Once again, Schneier provides essential reading

I strongly recommend everyone at least skim through this, especially the "Protecting Privacy and Liberty" section; we're going to hear a lot of nonsense about this sort of thing in the near future.

Crypto-Gram Newsletter Special Edition
Bruce Schneier, September 30, 2001

This is a special issue of Crypto-Gram, devoted to the September 11 terrorist attacks and their aftermath.

Please distribute this issue widely.

[...] Security and privacy are not two sides of a teeter-totter. This association is simplistic and largely fallacious. It's easy and fast, but less effective, to increase security by taking away liberty. However, the best ways to increase security are not at the expense of privacy and liberty.

It's easy to refute the notion that all security comes at the expense of liberty. Arming pilots, reinforcing cockpit doors, and teaching flight attendants karate are all examples of security measures that have no effect on individual privacy or liberties. So are better authentication of airport maintenance workers, or dead-man switches that force planes to automatically land at the closest airport, or armed air marshals traveling on flights.

Liberty-depriving security measures are most often found when system designers failed to take security into account from the beginning. They're Band-aids, and evidence of bad security planning. When security is designed into a system, it can work without forcing people to give up their freedoms.

http://www.counterpane.com/crypto-gram-0109a.html#8

ID cards have nothing to do with fighting terrorism

BBC1 "Breakfast with Frost" interview with Tony Blair
TX 30/9/2001

Sir David Frost: One of the things you hear people say a lot is obviously that if terrorists can fake passports they can fake ID cards, and the only people with proper ID cards will be the law-abiding citizens of this country who will have additional hassle ?

Tony Blair: Well that's precisely the type of argument we need to take into account, I mean would ID cards be effective in this way, however they may be effective in other ways in terms of fraud in terms of social security benefits and so on.

http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/pipermail/ukcrypto/2001-September/017635.html

It's that damn questionnaire

Some irritating things in the questions corrected.

Can I encourage everyone to edit their answers to add an <lj-cut> tag before the "HAVE YOU EVER" heading? Otherwise friends pages are going to get rather long...

piercings: none.

tattoos: none.

get along with parents: Yes, definitely. My Dad died nearly six years ago, but we were always on excellent terms; my Mum is way cool, as the many LJers who've met her will testify.

bedtime: Midnight, when I have the willpower to stop what I'm doing and turn in.

who on LJ have you been friends with the longest: purplerabbits. I think I've known lizw the longest but there was a long and unfortunate period when we weren't friends...

what's on the wall of your room: I've just put up the drawing I commisioned by Nik and the Permission flyer signed by Pat Califia.

what's your biggest wish at the moment: More energy. I can find a use for all the energy I can get.

what are you thinking right now: I shouldn't be timewasting like this...

what's the background on your computer: A photo of Yokohama Bay at dawn, that I took from the window of my hotel room in Japan's tallest building.

if you could change one thing about your appearance,what would it be: I'd like flawless skin. Not that my skin is abysmal, but it's a long way from flawless.

can you sing: Not in a way that anyone would encourage.

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BBC article on why encryption regs are stupid

There's only one way to stop terrorists using net
Caspar Bowden, BBC, 1 October 2001

The only way to stop terrorist cells communicating via the internet is to disinvent it. Encryption is irrelevant.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1569000/1569874.stm

I added some comments in the feedback form - I wonder if they'll use any of them?
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