Defending Free Speech and Liberty

Cheers for John Gilmore in his defense of free speech and liberty! The
Net.Nazi who apparently criticized him for inappropriate use of the Net
clearly understands neither the nature of free exchange of ideas nor the
relative innocuousness of Murdering Thug's article on viruses.

Thug's article on polymorphic viruses was factual and made some good
points, and certainly was not very controversial. And even if it was
controversial, so what? Frankly, Thug's article was pretty tame (no
offense, Thug...a lot of our postings are pretty tame). I've seen more
details elsewhere on the Dark Avenger Mutation Engine, so big deal! 

(The "virus construction kit" idea was also recently the subject of an
article in one of the trade rags, and I recall Steve Gibson writing at
least two fairly alarmist and detailed articles on polymorphic viruses for
"Infoworld." And the trade journal "Computers and Security" has extensive
coverage of all of these virus technologies.)

As with so many things that the cop and spy mentalities want kept secret
from the riffraff, who gains by keeping the secrets? The Bulgarian virus
writers (could this whole "Bulgarian" thing be just part of the propaganda
campaign by the SPA and GoreTechs to ensure a "safe" network, a la NREN?
Just a thought.) certainly will be a lot more current than casual readers
of a brief article.

If discussion of viruses is discouraged--or even banned--who will benefit?
Ordinary citizens will be kept in the dark, while the virus guys at Los
Alamos and the Army Center for Signal Warfare (Vint Hill Station, VA) will
continue to let out contracts for virus warfare to MITRE and their ilk,
while bogus stories get out (like the supposed viruses planted in equipment
bound for Iraq just before the war started), and while the supposed "good
guys" like Fred Cohen (he wrote the first big study of viruses and
brunnering) are busy proposing "good viruses" that would seek out tax
evaders, deadbeat Dads, and other subversives! (Lord, save us from the
fools!).

Meanwhile, the French SDECE is spying on everyone they can and probably was
behind CLODO (Comite Liquidant ou Detoumant les Ordinateurs), the
anti-computer terrorist group. The better to scare the populace, don't you
know?

I say, let's expand the scope of the Cypherpunks list to include more
discussion of viruses. We can't let it become a monopoly of the Authorities
(the Brunner Authority instead of the Turing Authority?)

The "Cypherpunk Ethic" says we don't trust authority to tell us how to
compute, and we don't understand defense methods until we understand attack
methods. QED.

Frankly, I expect the next target of the powerfreak authorities to be our
work on anonymous remailers and digital money. They'll come to see that as
a bigger threat than mere viruses.

-Tim May
--
Timothy C. May               | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,  
tcmay@netcom.com        | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
408-688-5409               | knowledge, reputations, information markets, 
W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA       | black markets, collapse of governments.
Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: MailSafe and PGP available.

[t.c. May]
>I say, let's expand the scope of the Cypherpunks list to include more
>discussion of viruses. We can't let it become a monopoly of the Authorities
>(the Brunner Authority instead of the Turing Authority?)

I say, unless it has to do with cryptography, please don't. Does
anybody else want a lot of virus articles on this list?  I found the
original thug article a bit questionable, as I said. But a new list
(viruspunks?) might be a good idea.

It has been a bit of a sore point with me for some years.  When Fred
Cohen wrote his thesis he credited Len Adelman ((the A in RSA) our
professor at the time) with coining the term "virus".  In fact it was
I who did this.  It was I who introduced the class to the concept of
computer viruses.  I developed the idea with a guy named Eric ??? with
whom I worked at the time.  It was in private with Eric that I came up
with the name (or perhaps he may have sugested it).  I based the idea
on the "worm" from one of John Brunner's novels which I had just read.

  The name is a natural choice for this class of program, and I don't
doubt that others may have nearly simultaneuosly come upon the same
idea.  I certainly didn't write the first virus.

j' (computer virus meme source)