and spend more time on the Internet issues at hand. Art
There is an additional price though, responsiblity.
Unlimited freedom without repsonsibility is equivalent to anarchy, and the net is as close to a functional implementation of anarchy that the world has seen. However, this does not imply that what we have is an ideal. Far from it in fact.
Spam is one immediately obvious result of this freedom. Give yourself a couple minutes and you can think of several other less than desirable outcomes of all this freedom.
By tempering freedoms with responsibility, we can have the free flow of ideas we all have come to expect from the web, but without propogating all those nuisance aspect of the beast.
Unfortunately that means regulation. But regulation is not feasible in the traditional sense. The internet is a global phenomenon, and while some corners of the world act to supress portions of the traffic, by and large the web is a building block of a truly global society.
But a society must have laws to function and sustain itself. In ten short years my own usage patterns have drastically changed, as well as the usages patterns of many of my peers.
Remember the good old days? I remember not having multiple email accounts, or any of a number of other measures I routinely undertake to weed out various garbage I don't want as part of my on-line experience. We've all had to take these measures, to some degree or another.
My question is, is that the way it should be? Is spam and it's unsavoury tribe really an acceptable cost for the freedoms entailed? Most, if not all of us have extreme antipathy to spam. It's the old adage about a right is such only until it infringes on the rights of others. I feel that spam has truly infringed on my web experience, most of us should feel the same way. Even if the measures to avoid it personally are trivial, should the majority who don't want spam have to make such changes to allow safeguard the freedoms of a few individuals who refuse to honor our freedoms?
Regulation is probably inevitable, and in fact is being attempted by governments today. I think this is the bigger concern. If the web is to be regulated, such regulation needs to come from within. The danger is that the regulation will be forced from outside. The reason this will occur is because we have subjugated responsibilites to freedoms. As long as this continues to be the case there will be an increasing impetus to force such regulation on the web. The problem is that the source of such change will be the very people we don't want to make the changes happen. Big business and government.
And it makes sense, why spend money and time and effort dealing with the effects of this (relatively) unabridged freedom with virus scanners, and spam blocking services Et. Al. when the same time and monies and effort can be used to eliminate the problem. For a multinational corporation, it is a relatively trivial exercise to lobby for the legislative changes required. Once that legal environment exists, it becomes easier to implement the rest of your solution. If you can get a couple of your peers to play ball...
I leave the hardest issue for the reader, how do we encourage those who threaten our freedoms with their irresponsible behaviours to behave responsibly?
"Talk minus action equals nothing" - Joey Shithead, D.O.A.
"Talk minus action equals
These sites are working on making the vision of 100 percent document control a reality:
http://www.doi.org/
http://www.handle.net/
John Walker writes more like an ivory tower recluse rather than a man living in social realities. Constitutional right to rpivacy does not exist - well it does, in a sublime way.
1. thy are not allowed to sell thy customers email lists
2. thy cannot turn over purchase records to a third party
3. thy have a right to vote *anonymously*
These are the founding principles on how we keep a check on our government and any other entity which has the power to affect, directly or indirectly our social behavior - in terms of opinion or purchasing habits.
As for freedom of speech during wartime, Walker was so kind to point out a few pertinent facts about the first world war.Seems he forgot about the Vietnam protests.
Yes, as a part of civilization, I am responsible for my actions. But people dont think in isolation, a persons opinion is also subject to his idea of social expectation of an opinion. That, ladies and gentlemen is where the Internet is an Elysian field. You are no longer afraid....
Long live Freenet
Wow, that's quite a scary picture. And while it's admittedly possible that things could turn that way, I'll go out on a limb and say that it's fairly unlikely.
... and a reasonable police officer won't pull you over for doing 68 in a 65. It's just not that big of a deal. Likewise, if someone (God forbid!) decides to install the same copy of Word on two different computers in their house, it's not likely that the FBI will come knocking on their door for a license violation.
Take Digital Rights Management, for instance. People put up with it for a little while, until they try to listen to their songs on something other than their own computer -- then they suddenly realize that DRM in fact sucks donkey ass.
Buying a Palladium-enabled computer will be like buying a car with a top speed of 65 miles per hour. The fact is, everyone bends the law a little bit from time to time
When Joe User runs into stupid problems like "Error! This computer sucks and therefore refuses to play this music file" or "Error! This computer sucks and refuses to allow you to install this program", he'll start getting pissy. He'll tell his friends not to buy any of these "trusted" computers, and pretty soon, everyone's buying computers and software that don't have this sort of crap built in.
This of course won't stop big companies and big government from trying to restrict things, but the chance that they'll succeed is actually fairly small. I don't see DRM ever completely dissappearing from the radar, but I'm gussing that it'll remain what it is right now -- an annoyance.
To be perfectly honest, I'm not worried about Trusted Computing, "The Theory"
I buy most/all of my software (okay...maybe not M$ Office, but I buy all my games), I don't write viruses, and it should make spam a trivial non-issue.
Blah, blah, blah
However, I am in TOTAL agreement with everyone here that TC is a bad idea in "The Implementation", especially in the (over?) paranoid forecasts in its use.
