In Corporatism the powers of law enforcement are merged with the interests of large corporations. They are now just two sides of the same pervasive-surveillance coin.
They may both be fine for representing the same physical amount, but 0.999... and 1 differ as numbers in a very obvious way: The former repeats endlessly while the latter is static and has a completely stable meaning.
"Dear sirs, we are a large corporation with loads of cash and/or a large government and we need you to unlock some expired photos for our (innovation | life-saving charity | anti-terrorism | anti-CP | etc)..."
Without a "legal entity" in charge they can just block it.
I don't agree:
First, that's like saying P2P is illegal. And individuals are proper legal entities that can communicate between themselves just fine, thanks.
Second, you can't just block it from a technical standpoint unless you block everything that looks like encryption. That's not gonna fly.
Third, they haven't blocked Tor yet, and I2P is basically just a faster, decentralized cousin of Tor.
A plain VPN doesn't work because it doesn't scale to millions of users and can't attract services that would only be useful with a large user base. Also, plain VPNs don't mask your identity so any infiltration of the network would leave the users open to scrutiny.
I think we can provide a VPN like tunneling service across the public Internet over to a private network. Most corporations already do this for their employees. Getting that last mile has always been the hard part.
See I2P link below. It's completely decentralized so even if the creators wanted to compromise it, they couldn't. Addresses cannot be censored and end-to-end security is assured (unless you are using an outproxy to access regular Internet sites).
It isn't a speed-demon but its much faster than Tor and its friendly to P2P and general-purpose traffic.
You can do some things like create a large-scale VPN of some kind, but at the end of the day you're still going to be vulnerable to at least liberal of QoS traffic shaping, not to mention that you'll still have to have some sort of certificate authorities that are centralized.
I've been running I2P for a while now and it works nicely as an "Anonymous Privacy Network". No one can censor you if you publish your address, because addresses are a public key that is randomly generated when installing the software and because I2P is extremely decentralized (someone could decide to censor your key, but the rest of the network would not comply). Having to move to a different uplink or having your IP address blocked will not affect your reachability.
As for "traffic shaping", all I2P traffic looks like encrypted streams, so the ISP is only left with the option of whether they should discriminate against encrypted traffic and doing so could land the ISP in hot water.
Either way, they had to either put something in there physically or upload some software. They can't just switch any phone's mic on.
They can do it with any reprogrammable phone.
BTW, you're a moron if you think FBI agents would try to physically modify and add to the electronics of today's ultra compact cell phones.
Verizon's response to a press inquiry on that case was that it "works closely with law enforcement and public safety officials. When presented with legally authorized orders, we assist law enforcement in every way possible." And its software updates, NOT hardware, that are possible.
...about protecting the consumer from computer theft, they would target the HD and RAM (where data is held). "Security RAM" that instantly self-erases when it is disturbed could be a beneficial feature for some.
Instead, the only significant thing Intel's new feature does is give the US government a channel for denying powerful CPUs to its enemies during a conflict.
This was the first thing that occurred to me. Its probably no coincidence that China recently surpassed the US in supercomputer rankings. Then again, computers have been used against the US government in other ways recently.
I'd be worried that this new feature would be used against anyone not aligned with US government ad corporate interests.
The FBI appears to have begun using a novel form of electronic surveillance in criminal investigations: remotely activating a mobile phone's microphone and using it to eavesdrop on nearby conversations.
The technique is called a "roving bug," and was approved by top U.S. Department of Justice officials for use against members of a New York organized crime family who were wary of conventional surveillance techniques such as tailing a suspect or wiretapping him.
Nextel cell phones owned by two alleged mobsters, John Ardito and his attorney Peter Peluso, were used by the FBI to listen in on nearby conversations. The FBI views Ardito as one of the most powerful men in the Genovese family, a major part of the national Mafia.
Cellular carriers will remotely update the firmware of a smartphone by government request in order to turn your apparently inactive phone into an active microphone.
Your ISP cannot tell who you are connecting to if you use an anonymizing proxy. And with some anon networks like I2P, the ISP may not know you are using an anonymizer at all.
But they can't tell if you're connected to them through an anonymizing proxy. And with some proxies, the watcher can't even tell you're using an anonymizer.
