[Noisebridge-discuss] Deep Crack

[Jeffrey Malone]

I fully understand the historical significance of this machine, and
the prestige that Noisebridge would have in hosting it.

However, I object to it being at Noisebridge, as it violates our
current policies which you yourself have vehemently defended, and
leaves us open to a large amount of liability.

On Wed, Oct 7, 2009 at 10:07 PM, Jacob Appelbaum <jacob at appelbaum.net> wrote:
> I had a conversation with John Gilmore today about picking up Deep
> Crack. During our discussion, I asked John about donating the machine
> and about a receipt and so on. To my surprise, he isn't ready to
> transfer ownership of the machine to Noisebridge at this time. This
> outright solves any tax concerns, although such concerns would have been
> John's burden anyway (it's up to him to value the item, not us -- we
> just confirm that we received an item).
>

We explicitly do not allow donations with strings attached.  This is
one of the two strings that come with this (the other I discuss below
quoting your reference to it).  Loans have not been regarded as
acceptable due to the ability for the owner to remove it, and due to
the risk that people could damage or alter the item.  What if we
damage it?  Either someone altering it, screwing with it,
incidental/accidental damage, etc.  What kind of liability would we
face?
For a machine with this much value, I would NEVER accept a verbal
agreement stating that we would not have liability.

> I'm going to lead a time limited project involving Deep Crack. The goal
> of this project will be to understand the history of the politics
> surrounding DES, a study of the machine itself and we'll hopefully also
> actually crack some DES keys at some point during this project. I hope
> we can find something in the wild to crack (found ciphertext, is that
> like found art?) but I'm also happy to attempt to crack a specially
> crafted message just for the purposes of learning!
>

I was told it's $300/key to crack.  I've also been told that you and
others have offered to pay for the power to run this so that
Noisebridge doesn't get the burden.  But, due to two factors it's
sadly not that simple.  The first is the actual power usage -- how
many amps does this require, and how reasonably can we provide it
without causing the rest of the space to be deficient?
Secondly, PG&E bills electricity on a tiered system.  Thus, the more
power you use, the more expensive it becomes per kWh.  This means that
even if you pay the $300 for a key to be cracked, the power
Noisebridge normally uses will cost more.  Attempting to calculate out
how much that additional cost would end up being is going to be an
overly complicated task.


> From a legal perspective, I do not believe that being near the Deep
> Crack machine is going to pose a problem for non-US citizens. Deep Crack
> was famously run a number of times, it even won awards for these runs! I
> might add that it was quite the spectacle, so it wasn't simply
> unnoticed! I have stood next to a non-US citizen holding a part of the
> machine. As I understand it this is not a violation of ITAR in spirit or
> in the letter of the law. I'll talk with John about this tomorrow too.
> He has spent a long time fighting ITAR and is probably the best person
> on the planet to talk with about it.
>
> I do however believe that a non-US citizen should not attempt to run or
> use the machine. This issue will not preclude any such persons from
> _learning about the machine_ or its history.
>
> I will attempt to talk with the relevant legal minds at the EFF and
> until then, I ask that people who have a concern about their respective
> visa situation to not touch the machine. It seems clear to me that if
> you're not sure if you should touch such a system, please be reasonable
> and do not do so.
>

This is obviously the #1 concern.  Whether or not it is legal for a
non-US citizen to be next to our touching the machine is a huge
concern.  Even the hint of doubt that it may be a problem should keep
this out of the space.  But Noisebridge has many members who are not
citizens -- and I fully reject us having tools in Noisebridge that
only a subset of our members can use.  It goes against our policies,
and leaves us open to a huge legal liability that could result in
Noisebridge being dissolved.
We could never guarantee that only citizens would operate the machine.


There are also many other issues with this, but I feel the ones I've
put forth to be the most pressing.
Until these questions are satisfactorily resolved, I do not feel that
this should be in Noisebridge.

Also, while this is not in ANY way a threat, I would remind you that
our policy currently does not allow private property to be stored at
Noisebridge with any guarantees that it will remain intact or unused.
I can honestly state that I would not participate in anything, but I
want to make it clear that our current policies explicitly say that
the integrity of the machine is in no way guaranteed or even
suggested.

Jeffrey