Financial identity is *dangerous*? (was re: Fake companies, real money)

[Trei, Peter]

James A. Donald wrote:

> R.A. Hettinga wrote:
> > [The mobile phone is] certainly getting to be like Chaum's
> > ideal crypto device. You own it, it has its own I/O, and it
> > never leaves your sight.
> 
> Is there a phone that is programmable enough to store secrets 
> on and sign and decrypt stuff?

I've been programming phones and PDAs for several years.
They are certainly powerful enough for symmetric operations.
Some at the higher end can to public key operations at a
reasonable speed. The lower end ones can't. Try taking a
look at the new Treos, the newer PocketPC devices, and
phones such as the Motorola A760.

> The ideal crypto device would be programmed by burning new 
> proms, thus enabling easy reprogramming, while making it 
> resistant to trojans and viruses. 

Some of the devices partition their storage, with portions
that are easily modified, and portions which are more
secure. The carriers generally want to prevent users from
modifying the SW in ways which could enable fraud or damage
the network, yet allow downloads of games, apps, etc.

Peter


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