Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!looking!brad
From: brad@looking.on.ca (Brad Templeton)
Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk
Subject: Re: The end of privacy... and so what comes next?
Message-ID: <1991Apr01.052655.3549@looking.on.ca>
Date: 1 Apr 91 05:26:55 GMT
References: <63473@bbn.BBN.COM>
Organization: Looking Glass Software Ltd.
Lines: 51

Here's an interesting idea...

What if we make it normal and legal for people to maintain literally
thounsands of aliases.   In fact, each different type transaction we would
make might be done with a different alias.    Your phone number is one,
your address another, your employee number, your account number with
everybody you deal with -- and you might have multiple accounts.

Bonded alias houses would store the aliases, and they would know which
ones were you in case of criminal investigation, and, sadly, tax
investigation.    But nobody else would have access without your
permission.

When you go to the bank for credit, you say to them, "By the way,
I am also XJ12312 and KJL234234 and KLJLlkjl and so on and so on..." listing
the relevant aliases under which they might check your credit.   Your
contract with the bank or other credit provider would require them to
erase the collection after having verified it.

For dozens of different transactions you might group together aliases in
different ways, as you wish.

Order something?  Don't give them your address, give them one of your
many shipping aliases, which they can then give to the post office or
UPS or any other bonded shipper, and the shipper will deliver it.

Of course, if you *want* to be recognized, you give the same alias that
you did last time, when ordering your pizza.    Credit cards?  The bank
sends you 100 different credit card nubmers that are all you to the bank,
and you give out the one you want.

This all assumes a smart-card carrying society, and a computer based
transaction system with a terminal in every home.  We'll get that.
Naturally, most of this aliasing will be invisible to you in most
situations.  Your smartcard will hand out a different credit card alias
each time without you knowing.   Your aliases will be classed so that
you can easily group them to hand to the bank to get credit.

Is fraud more likely under this system?  Probably.  Is it worth the
increased privacy?

Is the privacy all that much better?  Or would this be a false sense
of privacy?  Would bribes buy your aliases from the bonded alias clearing
houses too easily?   Would the NSA be able to quickly learn who you are
in your many forms?


Perhaps this system, while messy (but hopefully hidden from view) could
give us privacy and freedom at the same time?
-- 
Brad Templeton, ClariNet Communications Corp. -- Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473