Re: Spread-spectrum net (vulnerability of)

PCS is coming.  It will support data communications at moderate rates
to and from portable (handheld) units.  We may achieve some gains by
simply using PCS with encryption.  You (I don't know who:-) may object:
every PCS unit will have an ID will   hich will be traceable to a person.
But this need not be so.  What if XYZ cmpany were to buy thousands of
PCS units to issue to its independent agents and accept billing
responsibility for all of them? XYZ could use anonymous account registration
and pseudonyms from there on out.  Thus the telcos and PCS operators get
paid (by XYZ corp.) without having to know who the individual unit users are.
XYZ can cut off an anonymous user who fails to pay his bill by telling the
telcos/PCS operators to stop accepting calls from that ID (nobody needs to
know who the deadbeat connected to that ID is).  As long as there is
sufficient prepayment by unit users to XYZ, that meritorious company can
avoid losing its shirt to repeat deadbeats who keep registering
(anonymously) for new accounts, running up big bills and not paying.
What important point am I missing here? Thanks in advance to all the
professional flamers out there who will make it clear to me :-)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Stuart W. Card, Consultant, Card & Associates -- Research & Development
Box 153 RR 1 Newport Rd Utica NY 13502         315-735-1717 / FAX -8469
swc@uc1.ucsu.edu or cards@top.cis.syr.edu           "Who is John Galt?"

> XYZ can cut off an anonymous user who fails to pay his bill by telling the
> telcos/PCS operators to stop accepting calls from that ID (nobody needs to
> know who the deadbeat connected to that ID is).  As long as there is
> sufficient prepayment by unit users to XYZ, that meritorious company can
> avoid losing its shirt to repeat deadbeats who keep registering
> (anonymously) for new accounts, running up big bills and not paying.
> What important point am I missing here? Thanks in advance to all the
> professional flamers out there who will make it clear to me :-)

XYZ can also cut off an anonymous user who has paid all his bills.
The user will then either lose his money or get in contact with
the company to resolve the issue.  This is an excellent opportunity
to match an ID with a face.

> Stuart W. Card, Consultant, Card & Associates -- Research & Development
> Box 153 RR 1 Newport Rd Utica NY 13502         315-735-1717 / FAX -8469
> swc@uc1.ucsu.edu or cards@top.cis.syr.edu           "Who is John Galt?"

[Attribution lost, sorry] 
> > XYZ can cut off an anonymous user who fails to pay his bill...

Stuart Card:
> XYZ can also cut off an anonymous user who has paid all his bills.
> The user will then either lose his money or get in contact with
> the company to resolve the issue.  This is an excellent opportunity
> to match an ID with a face.

A pseudonymous customer has the opportunity to either file a
tort under their pseudonymous ID or to publicize the fraud,
either under their pseudonymous ID or anonymously.  Either
way the service provider's reputation is damaged if it
cannot disprove the allegation.

In general, the difficulty of anonymous credit is a good argument
for making the payments as fine-grained as possible (eg digital postage), 
instead of tallying up bills.  A trusted bank that knows the customer's 
True Name, long term reputation, or co-signers can handle extensions 
of credit to that customer for various purposes.  With such streamlined
credit and postage there's no reason for most service providers 
to be concerned about a customer's credit.

Nick Szabo				szabo@netcom.com