Its one thing to charge per MB, quite another to be a company like AT&T and add surcharges specifically for using Skype or other competing services like video downloads.
I wonder what kind of reaction they'd get if they proposed a surcharge for using the iTunes store.
I suppose that's a downside for some people. But I find it runs well on a used mini-PC (which is probably the best kind of home server to have anyway).
...or something a lot like it. Ive been using I2P for over a year and the more censorship and surveillance fiascos I see in the news the more invaluable it seems.
1. 'The issue is due process.'
What about coping with an absence of due process? What about communicating and organizing around the need for due process? You need a way around centralized control in the first place in order to bring pressure to bear and undermine establishment false propaganda.
2. 'DNS is being abused and IP addresses blocked'
Some anonymous networks like I2P overlay a virtual mesh topology over the Internet's topology of centralized control points. Each I2P node employs onion-like routing and uses public keys as addresses. Though the popular DNS services on I2P could censor domains, access to the addresses cannot be blocked (and its easy to change to a different DNS provider anyway)... plus even physical eviction from a real-world uplink and IP address cannot make you give up your I2P key address (you always keep your same I2P identity until you alone erase/replace your key).
3. 'A certificate cartel is abusing their power'
See #2 above. On a net like I2P, your net address is a crypto-verified identity as well. A side-benefit is that all links (except proxies leading outside the I2P net) are secure.
4. 'Use Freenet'
Freenet tends to lack in speed and in the types of applications you can use it for. I2P is like an anonymized Internet, flexible and relatively quick. Also see this post that contrasts Tor with I2P.
5. 'Use P2P DNS'
If the P2P DNS project believes a central authority is required for their vision, then they can still be taken out by a government or small group of governments. OTOH, their central authority over I2P could be a nice backup to the simple and switchable I2P DNS.
Further, even sites and users that have been removed from I2P's usual DNS sites can still participate in P2P applications like bittorrent.
Freenet was never fast enough to be usable for me.
The datastore is there for I2P, its just not built in yet. I like I2P's underlying concept better, because it can be easily put to other uses like chat, email, etc.
1) It weren't centralized. Tor can be taken down with coordinated action against its auth servers by a handful of governments. 2) It was faster. Tor was basically only intended for web pages, and simple ones at that. It chokes on large multimedia stuff. 3) It weren't anti-P2P... which should be a big no-no in any activists book. 4) It could offer some kind of automatic redundancy/mirroring.
Tor is starting to look antiquated / inadequate because it was designed based on assumptions from 1999.
I suggest you try I2P at the link below where you can get access to anything Wikileaks has published, anonymously and relatively quickly.
Um, as someone with an activist background, I should inform you that the CIA makes it its business to infiltrate even tiny and toothless organizations at least temporarily. And to do that they simply join the groups in question and do the work.
For an org like Wikileaks however, there's no way I can see how the CIA could possibly avoid it and you'd have to be out of your mind to assume they would resist their urge to do so.
As for the Daily Mail link, any paper that is less credible on the subject of Iraq WMD than the NY Times (which was an Iraq war cheerleader) has zero credibility on a story like this, IMO.
Like marcosdumay stated, MS can inject code into any Internet-connected Windows system virtually at will.
Ultimately, they are no different from any American corporation like Verizon or AT&T who routinely inject surveillance changes into people's smartphones to turn them into traveling microphones without the user knowing.
They only care about privacy for corporations and the people who run them, and they don't give a damn about consumer privacy anymore.
Good question. The i2p2.de domain is the original one, and geti2p.net is the new more user-friendly one. However the forum only exists on the old domain (and within the I2P network) at this point so I had to use that for the announce link.
It is not exactly rare for a software project to have more than one domain, and this is one of those cases. You will see both domains in the forum discussions and announcements, and I would think someone would have posted a very serious warning on one of the sites if the other domain was fake.
Use a distribution mechanism that, while it takes a bit more effort to get to work, allows untraceable unattackable, unaccountable distribution of the content.
Slashdot Mirror
In Corporatism the powers of law enforcement are merged with the interests of large corporations. They are now just two sides of the same pervasive-surveillance coin.
They may both be fine for representing the same physical amount, but 0.999... and 1 differ as numbers in a very obvious way: The former repeats endlessly while the latter is static and has a completely stable meaning.