My computer won't run unsigned software - no more viruses
My computer won't run unsigned software - any publisher can create subscriptions (overpriced ones, at that) and revoke the license 10 times a year
My computer won't open unsigned documents - the macros in the spreadsheet won't crash my computer
My computer won't open unsigned documents - this person has written op-ed columns against BigBadCorporation Inc, and they've revoked that person's software certificate so they can't send anything else
We could all go on and on - however, he says in the top of the article that he's not for it! What he says is basically a "Watch out for these kinds of words and messages from your legistators! These are the words with which they will woo you into consent!"
There is no problem that has a magic bullet. Every decision has good and bad, and I'm firmly convinced that the bad with DRM and TC has little to do with the proposed concept, but with a very foreseeable result and that it grossly outweighs the good.
Information used to be passed word-of-mouth, and evolved to cave paintings, the written text, the printing press, etc. etc. etc. and now the Internet as we know it. There is money to be made in keeping the spread of information in a one-to-many structure - scads and scads of cash - and with that as the primary (if not single!) motivation for those implementing DRM, as well as the politicians they influence, we the consumers will fall into the backdrop as a minor inconvenience.
It's quite possible to count packets, and charge for each one. it's fundamental to the technology. It might even improve the internet, by forcing people to use less chatty protocals, and lots more caching at all levels, as well as make people think more carefully about how they use the internet (Think junk mail vs individual usage).
I knew there was something about the idea of "trusted computing" that I didn't like, but this scares me. It's like 1984, but turn the quality of life back a millenium.
For an informed take on Trusted Computing, see this article by Seth Schoen at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Another tired complaint about how NAT is a terrible evil because it breaks badly designed applications.
At one point in history, there were telephone switches that were these big mechanical things that actually made physical links between the wires of the end points.
People could make a call between two phones, then run a fractional T1 over them. Awesome! End to end connectivity! High speed data! No pesky analog-to-digital converter, no wire-to-fiber convert, and all that nonsense. Just raw connectivity.
Perhaps we should go back to the era of mechanical switches, then, as well as getting rid of NAT.
Or maybe people can work on separating their application layers from the network layers properly.
I'll be damned if I'll listed to the opinion of an American who would join the Taliban.
It Is the Nature of Information to Transgress Artificial Boundaries
I trust it not to compute.
I'm sorry. I have a cold.
--- Ban humanity.
Who modded this flamebait? Autodesk is one of the biggest software-lockin whores there is, beyond even Micro$haft. They charge $700 for software to make a simple line drawing that was perfected over a decade ago. (doesn't help that the competition sucks)
bkr,
who still has to bug people to save their DWG files in R13 format...
bush is a gremlin, or a pacer, or a tricked-out Javelin.
Who is that on your wing?
The last paragraph of the article states that the great grand world of Trusted Computing will get rid of spyware. Why? If a commercial company is willing to publically sign code that is spyware, what exactly stops spyware?
I managed to RTFA (most of it, anyway), and I think he's off base in a few areas. For example, he uses firewalling as one part of the liberty-eroding equation, but doesn't seem to realize these two facts:
The problem with having a completely peer-to-peer system anymore is the fact that you have to share it with the lamers, spammers, l33t h8x0rs, script kiddies, and idiots who can't find the "any" key.
The basic problem with the internet is that it is a victim of its own popularity. Something does not get regulated or commercialized until it is popular. It is impossible to return to the days of yore when anything-goes. Take cars, for example. When they first came out, you only needed to be able to afford one to drive it. Just buy one, crank the engine, and off you go, and you could drive anywhere there was level ground. Today (in the US), you have to have a driver's license, mandatory insurance, you must follow the street and highways regulations, speed limits, etc.
I don't disaggree that there is an erosion of liberties happening, I just disagree with some of the reasoning behind it expounded in the article.
Karma: Frotzed (mostly due to the Frobozz Magic Karma Company)
He is not observing, he is saying that all these copy protection schemes will come to be in the future.
He may very well be right, but his argument fails to see opposing arguments (which IMPLIES advocacy) - He does not talk about the trusted computing initiative failing in the future, and because you were probably already convinced that copy protection will be the next big thing you failed to see his bias.
Except there is no Constitutional right to privacy. Penumbrae, vapors, and cumulo-nimbus can be inferred through imagination based on existing parts of the document to imply one, but it just does not exist: one can just as easily make up "implied" parts that negate a "Right to Privacy".
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
the more I do not like them. The big problem I have with a lot of these initiatives is the thought that corporations are getting into the mind set that it is right for them to be able to tell Joe consumer how he may or may not use his own property. If I buy an X-Box and want to take it apart... there is nothing at all wrong with that... you don't have to fix it for me... if I want to try to put a larger hard drive in my TiVo... well it's mine isn't it?My views also extend to media... If I buy a DVD or CD I should be able to listen to it however and whenever I want... Basically ... tinkering/ hacking != distributing un-authorized copies of media.
It's not quite time to start buying up all the high performance non DRM hardware out there yet... but who knows... the way things are shaping up we could see the birth of black market rigs and deckers ala Shadowrun style in 10 or so years...
Have you thought for yourself today?
