Archive-name: net-privacy/part1
Last-modified: 1993/3/3
Version: 2.1


IDENTITY, PRIVACY, and ANONYMITY on the INTERNET
================================================

(c) 1993 L. Detweiler.  Not for commercial use except by permission
from author, otherwise may be freely copied.  Not to be altered. 
Please credit if quoted.

SUMMARY
=======

Information on email and account privacy, anonymous mailing and 
posting, encryption, and other privacy and rights issues associated
with use of the Internet and global networks in general.

(Search for <#.#> for exact section. Search for '_' (underline) for
next section.)

PART 1
====== (this file)

Identity
--------
<1.1> What is `identity' on the internet?
<1.2> Why is identity (un)important on the internet?
<1.3> How does my email address (not) identify me and my background?
<1.4> How can I find out more about somebody from their email address?
<1.5> Why is identification (un)stable on the internet? 
<1.6> What is the future of identification on the internet?

Privacy
-------
<2.1> What is `privacy' on the internet?
<2.2> Why is privacy (un)important on the internet?
<2.3> How (in)secure are internet networks?
<2.4> How (in)secure is my account?
<2.5> How (in)secure are my files and directories?
<2.6> How (in)secure is X Windows?
<2.7> How (in)secure is my email?
<2.8> How am I (not) liable for my email and postings?
<2.9> How do I provide more/less information to others on my identity?
<2.10> Who is my sysadmin?  What does s/he know about me?
<2.11> Why is privacy (un)stable on the internet?
<2.12> What is the future of privacy on the internet?

Anonymity
---------
<3.1> What is `anonymity' on the internet?
<3.2> Why is `anonymity' (un)important on the internet?
<3.3> How can anonymity be protected on the internet?
<3.4> What is `anonymous mail'?
<3.5> What is `anonymous posting'?
<3.6> Why is anonymity (un)stable on the internet?
<3.7> What is the future of anonymity on the internet?


PART 2
====== (next file)

Resources
---------

<4.1> What UNIX programs are related to privacy?
<4.2> How can I learn about or use cryptography?
<4.3> What is the cypherpunks mailing list?
<4.4> What are some privacy-related newsgroups?  FAQs?
<4.5> What is internet Privacy Enhanced Mail (PEM)?
<4.6> What are other Request For Comments (RFCs) related to privacy?
<4.7> How can I run an anonymous remailer?
<4.8> What are references on privacy in email?
<4.9> What are some email, Usenet, and internet use policies?
<4.10> What is the MIT ``CROSSLINK'' anonymous message TV program?

Miscellaneous
-------------

<5.1> What is ``digital cash''?
<5.2> What is a ``hacker'' or ``cracker''?
<5.3> What is a ``cypherpunk''?
<5.4> What is `steganography' and anonymous pools?
<5.5> What is `security through obscurity'?
<5.6> What are `identity daemons'?
<5.7> What standards are needed to guard electronic privacy?

Issues
------

<6.1> What is the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)?
<6.2> Who are Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility (CPSR)?
<6.3> What was `Operation Sun Devil' and the Steve Jackson Game case?
<6.4> What is Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN)?
<6.5> What is the National Research and Education Network (NREN)?
<6.6> What is the FBI's proposed Digital Telephony Act?
<6.7> What other U.S. legislation is related to privacy on networks?
<6.8> What are references on rights in cyberspace?
<6.9> What is the Computers and Academic Freedom (CAF) archive?

Footnotes
---------

<7.1> What is the background behind the Internet?
<7.2> How is Internet `anarchy' like the English language?
<7.3> Most Wanted list
<7.4> Change history


PART 3
====== (last file)

Anonymizing
-----------

<8.1> What are some known anonymous remailing and posting sites?
<8.2> What are the responsibilities associated with anonymity?
<8.3> How do I `kill' anonymous postings?
<8.4> What is the history behind anonymous posting servers?
<8.5> What is the value of anonymity?
<8.6> Should anonymous posting to all groups be allowed?
<8.7> What should system operators do with anonymous postings?
<8.8> What is going on with anon.penet.fi maintained by J. Helsingius?


* * *


IDENTITY
========

_____
<1.1> What is `identity' on the internet?

  Generally, today people's `identity' on the internet is primarily
  determined by their email address in the sense that this is their
  most unchanging 'face' in the electronic realm.   This is your
  login name qualified by the complete address domain information,
  for example ``ld231782@longs.lance.colostate.edu''.  People see
  this address when receiving mail or reading USENET posts from you
  and in other situations where programs record usage.  Some obsolete
  forms of addresses (such as BITNET) still persist.

  In email messages, additional information on the path that a message
  takes is prepended to the message received by the recipient.  This
  information identifies the chain of hosts involved in the
  transmission and is a very accurate trace of its origination.  This
  type of identify-and-forward protocol is also used in the USENET
  protocol to a lesser extent.  Forging these fields requires
  corrupted mailing software at sites involved in the forwarding and
  is very uncommon.  Not so uncommon is forging the chain at the
  origination point, so that all initial sites in the list are faked
  at the time the message is created.  Tracing these messages can be
  difficult or impossible when the initial faked fields are names of
  real machines and represent real transfer routes.

_____
<1.2> Why is identity (un)important on the internet?

  The concept of identity is closely intertwined with communication,
  privacy, and security, which in turn are all critical aspects of
  computer networks. For example, the convenience of communication
  afforded by email would be impossible without conventions for
  identification.  But there are many potential abuses of identity
  possible that can have very severe consequences, with massive
  computer networks at the forefront of the issue, which can
  potentially either exacerbate or solve these problems.

  Verifying that an identity is correct is called `authentication',
  and one classic example of the problems associated with it is
  H.G.Well's ``War of the Worlds'' radio broadcast that fooled
  segments of the population into thinking that an alien invasion was
  in progress.  Hoaxes of this order are not uncommon on Usenet and
  forged identities makes them more insidious.  People and their
  reputations can be assaulted by forgery.

