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The Trouble with Gmail
Mark Rasch, 2004-06-14

Mass acceptance of the keyword scanning in Google's new e-mail service could leave government spooks feeling lucky.

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The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-14
Todd Knarr (3 replies)
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-16
Andrew Jones (1 replies)
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-16
Anonymous
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-16
Anonymous
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-17
magpublisher
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-15
Shawn NUnley, CISSP (2 replies)
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-16
Andrew Jones (1 replies)
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-18
Anonymous
Re: The Trouble with Gmail 2006-11-08
Anonymous
The Trouble with your generalization 2004-06-15
Asheesh Laroia [comments@asheeshenterprises.com] (2 replies)
The Trouble with your generalization 2004-06-16
Mark Rasch (2 replies)
The Trouble with your generalization 2004-06-16
Bill Eggers
The Trouble with your generalization 2004-06-18
Roger (1 replies)
Sender Right to Privacy 2004-06-21
Mark Rasch (1 replies)
Sender Right to Privacy 2004-06-21
Anonymous
The Trouble with your generalization 2004-06-16
Andrew Jones
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-15
C High (1 replies)
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-18
Anonymous
The Trouble with Gmail 2004-06-15
Anonymous
A different prospective? [ Your argument isn't analytical ] 2004-06-16
Bipin Gautam <visitbipin_hotmail+com> (1 replies)
A different prospective? [ Your argument isn't analytical ] 2004-06-16
Matt
--- Begin OP Said ---
Even if the filters are perfect and point the finger only completely guilty people,
--- End OP Said ---

--- Begin You Said ---
See the basic difference between intercepting communication via an electronic program for a purpose; and the same work done by a group of people is....... COMPUTER'S DON'T REMEMBER any of THOSE billions OF EMAILS which it scan but if it was done by human, HUMANS do... As the computer programmed never remembered anything cauz the content didn?t matched the pattern specified SO, ITS SAME LIKE THE COMPUTER PROGRAM NEVER SAW or WENT through what it was feed . Computers only put a database of suspicious contents, nothing more.
--- End You Said ---

The idea that a "computer . . . never remembered anything" is not necessarily true. Virtual memory. Memory dumps. Both can be used to extract data if necessary.

Also, the OP was working on the presumption that the filters were 100% perfect, 100% of the time, and only caught traffic related to guilty individuals. You say a computer develops a database of suspicious activity. 100% perfect 100% of the time is an unrealistic dream (with today's technology). These filters will be catching innocent traffic.

Such a device would require having no hard drive and erasing all evidence of the packet prior to working on the next packet. Ideally, it would have only the amount of memory necessary to perform -- nothing more, nothing else. That would be a double-edged sword, as there would be the potential for DoS attacks if configured in this manner. And never mind all of this if the filtering software isn't 100% perfect.

This argument is much more theoretical than realistic.


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Link to this comment: http://www.securityfocus.com/comments/columns/248/26757#26757
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