I recognize that the author is trying to make a "warning" article, but why not add in some serious risks about government and corporate misuse of the information, not like that's never happened before...
Of course another point that is essential to this whole "trusted computing scheme", is trust in the organizations that run it. Trust goes both ways, and given the behaviour of organizations like Verisign, Microsoft, Enron, or the US governments ability to discern illusionary uranium shipments, let alone admit their error etc. I have to seriously ask why I should trust any of them to run this kind of system?
Would I like to not have to deal with spam and all the tons of other benefits that "TCP" systems promote? Hell yes!!! But at what cost? In such a system I could be made into a non-entity with but a few keystrokes, and given that non-entities are likely to be assumed to be criminal, that would likely end up with me in jail or worse... and just what would be my recourse?
3. thy have a right to vote *anonymously*
Hmm... Non-anonymous Internet + Internet Voting == Non-anonymous Voting. Eeep!
Is this a sigs-optional kind of place? 'Cause I am totally down with that if you know what I mean.
...The article was written by a John Walker. Never trust anyone named John Walker if they don't distill whiskey.
Other notable John Walkers:
1) The Walker family spy ring headed by John Walker who spied for the Soviets for 20 years before getting caught.
2) John Walker, aka "Taliban Johnny", who fought for the Taliban in Afghanistan to defend executing people for flying kites.
...and that's the way the cookie crumbles.
I found the article extremely insightful and persuasive, and I would urge everyone to read it carefully. It's important to note that the author is NOT in favor of the hellish "Secure Internet" of the future:
>"Certainly you can't be advocating this!"
>Well, duh . . . of course not! But this is where
>we are going, unless we change course, and soon.
He is absolutely right, and people who say otherwise are burying their heads in the sand. But it is important to realize that we as individuals can have an impact on whether this happens or not, based on our actions. We must act, and act in concert, to protect our freedom.
Our strategy must be to strengthen the countervailing forces that act as a check against the power of the "ownership class" which seeks to recentralize power in their hands. We can do this by building up a community of people who get benefits from the Free Internet, understand those benefits, and are politically organized to resist the coming attacks on the Free Internet.
Encouraging the growth and acceptance of GNU/Linux is a big part of this. Encouraging the growth and acceptance of P2P is another part. Educating the average computer user about his or her rights and freedoms is another part, and organizing ourselves politicalcally is the final and most challenging stage. We have numbers on our side, they have money. What can we do to start? Join the FSF and the EFF.
If we get organized we can prevail. If we don't, the power of the Internet to empower the individual will slip away. The decicion is ours. As Walker concludes:
>That decision will determine whether the long
>dawn of the Internet was, itself, a false dawn,
>or will continue to brighten into a new day for
>humanity.
I think that he's proposing that than every web site add some new micropayment technology/system in order to impement metered site access at $0.001 per page, requiring users to install software and establish a paument relationship with some new party in order to access the site. That's not going to happen, as people have been implementing that same model, with virtually no acceptance, for many years now.
Instead, imagine if the ISP's drove the process. You've already got a billing relationship with them, so it simply turns a fixed cost into a slightly variable cost. They simply count the number of HTTP transactions initiated by their customers to each site (IP address), and the number of transactions initiated by each user. (Note: there's no need to log each transaction, just keep running counts). At the end of the month, they total up the numbers, multiply by $0.001, add the numbers to the month's bill, and mail checks out to all of the web sites that their customers visit (by looking up DNS contact info, and probably filtering out sites with too little traffic to make it worth cutting a check). Or instead of checks, deposit to Paypal, etc.
If people don't want to pay a variable cost, then it could operate like a pool. That is, if they have 100K customers, each puts $1 into a pool, so there's $100K in the pool. Then allocate the pool based on their traffic levels.
Either way, sites could decide to allow or block non-paying users pretty easily, either by enforcing an IP range map (i.e. return all request from non-paying ISP's to a 'please use a cool ISP' page) or by checking for a "flag" in the request. The ISP's could all modify HTTP requests that are "paid for" on the way through the routers by setting some available bit that the site could check for. It's technically messier, but gives sites more control.
Enable 3D printed prosthetics!
I don't know what he is thinking.. but you just redirect all incoming hits on 80 to whatever server is hosting the master webserver and then to whatever individual server as needed. You can host multiple websites from different servers on a single external IP address with NAT ... sheesh I guess this guy doesn't run Linux
(note: Smoothwall firewall, AOLserver virtual hosting and Apache et al)
At least our dystopian future comes with a funky graphic logo to introduce itself.
I think that most people underestimate this problem or are mis-informed about it thanks to all the propaganda floating around. While I do believe that 'trusted' computing in general could be useful, there are too many power hungry people out there who just want to abuse it (ie its biggest proponents). Unfortunately, I have to agree with walker wholeheartedly. The internet WILL slowly grow into something like this as there's too much money involved for it not to be. It is too bad. While anonymity (limited or otherwise) isn't a guaranteed right in the constitution, I'm beginning to think it should be. If anonymity wasn't important, no one would object to having a vid camera in every room of his house, or having GPS devices installed in his car etc etc. The old counter-argument of "if you've got nothing to hide.." doesn't hold up.