  However, the fluidity of identity on the internet is for some one of
  its most attractive features. Identity is just as useful as it is
  harmful.  A professor might carefully explain a topic until he
  finds he is talking to an undergraduate. A person of a particular
  occupation may be able to converse with others who might normally
  shun him.  Some prejudices are erased, but, on the other hand, many
  prejudices are useful!  A scientist might argue he can better
  evaluate the findings of a paper as a reviewer if he knows more
  about the authors.  Likewise, he may be more likely to reject it
  based on unfair or irrelevant criteria.  On the other side of the
  connection,  the author may find identities of reviewers useful in
  exerting pressure for acceptance.

  Identity is especially crucial in establishing and regulating
  `credit' (not necessarily financial) and `ownership' and `usage'. 
  Many functions in society demand reliable and accurate techniques
  for identification. Heavy reliance will be placed on digital
  authentication as global economies become increasingly electronic. 
  Many government functions and services are based on identification,
  and law enforcement frequently hinges on it.  Hence, employees of
  many government organizations push toward stronger identification
  structures.  But when does identification invade privacy?

  The growth of the internet is provoking social forces of massive
  proportions. Decisions made now on issues of identity will affect
  many future users, especially as the network becomes increasingly
  global, universal, widespread, and entrenched; and the positive or
  adverse affects of these actions, intended and inadvertent,  will
  literally be magnified exponentially.

_____
<1.3> How does my email address (not) identify me and my background?

  Your email address may contain information that influences people's
  perceptions of your background.  The address may `identify' you as
  from a department at a particular university, an employee at a
  company, or a government worker.  It may contain your last name,
  initials, or cryptic identification codes independent of both.  In
  the US some are based on parts of social security numbers.  Others
  are in the form 'u2338' where the number is incremented in the
  order that new users are added to the system.

  Standard internet addresses  also can contain information  on your
  broad geographical location or nationhood.  However, none of this
  information is guaranteed to be correct or be there at all.  The
  fields in the domain qualification of the username are based on
  rather arbitrary organization, such as (mostly invisible) network
  cabling distributions.  The only point to make is that early fields
  in the address are more specific (such as specific computer names
  or local networks) and the later ones the most general (such as
  continental domains).  Typically the first field is the name of the
  computer receiving mail.

  Gleaning information from the email address alone is sometimes an
  inspired art or an inconsistent and futile exercise.  (For more
  information, see the FAQs on email  addresses and known
  geographical distributions below.)  However, UNIX utilities exist
  to aid in the quest (see the question on this).

  Common Suffixes
  ---------------

  .us    United States
  .uk    United Kingdom
  .ca    Canada
  .fi    Finland
  .au    Australia

  .edu   university or college
  .com   commercial organization
  .org   'other' (e.g. nonprofit organization)
  .gov   government
  .mil   military site
 
_____
<1.4> How can I find out more about somebody with a given email address?

  One simple way is to send email to that address, asking.  Another
  way is to send mail to the postmaster at that address (i.e.
  postmaster@address), although the postmaster's job is more to help
  find user ID's of particular people given their real name and solve
  mail routing problems.  The sysadmin (i.e. `root@address') may also
  be able to supply information.  Users with related email address
  may have information.  However, all of these methods rely on the
  time and patience of others so use them minimally.

  One of the most basic tools for determining identity over the
  internet is the UNIX utility 'finger'.  The basic syntax is:

    finger user@here.there.everywhere

  This utility uses communication protocols to query the computer
  named in the address for information on the user named.  The
  response is generated completely by the receiving computer and may
  be in any format.  Possible responses are as follows:

  - A message `unknown host' meaning some aspect of the address is
    incorrect, two lines with no information and '???'.
  
  - A message 'In real life: ???' in which case the receiving computer
    could not find any kind of a match on the username. The finger
    utility may return this response in other situations.
  
  - A listing of information associated with multiple users. Some
    computers will search only for matching user IDs, others will
    attempt to find the username you specified as a substring of all
    actual full names of users kept in a local database.
  
  At some sites 'finger' can be used to get a list of all users on the
  system with a `finger @address'.  In general this is often
  considered weak security, however, because `attackers' know valid
  user ID's to `crack' passwords.

  More information on the fields returned by `finger' is given below. 
  More information on `finger' and locating people's email addresses
  is given in the email FAQ (such as the WHOIS lookup utility).  Just
  as you can use these means to find out about others, they can use
  them to find out about you.  You can `finger' yourself to find out
  what is publicly reported by your UNIX system about you.  Be
  careful when modifying `finger' data; virtually anyone with
  internet access worldwide can query this information.  In one
  amazing case, the New York Times writer J. Markoff uncovered the
  identity of R. Morris, author of the Internet Worm,  through
  the use of an anonymous tip and 'finger'.  See the book Cyberspace
  by K. Hafner and J. Markoff.

_____
<1.5> Why is identification (un)stable on the internet?

  Generally, identity is an amorphous and almost nonexistent concept
  on the Internet for a variety of reasons.  One is the inherent
  fluidity of `cyberspace' where people emerge and submerge
  frequently, and absences are not readily noted in the `community'. 
  Most people remember faces and voices, the primary means of casual
  identification in the 'real world'.  The arbitary and cryptic 
  sequences of letters and digits comprising most email addresses are
  not particularly noticeable or memorable and far from a unique
  identification of an individual, who may use multiple accounts on
  multiple machines anywhere in the world.

  Currently internet users do not really have any great assurances
  that the messages in email and USENET are from who they appear to
  be. A person's mailing address is far from an identification of an
  individual.  
  
  - Anyone with access to the account, e.g. they know the password,
    either legitimately or otherwise, can send mail with that address
    in the From: line.
  
  - Email addresses for an individual tend to change frequently as
    they switch jobs or make moves inside their organizations. 

