IBM Key Recovery Propaganda on United Airlines

The commercials between the movie and news show on the airline include an
IBM spot on their new Key Recovery software.  Sigh.

The explanations they gave were mixed; one person was talking about
making sure that if you lose the key that people with a legitimate need
to access the material can do it.  The other example they gave, with
pictures, was along the lines of
"Suppose you're going on vacation and you want to leave a key with
a neighbor to feed the dog.  A safe way to do it would be to put your house
key in a lockbox that needs several keys to open it, and give those keys
to people you trust."  Yeah, right - cops can get in, but Dog's gonna get 
pretty hungry....

#			Thanks;  Bill
# Bill Stewart, +1-415-442-2215 stewarts@ix.netcom.com
# You can get PGP outside the US at ftp.ox.ac.uk/pub/crypto/pgp
#     (If this is a mailing list, please Cc: me on replies.  Thanks.)

Bill Stewart <stewarts@ix.netcom.com> writes:

> The commercials between the movie and news show on the airline include an
> IBM spot on their new Key Recovery software.  Sigh.
> 
> The explanations they gave were mixed; one person was talking about
> making sure that if you lose the key that people with a legitimate need
> to access the material can do it.  The other example they gave, with
> pictures, was along the lines of
> "Suppose you're going on vacation and you want to leave a key with
> a neighbor to feed the dog.  A safe way to do it would be to put your house
> key in a lockbox that needs several keys to open it, and give those keys
> to people you trust."  Yeah, right - cops can get in, but Dog's gonna get 
> pretty hungry....
> 

I've been playing around with marina's new ibm thinkpad (real cool
machine) and it allows one to password-protect the hard disk. The
docs claim that if you forget the password, no one will be able to
unlock it for you. Sure... Now why isn't that export-controlled? :-)

---

Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM
Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps

Bill Stewart wrote:
> 
> The commercials between the movie and news show on the airline include an
> IBM spot on their new Key Recovery software.  Sigh.
> 
> The explanations they gave were mixed; one person was talking about
> making sure that if you lose the key that people with a legitimate need
> to access the material can do it. 

  Like the legitimate leader of a country, say, for instance...Hitler?
Or a legitimate law enforcement agency, say, for instance...the Gestapo?

Toto wrote:
> 
> Bill Stewart wrote:
> > 
> > The commercials between the movie and news show on the airline include an
> > IBM spot on their new Key Recovery software.  Sigh.
> > 
> > The explanations they gave were mixed; one person was talking about
> > making sure that if you lose the key that people with a legitimate need
> > to access the material can do it. 
> 
>   Like the legitimate leader of a country, say, for instance...Hitler?
> Or a legitimate law enforcement agency, say, for instance...the Gestapo?
> 

... Or a legitimate business need to recover the key of an employee
who suddenly quit the company?

There can be many good uses of key recovery.

	- Igor.

Igor Chudov @ home wrote:
> > Bill Stewart wrote:
> > >
> > > The commercials between the movie and news show on the airline include an
> > > IBM spot on their new Key Recovery software.  Sigh.
> > >
> > > The explanations they gave were mixed; one person was talking about
> > > making sure that if you lose the key that people with a legitimate need
> > > to access the material can do it.

>Toto wrote:
> >   Like the legitimate leader of a country, say, for instance...Hitler?
> > Or a legitimate law enforcement agency, say, for instance...the Gestapo?
> >
> 
> ... Or a legitimate business need to recover the key of an employee
> who suddenly quit the company?
> 
> There can be many good uses of key recovery.

  Yes there can, and your example is one of them.
  But you can bet your ass that those who tout the Key Recovery horn
the loudest are going to be doing so because it gives them control
of 'all' information.
  At every stage of technology, we have seen the 'surprise' that 
follows as a result of people finding out that the security of 
their communications is compromised in one manner or another.
  People found out that management was prying into their 'private'
email.  Management found out that their system administrator and
the night-janitor were profiting from company secrets.

  Key Recovery will, in all likelihood, give people who watch IBM's
airline ads a 'higher level' sense of 'false security'.
  I am sure that their motto will be, "Key Recovery--Trust Us."

  To me, Key Recovery cryptography is like using a condom with a
hole in it. No thanks.

Toto

Toto wrote:
> Igor Chudov @ home wrote:
> > > Bill Stewart wrote:
> > Toto wrote:
> > > Like the legitimate leader of a country, say, for instance...Hitler?
> > > Or a legitimate law enforcement agency, say, for instance...the Gestapo?

> Key Recovery will, in all likelihood, give people who watch IBM's
> airline ads a 'higher level' sense of 'false security'.
> I am sure that their motto will be, "Key Recovery--Trust Us."

> To me, Key Recovery cryptography is like using a condom with a hole in it.Forgive me (please!) if this is not on-topic, but believe it or not, in
this day and age of safe sex, you can go around Los Angeles and pick up
non-porn (free, distributed at record stores) gay-oriented magazines which
carry large full-page ads for sexual lubricants, and guess what - you
can't use a condom with those lubricants!  It says so right in the ad!