In addition, a system like this will always have a back door, somewhere. Who holds the root keys (I'm sorry you can't tell me there won't be any)? How can we 'trust' them? How do we know they won't abuse their power? How do we be sure the keys embedded in various hardware haven't been compromised by the vendors themselves? The more power you give to someone, the more likely it is they'll end up abusing it, either intentionally or accidentally. Sure, you might be granted 'conditional' anonymity, but I submit that that shouldn't be considered anonymity at all.
I'm a big fan of NAT, especially whne properly set up--as we know and as he acknowledges, there's nothing inherent to NAT that breaks the peer-peer model that works so well.
However, what I think he's objecting to comes down to ISP-level firewalls, out of control of the end user. I won't stand for that, but I'm afraid that he's right--it's likely to happen, and most people won't even notice it.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
Pretend I gave a brown-nosing spiel about "adapt or die" and how NAT really "isn't all that bad" just to placate you.
> Or maybe people can work on separating their application layers from the network layers properly.
Any quick tips?
The definitive proof that he didn't write this but it was generated by a script is the use of the word "fora". NO ONE in their right mind uses the word "fora" when they are talking about forums. ;P
Un-news
Missing URL ???
/. lost it... :(
http://www.fourmilab.ch/hackdiet/
I do not know why
Could be a bug.
Trolling using another account since 2005.
Just a reminder:
"Trusted Computing" means that the content owners can trust your computer. Period.
"Trusted Computing" has absolutely nothing to do with the end-user's trust in their computer. (In fact, it's backwards of that -- "Trusted Computing" implies that the end-user is specifically not to be trusted.)
Kudos to Slashdot for using the "Censorship" icon on this article. It's a bold (and welcome) step to start seeing a firm, positive association made between "Trusted Computing" and censorship.
It does exist and is the basis for several rights. Without privacy as a defacto Consitutional right, there is NO reasonable basis to "being secure in their persons" or "protected from illegal search and seizure". If you have no privacy, there can be no objection to me or anyone else searching through your life for whatever reason strikes my fancy (curiosity). Same for government. If you have no right to privacy, there can be no argument against me or anyone else violating the "security of your person" (which doesn't mean/imply right of self-defense which is also not specifically enumerated in the Constitution or Bill of Rights..it doesn't NEED to be stated as it is a natural and human right which is bigger than Constitutional Right).
Many Rights that are specifically enumerated are rendered baseless without an implied and understood right to privacy. I have found that most people who like to say there is no Constitutional right to privacy use this as code to say: It is my business what a woman does in the privacy of her life and with her body and that, damnit, she WILL be a baby incubator whether she likes it or not! My way or the highway!
There is also no Right to Bear Arms, per se. There IS a right to Bear Arms within the context of a "well regulated militia" (which most assuredly does NOT mean a bunch of yahoos getting together in the woods of Michigan and declaring themselves a "militia" so they can fight the "godless gov'mnt and coloreds").
Fess up, what you mean when you say "no right to privacy" is "women are men's property and their bodies to be controlled by the god-fearin' folk."
In Bushworld, they struggle to keep church and state separate in Iraq as they increasingly merge the two in America.
you don't have to worry about other people's problems.
:P
Way to go Mr. Logic.
Time to break out the modem and setup the BBS again
Is that it is SOOO compelling! I even find myself going "would that be so bad?" before I shake myself out of it. I wasn't too worried about this stuff before - now I am, and so should you. Good job writing this monster, now how do we counter it?
I haven't read all of the article yet so bear with me. Just responding to the section on "The Firewalled Consumer" as I come across it. I'd like to get this out before the discussion becomes too old. I'm not above amending my comments so what risk is there to post now? Anyway, you've been warned.
Internet service with blocked or restricted upstream access is what I call 'half' internet service. Needless to say it blows cookies, but it's obvious that most people don't care too much about it. Here are some ideas on how to deal with the issue and (dare I say) make some money in the process.
The general idea is to market free speech as a product. This has already been done to some extent with web blogs but with one fundamental difference. Web blogs are usually offered as a service where the service provider has power over the content. What I propose is to create a preconfigured web server with a content management system (basicly a blog of sorts) built into it. This server could could be plugged into a network just like printer and would be simple enough for any computer user to administrate. As members of a free society most people do value free speech but they are also members of a free capitalist market. Which means it helps if they can purchase something if they are going to 'buy' an idea. No one will value free speech unless they can go next door and brag about how they just bought the best means to express it.
The big question is how do puny mortals bring an idea like this to mass market without the backing of a big hardware company? Because that is what it will take in order for our ISPs to offer 'full' internet service and then for market forces to drive the price down to the point where it eliminates 'half' service. The way the tech industry works is basicly this. Most companies haven't developed the technology they sell they simply copy what others have done first. Sure they all have their clams to fame but most of what they sell is recycled. So more or less it's a me too industry. The reason there are no end user web servers is because no one has proven the concept. Once some one has created a fringe market for the product the big guys will take it and bring it to the main stream.
