Re: Crazy idea: How trust in darknets enables secure de

On Mon, Jul 11, 2005 at 06:10:56PM -0700, Tom Kaitchuck wrote:
> >
> >Granted, there are people abusing that to insert wide varieties of porn,
> >including c.p. but you see, that's a price that has to be paid.  If freenet
> >is to be what it's stated purpose is, then the ONLY action that can be
> >taken in regard to content that somebody finds objectionable is to not
> >request it.  One can also help push older objectionable content out by
> >continuing to insert quality content.
> > 
> >
> I wonder if the existence of the objectionable content is really the 
> problem. I mean people know there are things they don't like on the 
> normal Internet, but largely ignore it because they don't go to those 
> sites. The issue people see with freenet is that they could be spreading 
> this content. I think if we could eliminate this it would be better than 
> forcing people to look at the content that they don't want to see.

We can, and we can't. We can, by forcing the pedophiles to fork onto a
completely separate darknet, through the proposed means. We can't, in that
we can't undermine freenet's whole distributed storage ideal without
making it a completely different network. Yes we could implement a
non-load-bearing DHT (or something similar that would work on a
darknet), but that would not deal with caching.
> 
> >The problem with tracing and taking action against objectionable content is
> >that the definition of objectionable content has a tendency to change.
> >
> >Today the bad thing is c.p., tomorrow it's a certain political view, next
> >it's something else... and so on.
> > 
> >
> It would be great if we could specify criteria for what is acceptable, 
> and let the software handle it. However there is no way that software 
> can KNOW what the content is, at all. So all such decisions are 
> ultimately made by people. However if people did the right thing, we 
> would have no need for software.

The idea here is that we get people to vet content _occasionally_, and
if a certain subnet is a source of stuff we don't like, we warn them,
and then we warn them, and then we disconnect from them.
> 
> >I'm thinking ahead to when the thing that is illegal to distribute is
> >certain Christian teachings.  Given a system like you describe it is true
> >that a lot of c.p. can be removed.  However that same system would cause
> >the deaths of a lot of people in the eventual Hyper-Anti-Christian world
> >that is developing.
> > 
> >
> DEVELOPING? Where? Today a great number of religious groups including 
> various Christian ones are illegal in China. Some provinces in India are 
> no better. 5 years ago Christianity was a capital offense in 
> Afghanistan, today many of it's neighbors have globalization friendly, 
> but internally oppressive governments. The "western" world, however is 

Save us from Western-friendly totalitarian states! :)

Seriously, the point here is that I don't see how most religious groups
(if we accept that it's legitimate to help them express themselves)
COULD use freenet on any scale.

> certainly not becoming any more anti-Christian, it is true that there is 
> more rhetoric as Christianity has come to the forefront of the political 
> scene. But today in the United States for example, weekly church 
> attendance as a percentage of the population is at it's highest levels 
> ever. (and yes that includes those 200 years before it it was founded.) 

<FLAMEBAIT>Cool, shame most of them are republicans who ignore the
responsibility to care for the poor.</FLAMEBAIT> :)

> So the "Western" world will not become "Hyper-Anti-Christian" in our 
> lifetimes or our grand children's. However the fact remains that all the 
> world is not so fortunate. Today more than 2/3rds of the worlds 
> population lives in arias where free speach is simply not allowed.
> 
> Given that Freenet appeals to a global audience, there are two important 
> things to consider:
> 1. It is easy to filter everything, especially if you control all the 
> infrastructure and can pass laws requiring monitoring of people.

This is a problem but I am of the view that even if the internet is
shut down to the point that we can't run FNP over any sort of stego, we
will still be able to use _some_ transport. E.g. sneakernet. :)

> 2. Most people don't have the Internet.

A _lot_ of people do, especially in rapidly developing nations such as
India and China. Admittedly in the cities, and more often than not
students - but these are exactly the people who need it most.
> 
> So it makes since to try to present Freenet as being reasonable and safe 
> software to further it's adoption (I doubt most governments really care 
> about Kazza, but people like it). On the other hand one could try to be 
> more absolute and try to conceal the network completely. In this case a 
> darknet makes sense, it might make it's adoption harder, but it would 
> not be so easily taken down. However I don't see the gain in doing both. 
> (Technical anilisis of proposeal to come...)

Sorry, doing both what? We need a darknet because even in the West
there's a good chance of a working Freenet being banned, and it can't
survive that unless it is resistant to harvesting.
-- 
Matthew J Toseland - toad-EI5O+8PHWbJeeLb3ft/[email protected]
Freenet Project Official Codemonkey - http://freenetproject.org/
ICTHUS - Nothing is impossible. Our Boss says so.

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