traffic analysis (was: blackmail / stego)

[David Honig]

At 01:01 PM 8/27/03 -0700, Jim McCoy wrote:
>While IANL, it seems that the whole anonymity game has a flaw that 
>doesn't even require a totalitarian regime. I would direct you to the 
>various laws in the US (to pick a random example :) regarding 
>conspiracy. Subscribing to an anonymity service might not become 
>illegal, but if anyone in your "crowd" was performing an illegal action 
>you may be guilty of conspiracy to commit this action.  

Ok, so you have a EULA in which you prohibit "offensive" behavior.
A crowd-member might violate this, but any "chaff" crowd-member
would have a legal defense ---"Hey, I used the foobar service
to avoid hackers finding my IP, its not my fault if someone threatened the
king"

A real police state would just Tomahawk the servers.  After rubber
hosing the operators.  Anything less than a Total Police State
would have to acknowledge innocent subscribers.  

Kinda like (ca. 1980) yeah, I have a cell phone, its because I
am on the road ---I'm not a pharmdealer, even if half the carrier's
traffic is dubious.

Or, moving into this century, "yeah, I use KaZaa++, but its to 
download unrecognized indie bands, not MetalliMadonna"
(assuming K++ were anonymous..)

Of course, its becoming easier and easier to be a total police state..









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