  - As part of current mailing protocol standards, forging the From:
    line in mail messages is a fairly trivial operation for many
    hackers.
    
  The status and path information prepended to messages by
  intermediate hosts is generally unforgeable. In general, while
  possible, forgeries are fairly rare on most newsgroups and in
  email.  Besides these pathological cases abve there are many basic
  problems with today's internet protocols affecting identification
  on the internet:

  - Internet mail standards, described in RFC-822, are still evolving
    rapidly and not entirely orderly.  For example, standards for
    mail address `munging' or `parsing' tend to vary slightly between
    sites and frequently mean the difference between finding
    addresses and bouncing mail.
  
  - Domain names and computer names are frequently changed at sites,
    and there are delays in the propagation of this data.
  
  - Addresses cannot be resolved when certain critical computers
    crash, such as the receiving computer or other computers involved
    in resolving names into addresses called `nameservers'. 
  
  - A whole slew of problems is associated with  `nameservers'; if
    they are not updated they will not find name addresses, and even
    the operation of what constitutes `updating' has different
    interpretations at different sites.
  
  The current internet mailing and addressing protocols are slightly
  anachronistic in that they were created when the network was
  somewhat obscure and not widespread, with only a fraction of the
  traffic it now sees.  Today a large proportion of internet traffic
  is email, comprising  millions of messages.

_____
<1.6> What is the future of identification on the internet?

  Some new technologies and standards are introducing facial images
  and voice messages  into mail and these will improve the sense of
  community that comes from the familiarity of identification.
  However, they are not currently widespread, require large amounts
  of data transfer, standardized software, and make some compromises
  in privacy.

  Promising new cryptographic techniques may make 'digital signatures'
  and 'digital authentication' common (see below).  Also, the trend
  in USENET standards is toward greater authentication of posted
  information.  On the other hand, advances in ensuring anonymity
  (such as remailers) are forthcoming.  See below.


PRIVACY
=======

_____
<2.1> What is `privacy' on the internet?

  Generally, while `privacy' has multiple connotations in society and
  perhaps even more on the internet, in cyberspace most take it to
  mean that you have exclusive use and access to your account and the
  data stored on and and directed to it (such as email), and you do
  not encounter arbitrary restrictions or searches.  In other words, 
  others may obtain data associated with your account, but not
  without your permission.  These ideas are probably both fairly
  limiting and liberal in their scope in what most internet users
  consider their private domains.  Some users don't expect or want
  any privacy, some expect and demand it.

_____
<2.2> Why is privacy (un)important on the internet?

  This is a somewhat debatable and inflammatory topic, arousing
  passionate opinions.  On the internet, some take privacy for
  granted and are rudely surprised to find it tenuous or nonexistent.
  Most governments have rules that protect privacy (such as the
  illegal search and seizure clause of the U.S. constitution, adopted
  by others) but have many that are antithetical to it (such as laws
  prohibiting secret communications or allowing wiretapping). These
  rules generally carry over to the internet with few specific rules
  governing it.  However, the legal repercussions of the global
  internet are still largely unknown and untested (i.e. no strong
  legal precedents and court cases).  The fact that internet traffic
  frequently passes past international boundaries, and is not
  centrally managed, significantly complicates and strongly
  discourages its regulation.

_____
<2.3> How (in)secure are internet networks?

  - `Theoretically' people at any site in the chain of sites with
    access to hardware and network media that transmits data over the
    Internet  could potentially monitor or archive it. However, the
    sheer volume and general 'noise' inherent to this data makes
    these scenarios highly improbable, even by government agencies
    with supposedly vast funding and resources.
  
  - Technologies exist to `tap' magnetic fields given off by
    electrical wires without detection.  Less obscurely, any machine
    with a network connection is a potential station for traffic
    detection, but this scenario requires knowledge and access to
    very low-level hardware (the network card) to pursue, if even
    possible.
  
  - A company Network General Inc. is one of many that manufactures
    and markets sophisticated network monitoring tools that can
    'filter' and read packets by arbitrary criteria for
    troubleshooting purposes, but the cost of this type of device is
    prohibitive for casual use.

  Known instances of the above types of security  breaches at a major
  scale (such as at network hubs) are very rare. The greatest risks
  tend to emerge locally.  Note that all these approaches are almost
  completely defused with the use of cryptography.
    
_____
<2.4> How (in)secure is my account?

  By default, not very.  There are a multitude of factors that may
  reinforce or compromise aspects of your privacy on the internet. 
  First, your account must be secure from other users. The universal
  system is to use a password, but if it is `weak' (i.e. easy to
  guess) this security is significantly diminished.  Somewhat
  surprisingly and frighteningly to some, certain  users of the
  system, particularly the administrator, generally have unlimited
  access regardless of passwords, and may grant that access to
  others.  This means that they may read any file in your account
  without detection.

  Furthermore, not universally known, most UNIX systems keep fairly
  extensive accounting records of when and where you logged in, what
  commands you execute, and when they are executed (in fact, login
  information is usually public). Most features of this `auditing' or
   `process accounting' information are enabled by default after the
  initial installation and the system administrator may customize it
  to strengthen or weaken it to satisfy performance or privacy aims. 
  This information is frequently consulted for troubleshooting
  purposes and may otherwise be ignored.  This data tracks
  unsuccessful login attempts and other 'suspicious' activities on
  the system. A traditional part of the UNIX system that tracks user
  commands is easily circumvented by the user with the use of
  symbolic links (described  in 'man ln').
  
  UNIX implementations vary widely particularly in tracking features
  and new sophisticated mechanisms are introduced by companies
  regularly. Typically system adminstrators augment the basic UNIX
  functionality with public-domain programs and locally-developed
  tools for monitoring, and use them only to isolate `suspicious'
  activity as it arises (e.g. remote accesses to the 'passwd' file, incorrect
  login attempts, remote connection attempts, etc.).
  
