Re: Anonymous Remailer threat: Scientologists may subpoena anonymous remailerrecords?

At 7:37 PM 4/10/96, Jim Byrd wrote:

>The story is weirder than that.  The first poster of church secrets (with
>lots of commentary) was Dennis Erlich, an ex-scientologist.  Dennis was
>raided and sued, and is awaiting trial.  His ISP, Tom Klemesrud, refused

His ISP was Netcom. Klemesrud respresents Netcom.


>to find the identity of -AB-.  This turned out to be an alumni account at
>Cal Tech.  The poster has never been heard from again.

This was without a doubt just a user of one of Hal Finney's remailers he
runs out of an account at Caltech. (There's a tiny chance it was someone
else, but it fits the description of Hal's "alumni" remailer exactly, and
is almost certainly just that.)

This is a Cypherpunk-style remailer, and Hal is one of the original Cypherpunks.

The concept of "The poster has never been heard from again" is essentially
meaningless, unless he or she or signed the message and established a
persistent personna.

Sorry to sound picky, but I've just seen several messages all of which copy
a long dialog from some Finnish guy named Kaj. Some of the messages then
confuse the issues by confusing the types of remailers.

--Tim May

Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software!
We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^756839 - 1  | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

On Wed, 10 Apr 1996, Timothy C. May wrote:

> At 7:37 PM 4/10/96, Jim Byrd wrote:
>
> >The story is weirder than that.  The first poster of church secrets (with
> >lots of commentary) was Dennis Erlich, an ex-scientologist.  Dennis was
> >raided and sued, and is awaiting trial.  His ISP, Tom Klemesrud, refused
>
> His ISP was Netcom. Klemesrud respresents Netcom.
[snip]

Tom does not work for Netcom or represent them, AFAIK.

He is the sysop of the BBS (support.com) that Dennis uses to access the
Net.  The BBS gets its net feed through Netcom.

CoS sued both Tom and Netcom (in addition to Dennis).  They claimed that
after alerting Tom and Netcom to Dennis' alleged "copyright terrorism"
the ISPs should have cut off his net access.  Tom refused, and Netcom
didn't want to pull the plug on his whole BBS just to stop one man accused
of copyright infringement.

I hope I have that all straight...

______________________________________________________________________
Rich Burroughs  richieb@teleport.com  http://www.teleport.com/~richieb
See my Blue Ribbon Page at http://www.teleport.com/~richieb/blueribbon
New EF zine "cause for alarm" - http://www.teleport.com/~richieb/cause

> 
> Sorry to sound picky, but I've just seen several messages all of which copy
> a long dialog from some Finnish guy named Kaj. Some of the messages then
> confuse the issues by confusing the types of remailers.
> 

	Frankly, I'm getting antsy. Is C2 going to get subpoena'd or
not? I would be very disappointed if we don't.
	(Subpeonas envy!)

-- 
Sameer Parekh					Voice:   510-601-9777x3
Community ConneXion, Inc.			FAX:     510-601-9734
The Internet Privacy Provider			Dialin:  510-658-6376
http://www.c2.net/ (or login as "guest")		sameer@c2.net

On Wed, 10 Apr 1996, sameer wrote:

> 
> 	Frankly, I'm getting antsy. Is C2 going to get subpoena'd or
> not? I would be very disappointed if we don't.
> 	(Subpeonas envy!)

All you have to do is call up CoS's lawyers. Let your fingers do the 
walking...

Seriously though, might it not be nicer (easier?) to establish some court
precedents on remailers vs. CoS rather than the government? Think of it as
a preemptive strike. The argument of CoS's religious copyright and trade
secrets don't seem to me be as emotionally effective horsemen as "National
Security Threats" or "Child Pornography". I really wouldn't want to see
Congress get away with legislating on remailers in a legal vacuum. 

Go for it Sameer. ;-) (Hope you won't be needing Jim's ISP-Aspol inc. 
insurance against them pesky scientologists...[double ;-) ])