tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21633793.post5017456578921260264..comments2023-12-12T03:19:42.467-05:00Comments on CYB3RCRIM3: Envelopes and encryptionSusan Brennerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17575138839291052258noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21633793.post-4763567554706122722007-10-13T10:47:00.000-04:002007-10-13T10:47:00.000-04:00Good points.As to envelopes as cultural expectatio...Good points.<BR/><BR/>As to envelopes as cultural expectation of privacy: The Katz standard (from Katz v. U.S.) which the Supreme Court uses to decide if we have a Fourth Amendment expectation of privacy incorporates the concept of cultural expectations. Under Katz, I have a Fourth Amendment expectation of privacy if (i) I think something (my email) is private and (ii) society agrees. We pick up the cultural expectation in the second prong.<BR/><BR/>As to the Caesar cipher, it should work . . . I don't see any magic to the particular form encryption takes, as long as we "seal" the envelope for our email.<BR/><BR/>Thanks for the observations.Susan Brennerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17575138839291052258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21633793.post-8962383014347554392007-10-12T20:24:00.000-04:002007-10-12T20:24:00.000-04:00An envelope is really a cultural expectation of pr...An envelope is really a cultural expectation of privacy -- a notification that some affirmative action must be taken in order to view the contents, an action which is unambiguous in intent.<BR/><BR/>An electronic equivalent, then, might be a simple Caesar cipher (so-called because, according to Suetonius, Julius Caesar used it) which shifts every letter a fixed number of places.<BR/><BR/>The most widely used Caesar cipher is also called ROT-13, and is customarily used in Usenet news groups to hide the content of messages which are on-topic but contain information that not everyone wishes to see. The canonical examples are plot points in recently released movies, and potentially offensive jokes. It only takes a few lines of code to implement a Caesar cipher.<BR/><BR/>So, we can implement envelope-effective protection by adopting legislation that any enciphered or encrypted message automatically receives the same protection as a sealed letter, and using a Caesar cipher for our routine messages, and arrange for something more effective but harder to implement for those who want that.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com