On 10/22/02, Franck Martin wrote: >"Here is my preferred solution for Internet security. We >could implement a secure user identity system precisely >like telephone Caller ID. It would be essentially an >Internet ID. All Internet transactions could be based on >it. Anyone who sends me e-mail can be identified. Anything >I send can be traced to me. People wouldn't be forced to >participate, but if they remain anonymous, I might choose >to block them. I certainly wouldn't accept file >attachments from them. I know you hate this idea, but I >think the Internet needs a fingerprint. It does not have >to have personal information, but if you break the law it >can be traced to you. You can choose not to have a >fingerprint, but then your ability to communicate with >others may be limited -- a price many people may choose to >pay. " > > If posting this comment on this thread is supposed to imply that this is an alternative to Palladium, then I would strongly suggest actually going and reading some of the Palladium material. Palladium is ultimately about creating a lockbox for key data within a system. It really implies almost nothing about system to system interaction -- it has more to do with how a distributed application can avoid trusting the OS to store data and keys. Which is an admirable goal. I'll have to see the details. I have some skepticism about how you prevent the OS, which is the local traffic cop, from pulling off a man-in-the-middle attack. You can also make the obvious cheap jokes about Microsoft leading the way to solve problems of applications developers that do not trust the Operating System... But seriously, there are two types of Operating Systems that distributed applications should not trust: those where you cannot review the source code, and those where any attacker can modify the source code. A lot of this thread has struck me as an attempt to import the Bush/Cheney foreign policy to the IETF. Microsoft is evil, therefore everything Microsoft does is evil. Any statements they make are just part of their evil plan. We might as well launch the pre-emptive strike right now. It would make more sense to examine whether any aspect of this problem is a proper topic for the IETF, and where our concerns about interoperability would be. For example, Microsoft's position papers claim that alternate Nexus implementations will be legal. Will users be able to enable different Nexus implementations to interoperate and share keys for sealed storage? Caitlin Bestler http://asomi.com/CaitlinBestler/