Lucky the public domain ain't what it used to be. Some how the operating system, web server, CMS, along with everything else you need is available to be sold royalty free. All it needs is a simple setup and administration interface. Burn that stuff into a live CD and you can turn any old computer into a web server. At first it would grow in local market places as Linux geeks and savvy web designers sell the CDs to their clients. People will pay for free software if they lack the drive to obtain it on their own. As people start using it the demand for full internet service will increase. Once the hardware manufacturers hear about they'll start making dedicated devices and full service demand will increase even more.
Eventually more features will be added to the devices like photo and home movie archives. It's easier to post home movies on your own server because space is less expensive and you can upload them locally. Services like that will require a bit of bandwidth so ISPs can offer service upgrades and start to embrace individual hosting instead of resisting it. The problem with broadband today is that it does the same thing that dial-up does, just faster. If broadband clients did something with their upstream then that would add value to the network. ISPs wouldn't have court content owners to offer internet services. The public would create content for each other for free.
Anyway, this is going too long. All I have left to say is, "Get out there and do it!" I'm been working on my Linux skills (n00b) and I already know the customer. (web designer, "Would you like a server with that?") Don't let me beat you to market.
The public will never go for it. You cannot tax air, not beauce it isn't feasible but because it would never be allowed. In the same way, once a perfect implementaion of the copyright and patent system is implemented, it will be annihilated from the law. The reason peopel allow it now is becuase of the many loop holes and imprefrefections inthe present system. If they were removed, people would npo longer waste their time trying to fix the implementation of it and finally start attacking the real cause, the system itself. However, let's say the american public's collective morality (or lack thereof) falls to the point where their love of money outweighed there own ethics. If such a system was implemented, it would not stand for long, not even a decade. With innovation stifled to the point of suffocation one of two things would happen:
1. The majority of people would simply reject the law, much as prohabition was rejected. Laws aren't independent of human beings, they are a social contract between the government and those goverened. If either takes too many liberties, the other acts as a counterbalance to nullify that aggresssion.
2. Another siociety working outside the system, another government or even a group of people who, as the article points out often, have dodged the system by not connecting the computer to the Internet, will have such a significant advantage over those who are enslaved by the systems suffocating rule that the system will have to modify itslef (or in this case self-destruct) in order to compete against them. People live in groups becuase the good accomplished as part of that group outweighs the negatives that that group presents as compared to working alone. Right now I can see a person with two computers: 1 free and 1 enslaved. You use the enslaved one to gather documents and then you set up a private peer to peer local network to place them on the free one (by technological trickery if necessary). Even if those documents are later erased off the enslaved, the free since it is never connected to the interent, only to your enslaved computer at times when it too is not connected ot the interenet, will still maintain those documents to be used as you see fit.
Simply put, ppl will accept the present system but taht does not mean they will also accept an extreme of that system. People will never go for it.
If they do however, what do you think will happen to the traditional media. When you can get pay per view, what will happen to the good old used book. I can smell the stench of gasoline and firemen already.
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
I can't believe that there would actually be something on the internet worth buying. The only reason I have cable is to do something with that fucking TV I bought. That's the last TV I'm ever going to buy. I won't buy computers either if all they're going to be is internet appliances.
now, i have not read thoroughly. i have been skimming through it, and am only half way through it all. but here is one interesting thing i saw:
"As long as you protect your certificate as you would your wallet or credit cards, you're secure and, in the worst case, should your certificate be compromised, you can always revoke it and replace it with another."
much further down the page:
"If an individual wishes to never see E-mail (or other communications: for example instant messages, chat room text, news group and bulletin board postings, etc.) from a given person, they need only press the "Ban" button in their client program whilst reading an offending message: subsequent messages signed by that originator will be silently discarded or ignored. Since all of these media will only accept messages with a valid and verified certificate, filtering based upon it will be absolutely reliable."
what i do not understand is at what point it is not only illegal, but also impossible for spammers to revoke their certificates and get new ones, when anybody else may do so at will?
interesting rant, of course. some good thinking in it. some bad thinking is in there, as well. some flatly self-defeating logic appears to be there. can anybody find any other instances of this sort of thing?
i believe the only way this sort of "secure internet" will ever be provided is if the existing infrastructure is ignored, and an entirely new one is created. the problems with that (myriad though they are) include such sticky bits as the consideration that they will likely all require microsoft windows to access. while fine for the masses, i suspect that this sort of attempt to police the internet will not be greeted warmly by the national community, which (by and large) will prefer to remain on a heterogenous network that does not offer unquestioning trust to american businesses or government institutions.
certainly, there could be more than windows as a "trusted computing" platform, but realistically, only americans appear to not care for their freedoms. i see no reason to suspect that china will jump on this bandwagon just because it has a bit of backing in the usa. i also do not think australia, germany, france, russia (etc., the list goes on) will kotow to the american idea of a "secure internet."
our hacks and hobbles may gain ground in the states in the short term, but in the long term, they will serve only to fragment and divide the internet. you cannot paste something like this to an existing infrastructure and just expect everybody to adopt it. the only way it will ever succeed is if it is intended as a complete *replacement* for the internet, which (as i have just said) will give it even a chance of making it anyway.
cha-ching! $0.02
Congratulations! You want a bagel or somethin'?
"Some of the prognostications and conclusions reached may not be palatable to Slashdot readers."
