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I am in the process of developing a new messaging system to address exactly that issue ( anonymous communication where it is unclear who is talking to who ) Th

I am in the process of developing a new messaging system to address exactly that issue ( anonymous communication where it is unclear who is talking to who ) The way in which it will work is having all users of the system constantly send encrypted streams to each other ( mostly gibberish ). When you want to send a real message you simply replace the encrypted gibberish with some real content. It will implement "onion" style repeated encryption to prevent direct links from being statistically analyzed as well. Look for it in 6 months or so. Details will be up at circleofdistrust.com in about a month or so.

avoutthere 13y ago
Anybody building such systems today should have a plan for when (not if) they receive a National Security Letter.
- nanoscopic 13y ago
  Fuck the NSA. Dear NSA: I can and will be designing a fully anonymous open source distributed messaging system that is entirely secure even if you tap every line in the world. At the very best, you will be able to accuse people just of running the software. If you don't like this, I'd advise you that your only option is to hire me and/or pay be enough money to become disinterested in finishing the creation of the software.
  - JshWright 13y ago
    I take it you're not a US citizen?
    - prof_hobart 13y ago
      Or a citizen of any country that is friends with the US, or someone who is ever planning on passing through the airport of one of those countries.
  - advice4u 13y ago
    If you succeed in your endeavor, they probably would want to hire you.
  - nanoscopic 13y ago
    I am a U.S. citizen. I still believe in freedom of speech, as well as my right to "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of hapiness". I am also a Libertarian, which means I don't believe in large government, due to the corruption that follows. So long as my goals and beliefs are for freedom and privacy, the creation of secure anonymous messaging is of little interest to the NSA. Will they "like" if it is intentionally designed in a way that it could be used by criminals? No... But I should have no fear of that. Just because guns can kill people doesn't mean you should use them for that. Just because atomic theory can be used to make large bombs doesn't mean nuclear energy is wrong. Just because pressure cookers contain heat well at pressure doesn't mean you should use them for anything besides cooking your food.
  - hershel 13y ago
    Trying to blackmail the NSA ? please let us know how it goes, it could be an interesting story.
  - jacquesm 13y ago
    > If you don't like this, I'd advise you that your only option is to hire me and/or pay be enough money to become disinterested in finishing the creation of the software. So, I think you just lost my trust. You're coming at this from the wrong angle, instead of coming from a princpled stance you're approaching this as a value proposition. Too bad, up to there you had my attention.
BruceM 13y ago
Check out the mixmaster anonymous remailers: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixmaster_anonymous_remailer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixmaster_anonymous_remailer
- nanoscopic 13y ago
  The problem with this is that it is basically this "server x supposedly receives stuff and then sends stuff on without linking identities A and B". What if I don't trust server X to really be doing that? What if the government contacted owner of server X and altered the software not to do that? The system I am designing keeps anonymity without any need to trust the server. Hence the name. Don't trust anyone.
gizmo686 13y ago
The idea of masking real content with gibberish always seems hacky to me, and in security hacky is not a good idea. While I suspect you might be able to make it work, I think a better solution is to go to more of a bitcoin approach. Essentially, set up a new block-chain that allows transactions to contain 'large' messages (IE. large enough for long plaintext, but probably not enough to embed videos). Then, when you want to send a message, encrypt it using the intended recipients public key, then publish the cipher-text to the blockchain.
- yafujifide 13y ago
  Have you heard of bitmessage? It basically does what you suggest.
  - nanoscopic 13y ago
    Bitmessage is essentially a torrent server where everyone gets a copy of everyone elses emails, so you get your email by downloading all emails. Unfortunately in such a system, you have to download all emails, or request what you want in order to actual get the email you want. The system either does not scale, or will leak information in order to remove the requirement of getting everyone elses emails. Also, the government can collect -all- of the encrypted messages easily, and potentially eventually correlate who an anonymous id is based on their knowledge of who received messages on which day. Basically, it sucks.
    - gizmo686 13y ago
      I haven't checked Bitmessage's protocals, but that it is not nessasary to identify the intended recipient. If you publish the ciphertext with no meta-data, then everyone can attempt to decrypt it. Only the intended recipient would succeed, but an ease dropper would not be able to identify who successfully decrypted the message. This raises an obvious scalability question, as you need to attempt to decrypt every message that is used in the network (in addition to simply downloading it which you have to do anyway). There are probably ways to mitigate this overhead without compromising security.

