Interesting People mailing list archives
Re: Vanish: Self-destructing digital data
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 2009 19:17:13 -0400
Begin forwarded message: From: "Ed Gerck, Ph.D." <egerck () nma com> Date: July 22, 2009 12:09:03 PM EDT To: dave () farber net Cc: ip <ip () v2 listbox com> Subject: Re: [IP] Vanish: Self-destructing digital data [Dave: for IP if you wish]
From: Tadayoshi Kohno <yoshi () cs washington edu> Date: July 21, 2009 1:28:00 PM EDT To: dave () farber net Subject: Vanish: Self-destructing digital dataToday the New York Times reported on our "Vanish" research project on "self-destructing data": http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/science/21crypto.html .
Congratulations on the NYT article. However, the significant point of using a trust model that does not depend on the integrity of third parties is not new, while relying on a peer-to-peer network for "key hiding" is by itself an unsolved problem today (both technically and commercially). The free "Zmail Basic" listed in "Ten Free Services To Send Self-Destructing Emails Which Expire/Disappear Automatically After Specified Time Interval" at <http://thinkabdul.com/2007/07/25/ten-free-services-to-send-self-destructing-emails-which-expiredisappear-automatically-after-specified-time-interval/ > also uses a trust model that does not depend on the integrity of third parties but the novelty there is that keys are not stored anywhere (each dialogue party holds a part of it), and uses a system of "minority control" to allow independent destruction of the capability to reassemble the entire key.
Regarding legal issues surrounding the use of any "self-destruct" technology, where certain laws do require that corporations archive e- mails and make them accessible, the same "Zmail Basic" offers a solution based on both technology and the legal control offered by the US DMCA (and similar laws internationally), allowing senders to independently control the lifetime of the information they send -- which is legally- and technically-effective.
Best regards, Ed Gerck (*) I designed Zmail Basic and Premium. ------------------------------------------- Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/ Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
Current thread:
- Vanish: Self-destructing digital data David Farber (Jul 22)
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- Re: Vanish: Self-destructing digital data David Farber (Jul 22)
- Re: Vanish: Self-destructing digital data David Farber (Jul 23)
- Re: Vanish: Self-destructing digital data David Farber (Jul 23)
- Re: Vanish: Self-destructing digital data David Farber (Jul 23)
- Re: Vanish: Self-destructing digital data David Farber (Jul 23)
- Re: Vanish: Self-destructing digital data David Farber (Jul 23)