  Generally, you should expect little privacy on your account for
  various reasons:
  
  - Potentially, every keystroke you type could be intercepted by
    someone else. 

  - System administrators make extensive backups that are completely
    invisible to users which may record the states of an account over
    many weeks. 

  - Erased files can, under many operating systems, be undeleted. 

  - Most automated services keep logs of use for troubleshooting or
    otherwise; for example FTP sites usually log the commands and
    record the domain originations of users, including anonymous
    ones.

  - Some software exacerbates these problems.  See the section on
    ``X Windows (in)security''.

  Indepedent of malevolent administrators are fellow users, a much
  more commonly harmful threat. There are multiple ways to help
  ensure that your account will not be accessed by others, and
  compromises can often be traced to failures in these guidelines:

  - Choose a secure password.  Change it periodically.
  - Make sure to logout always.
  - Do not leave a machine unattended for long.
  - Make sure no one watches you when you type your password.
  - Avoid password references in email.
  - Be conservative in the use of the .rhost file.
  - Use utilities like `xlock' to protect a station, but be
    considerate.

  Be wary of situations where you think you should supply your
  password.  There are only several basic situations where UNIX
  prompts you for a password: when you are logging in to a system or
  changing your password.  Situations can arise in which prompts for
  passwords are forged by other users, especially in cases where you
  are talking to them (such as Internet Relay Chat).  Also, be  aware
  that forged login screens are one method to illegitimately obtain 
  passwords.


  (Thanks to Jim Mattson <mattson@cs.ucsd.edu> for contributions
  here.)

_____
<2.5> How (in)secure are my files and directories?

  The most important privacy considerations are related to file
  rights, and many lapses can be traced to their misunderstood nature
  or haphazard maintenance. Be aware of the rights associated with
  your files and directories in UNIX. If the `x' (`execute') right on
  your parent directory is off for users, groups, and other, these
  users cannot gain information on anything in your directories. 
  Anything less may allow others to read, change, or even delete
  files in your home directory. The rights on a directory supersede
  the rights associated with files in that directory. For a
  directory, 'x' means that access to the files (or subdirectories)
  in the directory is possible -- if you know their names.  To list
  the contents of the directory, however, requires the 'r' right.
 
  By default most accounts are accessable only to the owner, but the
  initial configuration varies between sites based on administrator
  preference.  The default file mode specifies the initial rights
  associated with newly created files, and can be set in the shell
  with `umask'.  The details of rights implementations tend to vary
  between versions of UNIX.  Consult man pages on `chmod' and `ls'.

  Examples
  --------

    traver.lance % ls -ld ~
    drwx------ 15 ld231782     1536 Jan 31 21:22 /users/ld231782/

  Here is a listing of the rights associated with a user's home
  directory, denoted by `~'.  The columns at the left identify what
  rights are available. The first column identifies the entry as a
  directory, and the next three columns mean that read, write, and
  execute rights, respectively, are permitted for that user.  For
  directories, the `x' right means that contents (file and
  subdirectory names) within that directory can be listed. The
  subsequent columns indicate that no other users have any rights to
  anything in the directory tree originating at that point.  They
  can't even `see' any lower files or subdirectories; the hierarchy
  is completely invisible to them.

    traver.lance % ls -l msg
    -rw-r--r--  1 ld231782   35661 Jan 29 23:13 msg
    traver.lance % chmod u=rw,g=,o= msg
    traver.lance % ls -l msg
    -rw-------  1 ld231782   35661 Jan 29 23:13 msg

  Here the modes on the file `msg' were changed to take away rights
  from `group' and `other'. 
  
  Note that `ls -l <file>' requires both the 'r' right to get the list
  of files and subdirectories, and the 'x' right to access the files
  and subdirectories in order to get their size, etc. For example,
  suppose the directory `foo' has rights dr--r--r--,  the following
  is possible:

    ls foo

  These commands would fail independent of file rights:
  
    ls -l foo
    ls -l foo/file
    cat foo/file
    cd foo

  If the directory `foo' has rights d--x--x--x, the following are
  possible if it is known beforehand that `foo' contains an 'r'
  readable file named `file':
  
    ls -l foo/file
    cat foo/file
    cd foo
  
  The following commands fail:
  
    ls foo
    ls -l foo
  

  (Thanks to Uwe Waldmann <uwe@mpi-sb.mpg.de> for contributions here.)

_____
<2.6> How (in)secure is X Windows?

  X Windows is the primary software developed by the MIT Athena
  project which is funded by U.S. government grants to develop
  applications to harness the power of networks in enhancing
  computational tasks, particularly the human-computer interface. 
  The software implements a client-server interface to a computer via
  graphical windows. In this case the `client' is the application
  requesting or utilizing  graphical resources (such as windows or a
  mouse) and the `server' is the machine that provides them.  In many
  situations the client is an application program running on the same
  machine as the server.

  The great utility of X Windows comes from its complete dissociation
  of the client and server so that windows may be `broadcast' to a
  server at a remote location from the  client. Unfortunately this
  dynamic power also introduces many deep, intricate, and complicated
  security considerations.  The primary security and privacy issue
  associated with X Windows is that much more sensitive data may be
  sent over a network, and over wider regions, than in the case where
  the human is situated near the host computer.  Currently there is
  no encryption of data such as screen updates and keystrokes in X
  Windows.

  Due to either intentional design decisions or unintentional design
  flaws,  early versions of the X Window system are extremely
  insecure. Anyone with an account on the server machine can disrupt
  that display or read it electronically based on access to the
  device unix:0.0 by any regular user.   There are no protections
  from this type of access in these versions.   The problem arises
  because the security is completely based on machine addresses
  rather than users, such that any user at a `trusted' machine is
  himself trusted. Quoting from X documentation (man Xsecurity):
  
  > Any client on a host in the host access control list is allowed
  > access to the X server. This system can work reasonably well in
  > an environment where everyone trusts everyone, or when only a
  > single person can log into a given machine...This system does not
  > work well when multiple people can log in to a single machine and
  > mutual trust does not exist. 
  
