O__________O

Appears you did a “Show HN” for Olvy almost a year ago:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30695628

Would it be possible for you to clarify your role at the company?

Link appears to be broken.

> which shouldn't be too hard to do tbh.

If so, should not be too hard to reply to this comment outlining the related workflow, prompts, etc.

When mailing item anonymous, never mail identifiable items from same point, especially in the same batch. Never use same drop. Beware that every anonymous item is traceable to point of entry. Numerous anonymous items mailed in a way the potential pattern analysis that when combined with other metadata might be identifiable; for example, mobile phone records.

Realize you believe degree to which I look at risks is unnecessary, but to me, it’s irresponsible to neglect mentioning how complex good OpSec is — and how frequently minor mistakes, especially over extended duration add up.

Wish you the best; I am done replying to your responses as they clearly are upsetting your sense of what’s reasonable, which is not my intention.

Above being here:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35027654

* To get a direct link to a HN comment, click timestamp for related comment; then click parent if additional context is needed.

Feel like automating the human feedback, not the summaries themselves, that should have been the core focus of research like this. As is, even reading guidelines for summary evaluation they presented the reviewers are not reproducible.

Vehicle have long list of identifiable traits, many of which are possible to systematically monitor; not to mention if individual is actively being watched it’s now very easy to put a variety of tracking devices on a vehicle that are very hard to find.

Google requires a phone number for most users to create a new account; there are currently ways around this, but for obvious reasons, I have no intention of sharing how to do this.

Google Voice has always required a phone number for signup, since its legacy design was to forward calls. When creating the account you’re able to allow Google to generate a Google Voice number for the account, disconnect the setup number, and use Google without a phone number.

Why though go to all that trouble when Signal just needs a PIN one-time from a throw away number; at which point Signal allows user to lockout future registrations from that number as long as the Signal account is active per their definition.

(Appreciate the clarifications; yes, LinkedIn is randomly highly aggressive to users, gatekeeps content, etc.)

To me, while I agree such a use case might make sense in a very narrow context, homomorphic encryption currently supports a limited subset of resources normally available on a computer and even doing basic operations on a small amount of data takes a very long time, adds a lot of complexity, custom information formatting, etc.

As such, in my opinion, unless I am something, homomorphic encryption would be a poor fit for a use case similar to SecureDrop’s use case.

Thanks, appreciate depth of your response and taken at face value, efforts to insure alternatives exist for secure private exchanges. I will take a look at the audits/auditors.

In my experience you’re wrong. Most OpSec failures are not magical or require massive resources but minor single mistake. Beyond that, OpSec is a skill that requires practice. If you only apply only when needed, odds of failure significantly increase.

Since you claim to know so much about what national mail systems know about a piece of mail, what specifically is your understanding of what they know?

For starters, if some how the leakers becomes a person of interest and still has the printer that matches the serial number present in leak documents, that would obviously link them to the leak.

Claim that data is able to be hidden in black & white laser prints is obviously false; for example, printer could intentionally embed information by make small algorithmic changes to the fonts that are unnoticeable to an untrained human eye.

Again, sure, possible this is over kill, but then so is SecureDrop. Anyone that’s worried about OpSec needs to understand their threats and related risks, then decide what to do, not just say do X just because Y said so. If mailing in documents was safer, why is that not presented as an alternative?

To do X is irrelevant, what matters is if it meets legal definition of reasonable suspicion, which I assure you is both extremely low at border crossings and that law enforcement is very aware of how to establish it; hence why the warrant was granted.

Way to address issues like this is not online or at a border crossing — but by changing laws themselves. I assure that vast majority of people support laws like these, otherwise they would not have been in place so long.

Again, I am not saying I agree with situation, but attempting to accurately describe the reality of it.

You are doing threat and risk assessments, which is 101 of basic OpSec. What is not basic OpSec is making blanket statements without context.

Why? Obviously color ones exist and non-color ones are just as easy to inject using modulation of laser intensity, variations in fonts, etc.