"Dear sirs, we are a large corporation with loads of cash and/or a large government and we need you to unlock some expired photos for our (innovation | life-saving charity | anti-terrorism | anti-CP | etc)..."
So YOU pay the $100,000 licensing fee so I can start my 3-person software project.
Seems like there are barriers to entry being erected on the new corporate bandwagon of "openness".
Without a "legal entity" in charge they can just block it.
I don't agree:
First, that's like saying P2P is illegal. And individuals are proper legal entities that can communicate between themselves just fine, thanks.
Second, you can't just block it from a technical standpoint unless you block everything that looks like encryption. That's not gonna fly.
Third, they haven't blocked Tor yet, and I2P is basically just a faster, decentralized cousin of Tor.
A plain VPN doesn't work because it doesn't scale to millions of users and can't attract services that would only be useful with a large user base. Also, plain VPNs don't mask your identity so any infiltration of the network would leave the users open to scrutiny.
I think we can provide a VPN like tunneling service across the public Internet over to a private network. Most corporations already do this for their employees.
Getting that last mile has always been the hard part.
See I2P link below. It's completely decentralized so even if the creators wanted to compromise it, they couldn't. Addresses cannot be censored and end-to-end security is assured (unless you are using an outproxy to access regular Internet sites).
It isn't a speed-demon but its much faster than Tor and its friendly to P2P and general-purpose traffic.
You can do some things like create a large-scale VPN of some kind, but at the end of the day you're still going to be vulnerable to at least liberal of QoS traffic shaping, not to mention that you'll still have to have some sort of certificate authorities that are centralized.
I've been running I2P for a while now and it works nicely as an "Anonymous Privacy Network". No one can censor you if you publish your address, because addresses are a public key that is randomly generated when installing the software and because I2P is extremely decentralized (someone could decide to censor your key, but the rest of the network would not comply). Having to move to a different uplink or having your IP address blocked will not affect your reachability.
As for "traffic shaping", all I2P traffic looks like encrypted streams, so the ISP is only left with the option of whether they should discriminate against encrypted traffic and doing so could land the ISP in hot water.
Either way, they had to either put something in there physically or upload some software. They can't just switch any phone's mic on.
They can do it with any reprogrammable phone.
BTW, you're a moron if you think FBI agents would try to physically modify and add to the electronics
of today's ultra compact cell phones.
Verizon's response to a press inquiry on that case was that it "works closely with law enforcement and public safety officials. When presented with legally authorized orders, we assist law enforcement in every way possible." And its software updates, NOT hardware, that are possible.
...about protecting the consumer from computer theft, they would target the HD and RAM (where data is held). "Security RAM" that instantly self-erases when it is disturbed could be a beneficial feature for some.
Instead, the only significant thing Intel's new feature does is give the US government a channel for denying powerful CPUs to its enemies during a conflict.
This was the first thing that occurred to me. Its probably no coincidence that China recently surpassed the US in supercomputer rankings. Then again, computers have been used against the US government in other ways recently.
I'd be worried that this new feature would be used against anyone not aligned with US government ad corporate interests.
This is public knowledge since 2006:
The FBI appears to have begun using a novel form of electronic surveillance in criminal investigations: remotely activating a mobile phone's microphone and using it to eavesdrop on nearby conversations.
The technique is called a "roving bug," and was approved by top U.S. Department of Justice officials for use against members of a New York organized crime family who were wary of conventional surveillance techniques such as tailing a suspect or wiretapping him.
Nextel cell phones owned by two alleged mobsters, John Ardito and his attorney Peter Peluso, were used by the FBI to listen in on nearby conversations. The FBI views Ardito as one of the most powerful men in the Genovese family, a major part of the national Mafia.
http://news.com.com/FBI+taps+cell+phone+mic+as+eavesdropping+tool/2100-1029_3-6140191.html
Cellular carriers will remotely update the firmware of a smartphone by government request in order to turn your apparently inactive phone into an active microphone.
Maybe you misunderstood me, or I was too vague.
Your ISP cannot tell who you are connecting to if you use an anonymizing proxy. And with some anon networks like I2P, the ISP may not know you are using an anonymizer at all.
But they can't tell if you're connected to them through an anonymizing proxy. And with some proxies, the watcher can't even tell you're using an anonymizer.