  With the access control list, the `xhost' command may prevent some
  naive attempts (i.e. those other than the direct-access unix:0.0
  evasion); the syntax as typed on the host machine is  ``xhost
  +[name]'' where [name] is the domain name or internet address of an
  authorized client machine. By default clients running nonlocal to
  the host are disabled.  Public domain programs to disrupt a display
  momentarily (such as 'flip' or slowly mirror the screen image, or
  cause pixels to 'melt' down to the bottom) have been circulating on
  the internet among hackers for several years and played as pranks
  on unsuspecting or inexperienced users.  Much more serious security
  breaches are conceivable from similar mechanisms exploiting this
  inherent weaknesses.  (The minimal, easily-bypassed `trusted'
  security mode of `xhost' has been jokingly referred to as ``X
  Hanging Open, Security Terrible.''). 

  New versions of the X Window system (X11R5 and higher) by default 
  make server access as secure as the file system using a .Xauthority
  file and 'magic cookies'.  Remote machines must have a code in the
  .Xauthority file in the home directory that matches the code
  allowed by the server.  Many older programs and even new
  vendor-supplied code does not support or is incompatible with
  `magic cookies'. The basic magic cookie mechanism is vulnerable to
  monitoring techniques described earlier because no encryption of
  keys occurs in transmission.  X11R5 also includes other
  sophisticated encryption mechanisms.  Try `man Xsecurity' to find
  out what is supported at your site.  Even though improved security 
  mechanisms have been available in X Windows since ~1990, local
  sites often update this software infrequently because installation
  is extremely complex.


  (Thanks to Marc Vanheyningen <mvanheyn@whale.cs.indiana.edu>, 
  Jim Mattson <mattson@cs.ucsd.edu>, and Bill Marshall
  <marshall@cs.iastate.edu> for contributions here.)

_____
<2.7> How (in)secure is my email?

  By default, not very.  The characters that you are reading are
  almost certainly encoded in ASCII, the American Standard Code for
  Information Interchange that maps alphabetic and symbolic
  characters onto numeric codes and vice versa.  Virtually every
  computer system uses this code, and if not, has ways of converting
  to and from it.  When you write a mail message, by default it is
  being sent in ASCII,  and since the standard is virtually
  universal, there is no intrinsic privacy.  Despite milleniums worth
  of accumulated cryptographic knowledge, cryptographic technologies
  are only recently being established that afford high priority to
  privacy as a primary criteria in computer and network design.  Some
  potential pitfalls in privacy are as follows:

  - The most serious threats are instances of immature or unscrupulous
    system operators reading private mail in the `spool files' at a
    local site (i.e. at the source or destination of the message),
    such as a university. 
  
  - System administrators may also release files to law enforcement
    agencies, but conventions and protocols for warrants involving
    computer searches have still not been strongly established and
    tested legally.

  - Note that bounced messages go to postmasters at a given site in
    their entirety.  This means that if you address mail with an
    incorrect address it has a good chance of being seen by a human
    other than the recipient.

  - Typically new user accounts are always set up such that the local
    mail directory is private, but this is not guaranteed and can be
    overridden.

  - Finally, be aware that some mailing lists (email addresses of 
    everyone on a list) are actually publicly accessable via mail 
    routing software mechanisms.  This `feature' can be disabled.

  Most potential compromises in email privacy can be thoroughly
  avoided with the use of strong end-to-end cryptography, which has
  its own set of caveats (for example, unscrupulous administrators
  may still be a threat if the encryption site is shared or
  nonlocal).  See the sections on ``email privacy'' and ``email
  policies.''

_____
<2.8> How am I (not) liable for my email and postings?

  As punishment or whatever, your system administrator can revoke
  certain `privileges' such as emailing, USENET posting or reading
  certain groups, file transferring, remote communications, or
  generally any subset of capabilities available from your account. 
  This all is completely at the discretion of the local administrator
  and under the procedures followed at a particular site, which in
  many cases are haphazard and crisis-oriented.  Currently there are
  virtually no widespread, uniform guidelines or procedures  for
  restricting use to any internet services, and local administrators
  are free to make arbitrary decisions on access.

  Today punitive measures are regularly applied in various situations.
  In the typical scenario complaint(s) reach a system adminstrator
  regarding abuses by a user, usually but not necessarily preceded by
  complaints to the user in email, regarding that person's
  objectionable email or postings.  `abusive' posters to USENET are
  usually first given admonitions from their system administrators as
  urged by others on the `net'. (The debate persists endlessly on
  many newsgroups whether this is also used  as a questionable means
  of attacking or silencing `harmless crackpots' or censoring
  unpopular opinions.)
  
  System administrators at remote sites regularly cooperate to
  'squelch' severe cases of abuse.  In general, however, by tradition
  Usenet readers are remarkably tolerant of diverse views and uses of
  the system, but a colorful vocabularly of slang helps describe
  their alternatives when this patience is sapped: the options
  wielded by the individual user are to simply advance to the next
  message (referred to as ``hitting the `n' key''), or to `plonk'
  annoying posters (according to the Hacker's Dictionary, the sound a
  jerk makes at the end of a fall to the bottom of a kill file).

