[3173] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: An Essay on Freedom, Anonymity & Financial
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Dianelos Georgoudis)
Mon Aug 10 01:00:23 1998
Date: Sun, 09 Aug 1998 23:32:05 -0500
From: Dianelos Georgoudis <dianelos@tecapro.com>
To: cryptography@c2.net
Reply-To: dianelos@tecapro.com
X-Return-Receipt-To: dianelos@tecapro.com
Dianelos Georgoudis writes:
>> Consider: almost all crimes are=
about money. In an international
>> system where money is by defi=
nition stamped with the identity of
>> its current and previous ow=
ners, stealing money, for example,
>> would be impossible. [=85]
=
Perry Metzger writes:
>Freedom would also become largely impossible.=
>
>You are essentially advocating the "surveillance state". If all o=
f
>everyone's activities are always tracked, how can anyone do evil? [=
=85]
I was only talking about a new form of money. I don't quite=
see
why this means that everyone's activities will always be trac=
ked.
Very few of my own activities are financial transactions.
=
If we agree that most crime is about money, then traceable money
=
will result in a more secure society where state surveillance is
=
less needed and therefore more difficult to justify. Police would
=
become more efficient. Government corruption would largely
disap=
pear because bribery would become a complicated matter.
As far a=
s freedom is concerned, the worldwide rise of criminality
is alrea=
dy restricting the freedom of most people - rich or poor.
Tax evas=
ion and government corruption are putting the breaks on
economic g=
rowth, efficiency and justice.
Encryption is potentially a very =
powerful technology. All of us
who develop encryption technology s=
hould take some time and think
about the ethical questions related=
to it. I don't think that
strong encryption can (or should) be st=
opped and therefore in a
few years time most everybody will be abl=
e to communicate in
secret, which would greatly facilitate most ty=
pes of crime and
make law enforcement much more difficult. I thoug=
ht that traceable
money would be a very effective way to balance t=
his situation.
Anyway, this is a very complex matter and I may ver=
y well be wrong.
It is not my intention to start an off topic di=
scussion in this
mailing list. Therefore I would like to bow out o=
f this
debate. I have started a thread in talk.politics.crypto whe=
re
the reader may wish to further pursue this matter.
Diane=
los Georgoudis
email: dianelos@tecapro.com
http://www.tecapro.com
