Xref: utzoo comp.org.eff.talk:2490 alt.privacy:736 alt.censorship:2428 Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk,alt.privacy,alt.censorship Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!think.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!casbah.acns.nwu.edu!mikea From: mikea@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (Atkinson Michael) Subject: Re: Prodigy charged with invading users' privacy Message-ID: <1991Jun1.172405.2877@casbah.acns.nwu.edu> Organization: Northwestern University References: <1991May28.050807.18871@casbah.acns.nwu.edu> Date: Sat, 1 Jun 1991 17:24:05 GMT Lines: 35 In article rockwell@socrates.umd.edu (Raul Rockwell) writes: >Me: > >People truly concerned about security don't hook their machines up > >to the outside world at all, run them in shielded rooms, do > >extensive validation on both the equipment and the software, etc. > >Michael Atkinson: > I have a few files on my hard drive that I don't care for > others to see. I have .ZIPed them with encryption, which on a > MS-DOS machine with PKZIP is fairly easy to do. Maybe somebody > with a serious decryption program could figure out that it is > zipped (has inoccuous .ext) and could figure out my key, but it > isn't *that* sensitive. > >Good, because any time you display the text (or whatever) in those >files on your screen, you're broadcasting it to the world (or at least >everybody in a several block radius with some fairly trivial >equipment). [Assuming you're using a CRT display.] > >Raul Rockwell Several block radius? Fairly trivial equipment? In My Less Than Perfect Understanding, it was a less than 100 foot radius with some serious equipment. Furthermore, if it is a couple of blocks, there are about 2000 other undergrads, with maybe 700 computers between them, within a couple of blocks. Interference might make it a bit difficult to read my text. Does anybody have the info on this technology? Michael A. Atkinson | "Life doesn't happen in straight lines." mikea@casbah.acns.nwu.edu | All opinions expressed herein are solely Student Consultant | those of my friend Buck the squirrel. Academic Computing and Network Services, Northwestern University