  In cases where punitive actions are applied, generally system
  administrators are least likely to restrict email.  USENET postings
  are much more commonly restricted, either to individual users or 
  entire groups (such as a university campus).  Restrictions are most
  commonly associated with the following `abuses':

  - harassing or threatening notes, `email terrorism'
  - illegal uses, e.g. piracy or propagation of copyrighted material
  - `ad hominem' attacks, i.e. insulting the reputation of the
    poster instead of citing the content of the message
  - intentional or extreme vulgarity and offensiveness
  - inappropriate postings, esp. binary files in regular groups
    `mail-bombing': inundating mail boxes with numerous or massive
    files

  Major problems originate from lack of distinctions in private and
  official email or postings.  Most users have internet access via
  accounts at businesses or universities and their activities on the
  internet can be construed as representative of their parent
  organizations. Many people put disclaimers in their `signatures' in
  an attempt dissociate their identity and activities from parent
  organizations as a precaution. A recent visible political case
  involves the privacy of electronic mail  written by White House
  staff members of the Bush administration.  Following are some
  guidelines:

  - Acquaint yourself with your company or university policy.
  - If possible, avoid use of your company email address for private
    communication.
  - Use a disclaimer.
  - Keep a low profile (avoid `flamewars' or simply don't post).
  - Avoid posting information that could be  construed to be
    proprietary or `internal'.

  The following references are available from ftp.eff.com
  (see also the section on ``internet use policies''):

  /pub/academic/banned.1991
  /pub/academic/banned.1992
  ---
    Computer material that was banned/challenged in academia in 1991
    and 1992 including USENET hierarchies.

  /pub/academic/cases
  ---
    This is an on-line collection of information about specific
    computers and academic freedom cases. File README is a detailed
    description of the items in the directory.

  /pub/academic/faq/netnews.liability
  ---
    Notes on university liability for Usenet.

_____
<2.9> How do I provide more/less information to others on my identity?

  The public information of your identity and account is mostly
  available though the UNIX utility `finger' described above. 
  
  - You have control over most of this information with the utility
    `chfn', the specifics vary between sites (on some systems use
    `passwd -f').
   
  - You can provide unlimited information in the .plan file which is
    copied directly to the destination during the fingering. 
    
  - A technique that works at some sites allows you to find out who is
    'finger'ing you and even to  vary the .plan file sent to them.
    
  - Your signature is determined by the environment variable SIGNATURE
    
  - USENET signatures are conventionally stored in the .signature file
    in your home directory.
    
  Providing less information on your online identity is more difficult
  and involved.  One approach is to ask your system adminstrator to
  change or delete information about you (such as your full name). 
  You may be able to obtain access on a public account or one from
  someone unrelated to you personally.  You may be able to remotely
  login (via modem or otherwise) to computers that you are not
  physically near.  These are tactics for hiding or masking your
  online activities but nothing is foolproof.  Consult man pages on
  the 'chmod' command and the default file mode.  Generally, files on
  a shared system have good safeguards within the user pool but very
  little protection is possible from corrupt system administrators.

  To mask your identity in email or on USENET you can use different
  accounts. More untraceable are new `anonymous posting' and
  remailing services that are very recently being established.  See
  below.

______
<2.10> Who is my sysadmin?  What does s/he know about me?

  The requirements and screening for getting a system administration
  job (and thereby access to all information on a system) vary widely
  between sites and are sometimes frighteningly lax, especially at
  universities.  Many UNIX systems at universities are largely
  managed by undergraduates with a background in computing and often
  `hacking'.  In general, commercial and industrial sites are more
  strict on qualifications and background, and government sites are
  extremely strict.

  The system adminstrator (root user) can monitor what commands you
  used and at what times.  S/he may have a record (backups) of files
  on your account over a few weeks. S/he can monitor when  you send
  email or post USENET messages, and potentially read either.  S/he
  may have access to records indicating what hosts you are using,
  both locally and elsewhere.  Administrators sometimes employ
  specialized programs to  track `strange' or `unusual' activity,
  which can potentially be misused.

______
<2.11> Why is privacy (un)stable on the internet?

  For the numerous reasons listed above, privacy should not be an
  expectation with current use of the internet.  Furthermore, large
  parts of the internet are funded by the U.S. NSF (National Science
  Foundation) which places certain restrictions on its use (such as
  prohibiting commercial use).  Some high-level officials in this and
  other government agencies may be opposed to emerging techniques to
  guarantee privacy (such as encryption and anonymous services).

  Historically the major threats to privacy on the internet have been
  local. Perhaps the most common example of this are the widespread
  occurrences of university administrators refusing to carry some
  portion of USENET newsgroups labelled as `pornographic'. The
  `alternative' hierarchy in the USENET system, which has virtually
  no restrictions on propagation and new group creation, is
  frequently targeted (although this material may appear anywhere).

  From the global point of view traffic is generally completely
  unimpeded on the internet  and only the most egregious offenders
  are pursued.  For example,  verbatim transcriptions of copyrighted
  material (such as newspaper or magazine articles) are posted to
  USENET with regularity without major consequences (some email
  complaints may ensue).  More astonishing to some is that currently
  significant portions of USENET traffic, and less so internet
  traffic, is comprised of sexually-explicit digitized images almost
  entirely originating from copyrighted material (newsgroups such as
  `alt.sex' regularly have the  highest traffic).
  
______
<2.12> What is the future of privacy on the internet?

  Some argue that the internet currently has an adequate or
  appropriate level of privacy.  Others will argue that as a
  prototype for future global networks it has woefully inadequate
  safeguards.  The internet is growing to become a completely global,
  international superhighway for data, and this traffic will
  inevitably entail data such as voice messages, postal mail, and
  many other items of extremely personal nature. Computer items that
  many people consider completely private (such as their local hard
  drives) will literally be inches from global network connections.
  Also, sensitive industrial and business information is exchanged
  over networks currently and this volume may conceivably merge with
  the internet.
  
  Most would agree that, for these basic but sensitive uses of the
  internet, no significant mechanisms are currently in place to
  ensure much privacy. New standards are calling for uniform
  introduction of `privacy enhanced mail' (PEM) which uses encryption
  technologies to ensure privacy, so that privacy protection is
  automatic, and may significantly improve safeguards.

