Schneier on Security

Clive Robinson • September 14, 2022 3:40 AM

@ SpaceLifeForm, ALL,

Re : Difference between a service and a transaction.

From what you quote, it appears that the US Treasury unlike a great many do actually understand the difference between a transaction carried out on a service and the service it’s self and the technology and infrastructure it’s based on.

That is the US Treasury appreciates the notion of a “common carrier” from the earliest days of postal services predating the “Elizabethan Era” of the Tudor period prior to 1600 some four centuries ago[1].

It is after all both a logical and reasonable view point to take (unlike the actions of others).

Especially when we have a saying that predates it and arguably goes back to pre-cristian events,

“Don’t shoot the messenger”

Thus the use of Tornado Cash for legitimate legal transactions was legal.

What was not legal were illegitimate and unlawful transactions that became illegal and continue to do so.

Where Tornado Cash over stepped the mark of “Common Carrier” of transactions was actively encoraging if not seeking out those who practiced unlawful behaviour with an intent based on criminal activity thus harmfull not just to US National Security but the National Security of other nations.

@ ALL,

With regards MicroSoft’s behaviour that has been seen as “over steping the mark”.

Yes it was then and still is. However “over stepping the mark” has been very much evident in US Political circles for some time now. Thus it could be argued that MicroSoft acteb in an over abundance of caution to protect it’s “Good Name”.

However as others will no doubt point out that “abundance of caution” had significant financial considerations for MicroSoft…

Which was just one of the many major objections the Open Source community had to MicroSoft taking over an Open Source Repository, and why MicroSoft was not considered “a safe pair of hands” to hold it. And indeed MicroSoft have “dropped the ball” at what appears to be the first opportunity, thus confirming many fears.

[1] Of the many English Monarchs, Elizabeth the First was perhaps the first to truely understand the power of Spy-Craft over other peoples communications and had her own Spy-Master Sir Francis Walsingham, who ran his own “black chamber”. You can get a little of the taste of a historic “Surveillance State” and see how little has actually changed in the intervening centuries other than an infusion of technology…

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/queen-elizabeth-is-vast-spy-network-was-the-original-surveillance-state

Clive Robinson • September 14, 2022 8:06 PM

@ lurker,

Re : Relative Behavior.

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blockquote>”Elizabeth I learned her spycraft from her father (Henry VIII) who learned it from . . .”

She learned some, like her father learbed some –possibly due to the “Petfidious French”– and so on.

The point is Elizabeth the First was the one who built it up and took it to places in effect a pinical that it did not go again for effectively centuries after her death. The reasons for the demise of spycraft in England were both prosaic and complex and had much to do with the stupidity of male egos and religion being in conflict,

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_I_of_England

Any way, the level of such spying did not realy return until the later pary of the era of the two Boer Wars (1880-1903). With “Old Dutch v. English” in the South of Africa and was as a result of “trade disputes” and the likes of Cecil Rhodes and earlier behaviours over the discovery of significantly gold and diamonds.

The second Boer War revealed the very sick and depraved mentality of certain British Military leaders that later contributed to the mass carnage and destruction of civilian populations and property in the following two world wars. Some historians credit the likes of Kitchener with not just the fall of the British Empire but also for inventing the tools and methods such as Concentration Camps that enabled many acts of genocide, right upto and including the likes of Gitmo etc.

Such is history and the lessons we mostly do not learn from it.

Which brings us onto,

“The messages and cyphers have moved into the ether, invisible, and thus to most people into the realm of magic.”

This too realy started with the Boer War Era and the Afghanistan campaign. The ability to machine effective man portable heliograph systems, sent out messages at the speed of light.

The early heliographs had a problem in that their light cone was two broad and the twinkling could be seen and the positions of troops and commands identified from quite a distance. A significant disadvantage with guerilla warfare where your enemy are in effect all around you watching. It’s not known if the Boer’s practiced signals intelligence, it’s probably not likely but nether the less during that period the use of codes and ciphers went up significantly. So much so it was a standard technique by “The Great War” and the birth of machine ciphers.

Which brings us to,

“The notion that the speed of light is finite, and much may happen while a message goes out of one computer into another, is also in the realm of magic.”

Actually, it was during the Second World War that this idea happened to a few people. The use of radar gunnery had shown that fast as light was, you still had to make alowance for changes. Further Gordon Welchman at Bletchly started thinking about time delays in the speed of communications and how communications networks would be limited by it. Which gave rise to quite a bit of the low level thinking that exists behind what we now call the Internet.

As for “taking the magic out of it” and getting people to realise the issues… So far in life we appear to have discovered two ways to do it,

1, Capitalize on a tragedy.
2, By “force majeure”.

Neither are effective, being more blunt instruments than precision tools…

However even though we have “fire guards” and similar, the number of people going to hospital with significant burns to hands and faces, tells us there are always going to be people who either do not listen, do not think, or both.

There is a reason why the Darwin Awards exist…