[Cryptography] Burner phone == One Time (i)Pad

Tom Mitchell mitch at niftyegg.com
Fri Nov 20 22:15:35 EST 2015


On Fri, Nov 20, 2015 at 1:14 PM, Arnold Reinhold <agr at me.com> wrote:

> On Thu, 19 Nov 2015 Henry Baker wrote:
>
> > Anyone who's watched a recent movie or TV show knows about burner
> phones.  They seem to have become the 21st century version of a "one time
> pad".
> >
> > What's the most important criterion for a burner phone?  It should be
> *cheap*; only the most well-heeled terrorists would use an iPhone as a
> burner.
>
.....

>
> Searching for potential terrorists is a needle in a hay stack problem.
> Anything that narrows that search potentially helps the good guys.
>
......

>
> Given the NSA  thoroughness revealed in the Snowden document, I would be
> very surprised if they don’t have a whole department devoted to tracking
> burner phones. Yes, some will turnout to be innocent uses like battered
> women shelters or people with limited income, but those will not be hard to
> separate out.
>

Sadly battered women are not a random sample of the population.
Many are trapped in social and cultural mismatches. i.e. immigrant,
unemployed...

Many pundits ignore the less expensive  walki-talkies that are good for
10-Km or so
kids love them.   There are no cell towers to slurp up the traffic.
Phrases
and verbal codes allow communications to seem innocuous. i.e.
Motorola 35-mile Talkabout Water Proof Rechargeable Two-Way Radio -
Yellow/Black (MS350R)

Cell phones are so well known as "targets" that except for domestic drug
traffickers
not subject to drone strikes the bad guys would use them rarely if at all.

This is a complex issue and with rare exceptions none truly understand
the reality, based on facts.

Of interest some Silicon Valley executives do understand the issues -- as
famous people
their coming and going is watched by the financial and news folk.   Should
a couple
go on a trip to a common location the rumors fly.   Trucks at the load
docks get counted.   Cardboard box
orders etc get translated into expectations.   Not seen on CNBC but market
bets
are made.   Based on this the silicon valley deciders may have a better
clue than
congress, judges, etc.



-- 
  T o m    M i t c h e l l
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