avoutthere 13y ago

Anybody building such systems today should have a plan for when (not if) they receive a National Security Letter.

nanoscopic 13y ago
Fuck the NSA. Dear NSA: I can and will be designing a fully anonymous open source distributed messaging system that is entirely secure even if you tap every line in the world. At the very best, you will be able to accuse people just of running the software. If you don't like this, I'd advise you that your only option is to hire me and/or pay be enough money to become disinterested in finishing the creation of the software.
- JshWright 13y ago
  I take it you're not a US citizen?
  - prof_hobart 13y ago
    Or a citizen of any country that is friends with the US, or someone who is ever planning on passing through the airport of one of those countries.
- advice4u 13y ago
  If you succeed in your endeavor, they probably would want to hire you.
- nanoscopic 13y ago
  I am a U.S. citizen. I still believe in freedom of speech, as well as my right to "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of hapiness". I am also a Libertarian, which means I don't believe in large government, due to the corruption that follows. So long as my goals and beliefs are for freedom and privacy, the creation of secure anonymous messaging is of little interest to the NSA. Will they "like" if it is intentionally designed in a way that it could be used by criminals? No... But I should have no fear of that. Just because guns can kill people doesn't mean you should use them for that. Just because atomic theory can be used to make large bombs doesn't mean nuclear energy is wrong. Just because pressure cookers contain heat well at pressure doesn't mean you should use them for anything besides cooking your food.
- hershel 13y ago
  Trying to blackmail the NSA ? please let us know how it goes, it could be an interesting story.
- jacquesm 13y ago
  > If you don't like this, I'd advise you that your only option is to hire me and/or pay be enough money to become disinterested in finishing the creation of the software. So, I think you just lost my trust. You're coming at this from the wrong angle, instead of coming from a princpled stance you're approaching this as a value proposition. Too bad, up to there you had my attention.

BruceM 13y ago

Check out the mixmaster anonymous remailers: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixmaster_anonymous_remailer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixmaster_anonymous_remailer

nanoscopic 13y ago
The problem with this is that it is basically this "server x supposedly receives stuff and then sends stuff on without linking identities A and B". What if I don't trust server X to really be doing that? What if the government contacted owner of server X and altered the software not to do that? The system I am designing keeps anonymity without any need to trust the server. Hence the name. Don't trust anyone.

gizmo686 13y ago

The idea of masking real content with gibberish always seems hacky to me, and in security hacky is not a good idea. While I suspect you might be able to make it work, I think a better solution is to go to more of a bitcoin approach. Essentially, set up a new block-chain that allows transactions to contain 'large' messages (IE. large enough for long plaintext, but probably not enough to embed videos). Then, when you want to send a message, encrypt it using the intended recipients public key, then publish the cipher-text to the blockchain.

yafujifide 13y ago
Have you heard of bitmessage? It basically does what you suggest.
- nanoscopic 13y ago
  Bitmessage is essentially a torrent server where everyone gets a copy of everyone elses emails, so you get your email by downloading all emails. Unfortunately in such a system, you have to download all emails, or request what you want in order to actual get the email you want. The system either does not scale, or will leak information in order to remove the requirement of getting everyone elses emails. Also, the government can collect -all- of the encrypted messages easily, and potentially eventually correlate who an anonymous id is based on their knowledge of who received messages on which day. Basically, it sucks.
  - gizmo686 13y ago
    I haven't checked Bitmessage's protocals, but that it is not nessasary to identify the intended recipient. If you publish the ciphertext with no meta-data, then everyone can attempt to decrypt it. Only the intended recipient would succeed, but an ease dropper would not be able to identify who successfully decrypted the message. This raises an obvious scalability question, as you need to attempt to decrypt every message that is used in the network (in addition to simply downloading it which you have to do anyway). There are probably ways to mitigate this overhead without compromising security.