...for all sites, for reasons that are obvious in this discussion. Using anonymizing networks would be even better for some applications.
Its one thing to charge per MB, quite another to be a company like AT&T and add surcharges specifically for using Skype or other competing services like video downloads.
I wonder what kind of reaction they'd get if they proposed a surcharge for using the iTunes store.
I suppose that's a downside for some people. But I find it runs well on a used mini-PC (which is probably the best kind of home server to have anyway).
...or something a lot like it. Ive been using I2P for over a year and the more censorship and surveillance fiascos I see in the news the more invaluable it seems.
1. 'The issue is due process.'
What about coping with an absence of due process? What about communicating and organizing around the need for due process? You need a way around centralized control in the first place in order to bring pressure to bear and undermine establishment false propaganda.
2. 'DNS is being abused and IP addresses blocked'
Some anonymous networks like I2P overlay a virtual mesh topology over the Internet's topology of centralized control points. Each I2P node employs onion-like routing and uses public keys as addresses. Though the popular DNS services on I2P could censor domains, access to the addresses cannot be blocked (and its easy to change to a different DNS provider anyway)... plus even physical eviction from a real-world uplink and IP address cannot make you give up your I2P key address (you always keep your same I2P identity until you alone erase/replace your key).
3. 'A certificate cartel is abusing their power'
See #2 above. On a net like I2P, your net address is a crypto-verified identity as well. A side-benefit is that all links (except proxies leading outside the I2P net) are secure.
4. 'Use Freenet'
Freenet tends to lack in speed and in the types of applications you can use it for. I2P is like an anonymized Internet, flexible and relatively quick. Also see this post that contrasts Tor with I2P.
5. 'Use P2P DNS'
If the P2P DNS project believes a central authority is required for their vision, then they can still be taken out by a government or small group of governments. OTOH, their central authority over I2P could be a nice backup to the simple and switchable I2P DNS.
Further, even sites and users that have been removed from I2P's usual DNS sites can still participate in P2P applications like bittorrent.
Freenet was never fast enough to be usable for me.
The datastore is there for I2P, its just not built in yet. I like I2P's underlying concept better, because it can be easily put to other uses like chat, email, etc.
1) It weren't centralized. Tor can be taken down with coordinated action against its auth servers by a handful of governments.
2) It was faster. Tor was basically only intended for web pages, and simple ones at that. It chokes on large multimedia stuff.
3) It weren't anti-P2P... which should be a big no-no in any activists book.
4) It could offer some kind of automatic redundancy/mirroring.
Tor is starting to look antiquated / inadequate because it was designed based on assumptions from 1999.
I suggest you try I2P at the link below where you can get access to anything Wikileaks has published, anonymously and relatively quickly.
Um, as someone with an activist background, I should inform you that the CIA makes it its business to infiltrate even tiny and toothless organizations at least temporarily. And to do that they simply join the groups in question and do the work.
For an org like Wikileaks however, there's no way I can see how the CIA could possibly avoid it and you'd have to be out of your mind to assume they would resist their urge to do so.
As for the Daily Mail link, any paper that is less credible on the subject of Iraq WMD than the NY Times (which was an Iraq war cheerleader) has zero credibility on a story like this, IMO.
My understanding is they lost that domain because someone left the project.
Like marcosdumay stated, MS can inject code into any Internet-connected Windows system virtually at will.
Ultimately, they are no different from any American corporation like Verizon or AT&T who routinely inject surveillance changes into people's smartphones to turn them into traveling microphones without the user knowing.
They only care about privacy for corporations and the people who run them, and they don't give a damn about consumer privacy anymore.
Good question. The i2p2.de domain is the original one, and geti2p.net is the new more user-friendly one. However the forum only exists on the old domain (and within the I2P network) at this point so I had to use that for the announce link.
It is not exactly rare for a software project to have more than one domain, and this is one of those cases. You will see both domains in the forum discussions and announcements, and I would think someone would have posted a very serious warning on one of the sites if the other domain was fake.
I got the key from a foreign proxy and it matches the one I got earlier. ...... Anyone else??
Use a distribution mechanism that, while it takes a bit more effort to get to work, allows untraceable unattackable, unaccountable distribution of the content.
See this post: http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1896338&cid=34448224