[tor-talk] Tor and Financial Transparency

[Paul Syverson]

On Sat, Sep 14, 2013 at 09:32:58PM +0000, mirimir wrote:
[SNIP]
> 
> That sums it up well, I think.
> 
> Given Tor's design, numerous parties, including many sets of bitter
> enemies, can cooperate to provide common anonymity. The design is open,
> so all parties can identify weaknesses and contribute improvements.
> Moreover, there's a common interest in doing so.
> 
> That's elegant and beautiful.
> 

Back in the ancient pre-Tor days, at the height of the crypto wars, Ian
Goldberg asked me at Financial Crypto in 1998 why we created onion
routing. Not entirely facetiously I told him that the fascinating
technological problems and the pontential to better protect people and
their activities was nice, but the real attraction was to create a
context where people who were sure they should hate each other were
forced to collaborate.

aloha,
Paul