Sounds like their position is law enforcement officer commanded the nurse to perform a medical procedure which as result of it being related to a border crossing was legal if there was “reasonable suspicion” which you have said the claimed to have based on your responses and lack of cell phone.

To be clear, not stating I agree with situation, fully understand law, your perspective, law enforcement perspective, etc — but claim that body cavity search requires a warrant once reasonable suspicion is established at a border crossing to my knowledge is inaccurate if you’re claiming it is.

Example of Google search that appears to return search results supporting this:

https://www.google.com/search?q=is+it+legal+for+us+customs+t...

Disputing reasonable cause is very hard to do. Most people would likely find it reasonable to be suspicious of a person lacking a cell phone. Also appears judge granted a warrant, which to me confirms they believed their the threshold for reasonable suspicion had been passed.

Without knowing the specific metadata by name, it’s source, exact context you’re referring to, etc — it is not possible to respond.

Strange, what was the difference, link has been the exact same and it is the same link Google provided. Regardless, you made claim without any explanation to which both I and another user have requested clarification on why the technology you recommended is relevant.

From home page, “Nodes Worldwide: 361” to me sounds like it would be extremely easy to control the network.

Have there been any published third party security audits of the related code?

Lastly, do you have any affiliation to the projects mentioned?

Again, Signal supports anonymous connections, anonymous user accounts, secure operating systems, etc. If anything, it’s more secure than SecureDrop because it doesn’t require using Tor, which is a huge red flag and appear to acknowledge odds of it being secure are questionable at best. Also, assuming user uses an anonymous connections, anonymous user account, secure operating systems, etc — Signal would have no information it could be compelled to provide.

Depends on context, jurisdiction, etc — for example, given topic is US law enforcement, here’s one example of costs of investigation assigned for collection based on outcome of a case:

https://www.findlaw.com/legalblogs/criminal-defense/when-do-...

Use of K9s as pretext for plausible cause is well known issue, that said, without knowing specifics of the situation, impossible to comment on legal merit of them submitting the cost of search warrant for debt collections.

Signal supports anonymous connections, anonymous user accounts, secure operating systems, etc — not saying it’s easy, but neither is securely using SecureDrop to my knowledge. OpSec is hard by definition, if it was easy and cheap, counter measures including laws banning such activities would rapidly appear.

Worth noting that both Secret Service and ICE likely have exceptions to Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable search and seizure based on context. Without specific examples, it’s hard to say if laws as is are being violated. If laws are not being violated, then real issue is if the exceptions should stand.

Agree, that was my understanding too, thought didn’t take the time to find relevant source, court cases, etc.

Generally speaking, one should assume if it’s possible to do something and economics make sense, it’s being done.

To be fair, I was puzzled by rapid positive comments on HN, but lack of significant Amazon comments and/or easily finding significant prior coverage of the book. That said, book did receive prior coverage on HN, so sort of makes since:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17430059

It’s not, I have no affiliation to author of that post; assumed that was obvious when I said “here’s one author’s” in the prior comment.

Please respond to the question — and review HN’s guidelines, specifically:

> When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith. Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents. Omit internet tropes. Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something.

If you’re curious, found link via simple Google search, since I wanted to quickly check if there was an obvious relevant use case I was not aware of and after reviewing it thought it might be of use in you replying:

https://google.com/search?q=homomorphic+encryption+use+cases

You’re assuming leaker is not actively being monitored, mail carriers’ non-public methods of identifying anonymous/fake senders do not overlap OpSec failure of sender, assuming printer & content steganography doesn’t apply, unusual device tracking counter surveillance techniques are not a red flag, leaker understands counter biological forensic identification measures, etc.

Point is OpSec is HARD — and telling someone “just physically deliver it” is a recipe for failure.

FYI: Advice given in that guide is horrible for using Signal anonymously; burner phone OpSec is hard; Google Voice requires phone number for signup; landlines are easy to trace.

Core point is that survey requests prior experience using SecureDrop, then uses Signal, email and/or https-form to communicate. Why? Feel like at very least SecureDrop should themselves be explicitly stating why they opted use alternatives instead of their own service.