Most Slashdot readers won't bother reading the article yet will still hold forth adamant opinions on the matter, quotes too!
************************
What, me worry?
Why was this:
Some of the prognostications and conclusions reached may not be palatable to Slashdot readers.
quoted from the original contributor? The article itself, meanwhile, states:
"Certainly you can't be advocating this!"
Well, duh . . . of course not!
So, apart from questioning the need for a disclaimer toward an audience of individual minds that considers themselves to be free and critical minds (well, part of us at least then), I'd like to ask what elements in the article might not be palatable; John Walker (for those who have not read the actual article) very clearly states this is his view of the future, not his own wish for the future, especially here:
In this document I will provide a road map of precisely how I believe that could be done, potentially setting the stage for an authoritarian political and intellectual dark age global in scope and self-perpetuating, a disempowerment of the individual which extinguishes the very innovation and diversity of thought which have brought down so many tyrannies in the past.
You can disagree with his theory that things will turn out this way, and history will surely tell us in the future how his predictions stand the test of time.
You could hardly call this work unpalatable, unless you read it the wrong way. In that respect, the article is never really clear on exact point of view of the author on each subject he glosses over, but careful reading certainly makes it more palatable.
JeR
restricting access to the internet would be like restricting access to our highway system.
umm... they already do that. It's called a "driver's license". Not a perfectly secure system, but it's effective enough.
The only way to stop this process is for consumers to adopt, on a large scale, the kind of technology that will be made impossible by the "trusted computing" technologies. Digital video recorders like Tivo are the best example of this. If a huge preponderance of television owners become accustomed to conveniences like commercial skipping and saving shows to watch later they will revolt en masse with the vehemence of the do-not-call list when tentacles of the content providers via DRM remove these features. If such a thing never occurs before trusted computing is ubiquitous then I think we'll see the old frog in the slowly warming pot of water problem and be stuck with it.
Syntax error: loose != lose, affect != effect, then!=than
But it is a stretch to conjure this "right" when it is not in the constutition.
"There is also no Right to Bear Arms, per se"
It is referred to explicitly: a right to keep and bear arms. Not so with privacy.
"I have found that most people who like to say there is no Constitutional right to privacy use this as code to say:"
Shows the kind of mistakes you make when you put words into someone's mouth and judge them on what you wish they said instead of what they said. As for me, you could not be more wrong: to me, it is code to say that this right is needed and it is bad that it is not there.
Stretching things such as "being secure in their persons" or "protected from illegal search and seizure" beyond their meaning still does nothing at all about protecting your privacy if a company wants to sell personal data it has on you (it already has the info: no illegal search; and the data is in its repositories well-clear of your person at this point). It can help with privacy in your home, but not very far beyond that.
However, you misunderstand me beyond the statement of this fact. I wish there were a right to privacy: it would be a great idea for an amendment. Since there is no right to privacy, government and corporations and others run roughshod over privacy.
"Fess up, what you mean when you say "no right to privacy" is "women are men's property and their bodies to be controlled by the god-fearin' folk.""
If I were against privacy for these reasons, I'd actually probably be for it so I could marry my sister and live in a Montana shack in peace.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
I found one sentence in his article that really summed up his whole problem - the problem with copyright isn't the concept but rather its granularity
That is simply false and not true to history. For example, it is a good thing that the letter U is not owned by anybody. It is not a matter of a fair and equitable price, even if the royality is one one millionth of a cent, it would be unjust. It is not a matter of who created it, or what their incentive is - and a failure to understand such is a failure to understand what truely drives the internet and the information age today.
The simple fact is that sharing information has an intrinsic value to those who create it as much as those who consume it. And when you restrict someone from sharing content, even if it is a miniscule restriction, then you are violating them even if it is a miniscule violation.
The funny thing is the way the "Trusted Computing Initiative" is actually the reverse of what it says. It isn't to help you. It is to lock in all your media and documents to force you into a subscription model of paying for things that you only pay for once now. It is to put a DMCA fence around all your music, your own documents, the programs you use, the games you play and your video that you have paid for and uptil now have had the right of first sale on. Apple is already trying to restrict people from selling the music they have bought and paid for at the iMac store from selling to someone else. They just want to make it physically impossible for you to do so with the very technology that you pay for to be put into your house.
The thing that is chilling about this trend to me is that it makes people who tinker and hack up mechanical and electric systems criminals. At some point opening the cover for your own computer is going to be a crime if we keep heading down this slippery slope.
The name reminds me of the "news speak" they use in the novel 1984 by George Orwell.
Another scarey resemblence between 1984 and real life is the never ending war against "the enemy" that the goverment uses to pursue it's enemies both foreign and domestic. Remind you of any countries? But don't worry, "Big Dubya..." errr I mean "Big Brother" will protect you.
Is this guy always so long-winded? I couldn't get half-way through it before my eyes began to bleed.
You are all fartheads.
Right now, the Internet stifles artists because writers have a medium that does not allow them to collect money for their content. Anyone can copy a web page or even an ebook.
But, if there was a mechanism for safely charging for web content, then, suddenly a real independent publishing would emerge. The makers of the trusted software would want everyone to buy it, so, everyone would become or could become a trusted document author.
