"Stuart Miller" <stuart_miller@shaw.ca> wrote in message
news:EouZg.161589$R63.41013@pd7urf1no...
>
> "Aluxe" <aluxelocochon@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:1g5u1r8q8ztgp$.1a9ngqoflqnt2.dlg@40tude.net.. .
> > On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 19:58:19 GMT, David H. Lipman wrote:
> >> All of your subject matter is on COMSEC and alt.computer.security is
> >> the ONLY News Group
> >> you need to post to.
> >>
> > Hi David,
> > I don't know what a COMSEC is but I will look it up.
>
> There is a lot of interesting technical discussion here, but I would like
to
> take a different approach
> From all the posts here and on the 'firewall' newsgroup, I believe I
> understand what Aluxe is after.
>
> Certainly we can trace posts here by screen name or IP (of the router) ,
and
> if the IP changes it would make it more difficult to correlate posts if
made
> under a different name.
> When we post, we expect that our message will be read, and the consequence
> of that is that we identify ourselves to some degree. Some of us hide our
> e-mail address - I don't mind if mine shows.
>
> There was mention made of posts to 'personals' type groups, and not
wishing
> these posts to be correlated with technical posts. The use of different
> 'screen names' helps. But there is still the matter of IP address.
> Somebody could determine my IP address, and scan all usenet posts for
today
> and discover that I also posted to the 'windows98' group, because a post
> there had the same IP address, even if it was under a different name. If I
> had used a different screen name AND had changed my IP address, that
> correlation could not be made.
> It is worth noting that nobody 'owns' a usenet screen name - I have seen
the
> same name used by different posters. Therefore posts having the same
'screen
> name' suggests but does not proove that they were made by the same person.
>
> It would appear that, in order to cover ones tracks for this scenario, one
> would have to do the technical (public) posts from home and either use a
> different name with dial up, a public computer, or take the laptop to a
> hotspot for the 'personals' posts. These can still be traced to some
degree,
> but with normal tools could not correlate the technical poster with the
> 'personals' poster.
>
> This has nothing to do with security, but does grant a measure of privacy.
>
> Comments?

Interesting remarks. Especially when we now see that the FBI wants to force
the ISP's to track the users of their systems.
So what to do about privacy. Concerning your broadband connection to an ISP,
the cable/dsl modem would be the device used to identify you to the system.
This address while it probably can be changed, would probably result in the
ISP blocking your access, as now that address does not match their records.
So realizing that you cannot change that address, changing your own
computers address really does no good, as you could still be identified just
because of your connection to the broadband service. Using a dialup account
may be a bit harder, but you would still have to provide some form of
identification/authorization to log on, hence as a paying subscriber you
really cannot avoid being identified.
The free public hotspots, can remain free but I can see where in the future
they may have you log in to use the system, the room for abuse here is
large, so being tracked while using a free public hotspot may be difficult
at best, unless the providers are forced to implement strict accountability
procedures. I.E you have to show your drivers license to use the system, and
your license number will be associated with the MAC you use to connect. But
that takes a lot of oversight.
So where does that leave people like the OP who desires more privacy.
I see his only avenue would be to use proxy servers while surfing, and some
premium news group posting service that strips his headers and uses there
own headers as a way of remaining semi private.

>
>