5th Amendment case in Vermont. Computer passwords and child porn

[ChamberedRound]

This guy could be a complete scumbag, I don't know, but he shouldn't be forced to give up his password. If he does, he incriminates himself, and his 5th Amendment rights grant him protection from that. We should all have that right, it doesn't matter if we're priests or thugs.

I don't understand how anyone could argue that his 5A rights don't apply just because it's computer related. Once again, this is a classic case of the government trying to use "modern circumstances" as an excuse to usurp the Constitution. This is no different than the government claiming the NFA and the CGA don't violate the 2A because the "founding fathers didn't know about machineguns".

[Eugene V. Debs]

Originally Posted by ChamberedRound

This guy could be a complete scumbag, I don't know, but he shouldn't be forced to give up his password. If he does, he incriminates himself, and his 5th Amendment rights grant him protection from that. We should all have that right, it doesn't matter if we're priests or thugs.

I don't understand how anyone could argue that his 5A rights don't apply just because it's computer related. Once again, this is a classic case of the government trying to use "modern circumstances" as an excuse to usurp the Constitution. This is no different than the government claiming the NFA and the CGA don't violate the 2A because the "founding fathers didn't know about machineguns".

Excellent analogy.

[ChamberedRound]

On an administrative note, I'm going to move this thread to the National Law & Politics forum. While it's not firearms related, IMHO it is an interesting case as far as Constitutional law is concerned.

[sjl127]

Your computer hard drive can be considered as an extension of your own mind.

I use the iron key, check it out, http://www.ironkey.com

[netw0rkpenguin]

Originally Posted by CCinPA

It was my understanding that PGP protection was not as strong as it use to be since 911. The government talked the writer into allowing a back door on all versions cince 911 and the more secure earlier versions are not available, the links for earlier very secure USA versions have been taken down.

Is there anyone who can shed some light on this. My notebook travels with me and I don't bother encrypting it in any was since I always thought all protection had built in back doors for the government.

Not 100% sure if it's true or not, the most credible rumors I heard is that is true for copies going out for export, not bought domestically, esp by large corporations.

Unless you are doing something very very wrong your threat profile should be mostly theft, other individuals, other corporations. Even a version of PGP backdoored by NSA will still be effective against those threats.


The .gov has had a hardon about backdooring crypto software since forver, it just takes on a different form. Google Diffie Hellman, clipper chip, key collisions, elliptic curve cryptography etc. Don't google echelon :-P .

Old versions are still available if you want to, some older versions do have buffer overflows and race conditions which can be theoretically exploited if you have it set to automatically decrypt email and your passphrase is cached.

[sjl127]

does truecrypt.org have a backdoor?

[netw0rkpenguin]

Originally Posted by sjl127

Your computer hard drive can be considered as an extension of your own mind.

I use the iron key, check it out, http://www.ironkey.com

Aren't they the company that got put to shame when it was exposed it is jsut a regular thumb drive with a program and not real hardware encryption? There were even pictures of the board to show there was no dedicated crypto chip on it? Could be another vendor but I'd look it up if I were you. If you want good hardware crypto look at flagstaff hard drives, they are a bit pricey though.

For just anonymous browsing burn yourself a live cd distro and use a proxy chain.

I should go do some work instead of dispensing infosec advise...

[CCinPA]

Originally Posted by sjl127

does truecrypt.org have a backdoor?

I don't know for sure but since it is opened source and the couece code is available I would think private security groups and activists would have decompiled teh source to see if it it is back doored. I am not certain of this though.

[netw0rkpenguin]

Originally Posted by sjl127

does truecrypt.org have a backdoor?

Truecryot is fucking good, has plausible deniability, volume within volume supposrt, run of usb stick support etc. If it did have a backdoor you could go look for it yourself since it is open source. There have been many great papers written since the 70s about backdooring the compiler that is used to compile trusted code so you could compile yourself. Realistically any back door that would have been added if there is 1 would be disguised as a buffer overflow, or some kind of a marker for hidden volumes.

[netw0rkpenguin]

Originally Posted by CCinPA

I don't know for sure but since it is opened source and the couece code is available I would think private security groups and activists would have decompiled teh source to see if it it is back doored. I am not certain of this though.

Since it is open source I don't need to decompile it, I can go to sourceforge and download the tarbal. Do you have any idea what goes into a source code audit? There has been software that has went from closed source to open source and only 5 years later did someone spot a hardcoded backdoor password.