  The same technology that can be extremely destructive to privacy
  (such as with  surreptitious surveilance) can be overwhelmingly
  effective in protecting  it (e.g. with encryption). Some government
  agencies are opposed to unlimited privacy in general, and believe
  that it should lawfully be forfeited in cases of criminal conduct
  (e.g. court-authorized wiretapping).  However, powerful new
  technologies to protect privacy on computers are becoming
  increasingly popular, provoking some to say that ``the cat is out
  of the bag'' and the ``genie can't be put back in the bottle''.  In
  less idiomatic terms, they believe that the spread of strong
  cryptography is already underway will be socially and technically
  unstoppable.
  
  To date, no feasible system that guarantees both secure
  communication and government oversight has been proposed (the two
  goals are largely incompatible). Proposals for ``registration'' of
  secret keys (by D. Denning on sci.crypt, for example) have been met
  with hot controversy at best and ridicule and derision at worst,
  mainly because of concerns for the right to privacy and objections
  of inherent feasibility.  Electronic privacy issues, and
  particularly the proper roles of networks and the internet, will
  foreseeably become highly visible and explosive over the next few
  years.


ANONYMITY
=========

_____
<3.1> What is `anonymity' on the internet?

  Simply stated, anonymity is the absence of identity, the
  ultimate in privacy. However, there are several variations on
  this simple theme.  A person may wish to be consistently
  identified by a certain pseudonym or `handle' and establish a
  reputation under it in some area, providing pseudo-anonymity.
  A person may wish to be completely untraceable for a single
  one-way message (a sort of `hit-and-run'). Or, a person may
  wish to be openly anonymous but carry on a conversation with
  others (with either known or anonymous identities) via an
  `anonymous return address'.  A user may wish to appear as a
  `regular user' but actually be untraceable.  Sometimes a user
  wishes to hide who he is sending mail to (in addition to the
  message itself). The anonymous item itself may be directed at
  individuals or groups.  A user may wish to access some
  service and hide all  signs of the association. 
  
  All of these uses are feasible on the internet but are currently
  tricky to carry out in practice, because of all the tracking
  mechanisms inherent to operating systems and network protocols. 
  Officials of the NSF and other government agencies may be opposed
  to any of these uses because of the potential for abuse. 
  Nevertheless, the inherent facelessness of large networks will
  always guarantee a certain element of anonymity.

_____
<3.2> Why is `anonymity' (un)important on the internet?

  Anonymity is another powerful tool that can be beneficial or
  problematic depending on its use.  Arguably absence of
  identification is important as the presence of it.  It may be the
  case that many strong benefits from electronic anonymity will be
  discovered that were unforeseen and unpredicted, because true
  anonymity has been historically very difficult to establish.

  One can use anonymity to make personal statements to a colleague
  that would sabotage a relationship if stated openly (such as
  employer/employee scenarios).  One can use it to pass information
  and evade any threat of direct retribution.  For example,
  `whistleblowers' reporting on government abuses (economic, social,
  or  political) can bring issues to light without fear of stigma or
  retaliation. Sensitive, personal, potentially damaging information
  is often posted to some USENET groups, a risky situation where
  anonymity allows conversations to be carried on completely
  independent of the identities of the participants.  Some police
  departments run phone services that allow anonymous reporting of
  crimes; such uses would be straightforward on the network.
  Unfortunately, extortion and harassment become more insidious with
  assurances of anonymity.

_____
<3.3> How can anonymity be protected on the internet?

  The chief means, as alluded to above, are masking identities in
  email and posting. However, anonymous accounts (public accounts as
  accessable and anonymous as e.g. public telephones) may be
  effective as well, but this use is generally not officially
  supported and even discouraged by some system adminstrators and NSF
  guidelines.  The nonuniformity in the requirements of obtaining
  accounts at different sites and institutions makes anonymous
  accounts generally difficult to obtain to the public at large.

  Many communications protocols are inherently detrimental to
  anonymity.  Virtually every protocol in existence currently
  contains information on both sender and receiver in every packet.
  New communications protocols will likely develop that guarantee
  much higher degrees of secure anonymous communication.

_____
<3.4> What is `anonymous mail'?

  One approach to `anonymizing' mail has been to set up an `anonymous
  server' that, when activated by email to its address, responds by
  allocating and supplying an `anonymous ID' that is unique to the
  person requesting it (based on his email address).  This will vary
  for the same person for different machine address email
  originations. To send anonymous mail, the user sends email directed
  to the server containing the final destination. The server
  `anonymizes' the message by stripping of identification information
  and forwards the message, which appears to originate from the
  anonymous server only from the corresponding anonymous user id. 
  This is the `interactive' use of anonymity or pseudonymity
  mentioned above.

  Another more `fringe' approach is to run a `cypherpunk' remailer
  from a regular user account (no root system privileges are
  required). These are currently being pioneered by  Eric Hughes and
  Hal Finney <hal@alumni.caltech.edu>. The operator runs a process on
  a machine that anonymizes mail sent to him with certain
  characteristics that distinguish it from his regular incoming mail
  (typically fields in the header). One has been implemented as a 
  PERL script running on UNIX.  Several of these are in existence
  currently but sites and software currently are highly unstable;
  they may be in operation outside of system administrator knowledge.
  The remailers don't generally support anonymous return addresses. 
  Mail that is incorrectly addressed is received by the operator. 
  Generally the user of the remailer has to disavow any
  responsibility for the messages forwarded through his system,
  although actually may be held liable regardless.

  These approaches have several serious disadvantages and weaknesses:
  
  - The anonymous server approach requires maintaining a mapping of
    anonymous ID's to real addresses that must be maintained
    indefinitely.  One alternative is to allow `deallocation' of
    aliases at the request of the user, but this has not been
    implemented yet.

  - Although an unlikely scenario, traffic to any of these sites could
    conceivably be monitored from the `outside', necessitating the
    use of cryptography for basic protection,.