I used to be in favor of anonymity on the Internet. Now, I'm dead against, so long as everyone's identity is always known. That is, the government might know my messages, but I, or actually -we-, would know the identities of every person working in the government.
History has shown, time and time again, where institutions and cultures are more transparent, society is better off. I think people need to learn for themselves to rise above their perceptions of what they need to be. You have to stand for something.
Already you see in corporate America the trend to put the "identity" genie back into the bottle. You routinely get corporations trying to cut back on email, cut back on archiving of email. These are not initiatives to save disk space. These are initiatives to subvert the truth and hide things.
Let them make an Internet that audits all communication. Let them make it so that it is technologically impossible to impersonate anyone and that no man may hide. Governments will fall, before the citizenry is oppressed.
You cannot have a dictatorship without lies.
This is my sig.
Let's see, a central server, users connect to exchange addresses, they talk peer to peer.
This is my sig.
finally... what? Gay?
So you're finally gay. Congratulations. You've joined the FP club (faggot posters).
Fuck Beta. Fuck Dice
PGP and SSL is not what "trusted computing" is all about. The word "trusted" here is closer to the meaning we used in DoD, i.e. the system or component is considered "trusted" if it is able to violate the security policy. It may seem strange at first but is actually very logical. I don't have to trust someone who can't betray me anyway.
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
No thanks; I'm staying away from simple carbs.
Joe
http://www.joegrossberg.com
Another tired complaint about how NAT is a terrible evil because it breaks badly designed applications.
NAT breaks apache. And IIS too. You call them "badly-designed applications"?
How insightful. Clearly because I participate in an amusing Slashdot tradition, it means I like cock instead of pussy. Someone mod this guy up to Score:5, Insightful.
At least you had the balls to attach your nickname to your homophobic posturing.
P.S. If you hate stupid comments so much, then why are you reading at Threshold (-1)? So you can't miss an opportunity to be cool?
Joe
http://www.joegrossberg.com
I know someone who mailed autodesk to find out if they have any plans to release a Linux version.
Answer was no basically so Autodesk have no reason to care if Linux lives or dies as they are betting on Windows for their income. I 'spose it saves them from having to do a port and they will no doubt be biased to MS in their media appearances.
Hmmmmmm..... Deep fried and look like Squirrel.
If the shoe fits, yes.
IP addresses are network layer information. URLs are application level information. If the applications are dependent upon the IP address information, then this is going to break during any IPv4/IPv6 NAT, too. (This is not a matter of native applicaton IPv6 support being needed, but that if the server is on one address version and the client the other going through a NAT between the networks.) (Actually, that there are compile time flags for IPv6 support suggests a lack of modularity -- the application is too tightly coupled to the network, where the network access should be presented through a system library/API that hides the transport layer -- be it Bluetooth, ATM, celluar data, SMS, or whatever.)
Should Apache break just because I replace my ethernet cable with a wireless ethernet link? My 10-Base-T connection with Gig Ethernet? Or even, heaven forbid, change my MAC address? Should I need to include any of that in my Apache config? Why should IP addresses matter, then? From an application level, it should be all hostnames and URLs. Unfortunately, it is not a perfect world -- and we have to sometimes live with badly-designed solutions.
I assumed "Trusted Computing" was in response to the dot.com bust, creating a down stream media (content) delivery system which will eventually be metered and maximized for profitability which fits the profile of a few contributers around the world. Most issues "Trusted Computing" addresses (from a commercial sense) can be done through my ISP-such as secure content delivery, DRM and fair use, so on.
Trusted Computing can/will remove functionality of PC's.
Trusted Computing will put an extreme amount of influence/power in very few hands (not elected, but unresponsable corporations, with mergers and softening regulations on monopolies the outcome is obvious). I tend to believe trusted computing is a cash grab, I tend to think trusted computing has little to do with the concerns addresses and more to do with creating a foundation for technology/intelligence for the next century. I tend to believe much of the driving force behind the push comes from spammer/telemarketer mentality and control freaks.
"Measured relatively, this individual empowerment comes at the expense of the power of governments and large commercial enterprises, reversing a trend toward concentration of power more than a century old which has acted to reduce free citizens and productive individuals to subjects and consumers."
The problem with the above statement is that it assumes the Internet can somehow magically fix problems with the political-social climate. The internet, like television, radio, telephone, etc., is a communication network. In a free society, the only restrictions are practical, based on limited resources. In a controlled society, the restrictions are whatever the govt feels like imposing. For instance, in N. Korea, only the govt broadcasts tv, and your tv is specifically designed to only allow you to tune in the govt. stations. In most countries that are somewhat free, the only restritions on tv broadcast relate to the fact that the bandwidth is limited. There are also obscenity laws depending on the level of censorship, which is why I use the term mostly-free. If you apply this trend to the internet what you find is that as the internet evolves, in free societies, there will still be a free exchange of information. The restrictions you see will involve only content that you don't own the copyright to, or is in some way illegal (child pornography, for instance). Micropayments will only be charged by sites that feel their content is worth the money. Personal identification won't be necessary unless one of the parties insists, at which point the other party can go elsewhaere. Of course in a controlled society, they will use internet tools like TCP to clamp down, but they already block content anyway. My point is, the internet, in any form, can't create freedom if the govt. doesn't want people to have that freedom. They'll simply block the content. Also, I thought the attack on business was somewhat misinformed. In a truly free society, businesses can only offer goods and services, which individuals can accept or refuse. Even in mostly free societies, however, any number of interests can influence govts. to strip people of their freedoms. I don't know why the author singled out big business, since many groups use their influence with the govt. to abuse freedom.