  - Local administrators can shut them down either out of caprice or
    under pressure from local, network, or government agencies.
  
  - Unscrupulous providers of the services can monitor the traffic
    that goes through them.

  - Most remailers currently keep logs that may be inspected. 

  - The cypherpunk approach tends to be highly unstable because these
    operators are basically  network users who do not own the
    equipment and are accountable  to their own system
    administrators, who may be unaware of the use and unsympathetic
    to the philosophy of anonymity when the operation is discovered,
    regarding it as illicit use. 

  - In all cases, a high degree of trust is placed in the anonymous
    server operator by the user.

  Currently the most direct route to anonymity involves using SMTP
  protocols to submit a message directly to a server with arbitrary
  field information.  This practice, not uncommon to hackers, and the
  approach used by remailers, is generally viewed with hostility by
  most system administrators.  Information in the header routing data
  and logs of network port connection information may be retained
  that can be used to track the originating site.  In practice, this
  is generally infeasible and rarely carried out.  Some
  administrators on the network will contact local administrators to
  request a message be tracked and its writer admonished or punished
  more severely (such as revoking the account), all of this actually
  happening occasionally but infrequently.

  See the sections ``known anonymous mail and posting sites'' and 
  ``responsibilities associated with anonymity''.

_____
<3.5> What is `anonymous posting'?

  Anonymous servers have been established as well for anonymous Usenet
  posting with all the associated caveats above (monitored traffic,
  capricious or risky local circumstances, logging).  Make sure to
  test the system at least once by e.g. anonymous posting to
  misc.test (however some operators don't recommend this because many
  sites `autorespond' to test messages, possibly causing the
  anonymous server to allocate anonymous IDs for those machines). 
  See the ``responsibilties associated with anonymous posting''
  before proceeding.

  Another direct route involves using NNTP protocols to submit a
  message directly to a newserver with arbitrary field information.
  This practice, not uncommon to hackers, is also generally viewed
  with hostility by most system administrators, and similar
  consequences can ensue.

  See the sections ``known anonymous mail and posting sites'' and 
  ``responsibilities associated with anonymity''.

_____
<3.6> Why is anonymity (un)stable on the internet?

  As noted, many factors compromise the anonymity currently available
  to the general internet community, and these services should be
  used with great caution.  To summarize, the technology is in its
  infancy and current approaches are unrefined, unreliable, and not
  completely trustworthy.  No standards have been established and
  troubling situations of loss of anonymity and bugs in the software
  are prevalent.  Here are some encountered and potential bugs: 
  
  - One  anonymous remailer reallocated already allocated anonymous
    return addresses. 
  - Others passed signature information embedded in messages
    unaltered. 
  - Address resolution problems resulting in anonymized mail bounced
    to a remailer are common.
  - Forgeries to the anonymous server itself are a problem,  possibly
    allowing unauthorized users to potentially glean anon ID - email
    address  mappings in the alias file.  This can be remedied with
    the use of passwords.
  - Infinite mail loops are possible with chaining remailers.
  
  Source code is being distributed, tested, and refined for these
  systems, but standards are progressing slowly and weakly.  The
  field is not likely to improve considerably without  official
  endorsement and action by network agencies.  The whole idea is
  essentially still in its infancy and viewed with suspicion and
  distrust by many on the internet, seen as illegitimate or favorable
  to criminality.  The major objection to anonymity over regular
  internet use  is the perceived lack of accountability to system
  operators, i.e. invulnerability to account restrictions resulting
  from outside complaints.  System adminstrators at some sites have
  threatened to filter anonymous news postings generated by the
  prominent servers from their redistribution flows.  This may only
  have the effect of encouraging server operators to create less
  characteristically detectable headers.  Probably the least
  problematic approach, and the most traditional to Usenet, is for
  individual users to deal with anonymous mail however they prefer,
  e.g. ignoring it or filtering it with kill files.
  
_____
<3.7> What is the future of anonymity on the internet?

  New anonymous protocols effectively serve to significantly increase
  safeguards of anonymity.  For example, the same mechanism that
  routes email over multiple hosts, thereby threatening its privacy,
  can also be used to guarantee it. In a scheme called `chaining' an
  anonymous message is passed through multiple anonymous servers
  before reaching a destination.  In this way generally multiple
  links of the chain have to be `broken' for security to be
  compromised. Re-encryption at each link makes this scenario even
  more unlikely.  Even more significantly the anonymous remailers
  could be spread over the internet globally so that local weaknesses
  (such as corrupt governments or legal wiretapping within a nation)
  would be more unlikely to sacrifice overall security by message
  tracing. However, remailers run by corrupt operators are possible.
  
  The future of anonymous services on the internet is, at this time,
  highly uncertain and fraught with peril. While specific groups seem
  to benefit significantly from anonymous posting capabilities, many
  feel that unlimited newsgroup scope for anonymous posting is a
  disruptive and dangerous idea and detracts from discussions in
  `serious' groups.   The introduction of unlimited group anonymity
  may have fundamental repercussions on Usenet conventions and
  distribution mechanisms such as moderated and `alt' groups have had
  in the past. For example, as part of new group creation, the
  charter may specify whether `anonymous' posting is (un)welcome. 

  Nevertheless, the widespread introduction and use of anonymity may
  be inevitable. Based on traffic statistics, anonymous services are
  in huge demand. Pervasive and readily available anonymity could
  carry significant and unforeseen social consequences.  However, if
  its use is continued to be generally regarded as subversive it may
  be confined to the underground.  The ramifications of widespread
  introduction of anonymity to Usenet are still largely unknown. It
  is unclear whether it will provoke signficant amounts of new
  traffic or, instead of expansion, cause a shift where a greater
  portion of existing traffic is anonymized.  Conceivably the
  services could play a role in influencing future mainstream social
  acceptance of Usenet.


* * *