Vote for Pedro
IP addresses are network layer information. URLs are application level information.
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You seem to be completely missing the point
I just mentioned out Apache and IIS as big examples, but in reality, every Internet application is broken by NAT. I can't think of one major TCP/IP program that would work correctly if all computers in the world were NATted. Since universal NAT would destroy the internet, it follows that partial NAT is damaging to it (or so the reasoning goes)
You might respond, "But that's not what I was talking about". True. However, that's what Walker's article was all about. Your complain of "NAT bashing" was apparently a knee-jerk reaction, with no basis on having read the story.
The idea of have digitally-signed certificates for all this dynamic data just aint gonna work. In principle, by restricting us to a very static and primitive state of the Internet and asssociated hardware (mostly like we have now), a big-brother kind of system might be possible. But the rapid develpment of hardware and software is just too much of a moving target - there is no way that the technology is going to stand still long enough for it all to be monitored and validated. And that is most likely both a good and a bad thing.
mhack
Building a better ribosome since 1997
"pant, pant... whew... finally... acheived... gay"
Try delivering my post in a straight, candid monotone, without giggling.
Pure gold, chum.
I just love to harass those people who give in to first posts, reply to "nigger/goatse/editors-related" crapfloods, etc. and I'll waste my karma doing it.
Fuck Beta. Fuck Dice
I can't think of one major TCP/IP program that would work correctly if all computers in the world were NATted. Since universal NAT would destroy the internet, it follows that partial NAT is damaging to it (or so the reasoning goes)
I can't think of one country that would survive if all the people in it were male, therefore, having a partially male population must be bad for the survival of the country.
It's poor reasoning.
The analysis is pretty complete, but where this article fails is not providing a counter analysis of how the evils of TC / DRM / closed internet / etc. can be fought. For every mis-use of the technology, there is a means to subvert it with a superior alternative. For example:
- Firewalled commercial internet access can be fought with community networks and co-ops, especially wireless. If a feasible ultra-wideband technology ever matures and is commercialized, the entire communications landscape will change seemingly overnight. Also, anything that promotes strong competition in the broadband access industry will make lack of restrictions (NAT) more of a selling point.
- DRM schemes can be fought by eliminating software monopolies. DRM cannot be implemented widespread without either monopoly power or government intervention. Practically speaking, this means using, supporting, and developing only Open Source software. Who will buy MS Office 200x with DRM if OpenOffice is just as good, is free, and becomes the dominant "business document" format.
- Personal ID certificates can be accomplished using standard PKI, certificate authorities, biometrics, etc. There is absolutely no need for DRM in the BIOS and operating system, nor any bizarre "secure internet" where only "trusted" data may pass. In fact, since DRM is *always* security through obscurity (black boxes), a truly open solution is far more secure anyhow. Please note that I am not advocating the use of personal ID for anything other than need-to-know scenarios.. financial transactions, contracts, etc.
My computer won't run unsigned software - no more viruses
Incorrect. One of the main selling points of Trusted Computing is that ALL old software will still run on the new machines. Anything old computers can do the new computers can do. That includes getting infected by viruses. And those viruses are still perfectly capable of slagging your entire harddrive.
Well, actually Trusted Computing can do one thing, your music files will be encrypted and unreadable. The virus can scramble or delete the music, but it won't be able to "steal" it. Yipee!
My computer won't open unsigned documents - the macros in the spreadsheet won't crash my computer
Incorrect, macros are a normal part of the file. Trusted Computing and macros will be competely invisible to each other. The effect of Trusted Computing is that only Microsoft Word can read and write Word files. A Microsoft Word macro virus "lives" inside a normal Word file. Trusted Computing does not interfere when Word opens a Word file (even if it is infected). The virus then tells Microsoft Word what to do, and again Trusted Computing does not interfere when Word reads/writes Word files.
Well, Trusted computing will do one thing. If you have a copy of someone else's locked word file you won't be able to open it at all even if it doen't have a virus. Yipee! Besides, you can have locked unreadable files with plain encryption.
I'm firmly convinced that the bad with DRM and TC has little to do with the proposed concept, but with a very foreseeable result and that it grossly outweighs the good.
Actually there IS a way to get 100% of the (minimal) benefits while eliminating EVERY possible abuse (including DRM). The Trusted Computing hardware is perfecly fine with one exception - the owner is forbidden from knowing his own "master key" hidden in the hardware. If the ower were allowed to know his own key you lose NONE of the benefits, but he would then have total control over his computer. He could unlock any file making DRM useless.
Of course they'd never spend this enormous amount of money developing this (mostly worthless) new hardware if DRM didn't work on it. They simply refuse to give you the (minimal) benefits (bait) without without the DRM (nasty fishhook).
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.