This message is sent to you in response to an email that you sent to the Frannie Remailer. This automated reply was triggered by the subject "remailer-help" contained in your email. If you did not send such an email, please ignore this message. This remailer is a free service that allows individuals including crime victims, domestic violence victims, persons in recovery, and others, such as those living under oppressive regimes, to communicate confidentially in a manner that ensures their privacy under even the most adverse conditions. This independent remailer uses the Mixmaster remailer software. It is highly recommended that you obtain a copy of the Mixmaster software to utilize this remailer. This particular remailer may offer other means of accessing the remailer service. If this remailer offers other means of accessing the remailer service, the means will be described later in this help file. However, only by using the Mixmaster client software will you assure the highest level of security against third-parties compromising your privacy. How to obtain the Mixmaster software: Mixmaster source code for FreeBSD, Linux, other variants of UNIX, and Win32: The first version of Mixmaster to allow RSA keys of 4096 bits is at http://www.zen19351.zen.co.uk/mixmaster302/ and without this feature your chains will not be able to use remailers with large keys. Keys of 1024 bits are less secure and there has been discussion about ending their use. If your operating system is a UNIX derivative, simply download and compile the client from the source code available at http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/mixmaster/ Mixmaster clients binaries for Win32 (Windows 98, NT, 2000, XP) Win32 users may wish to try one of the GUI applications that interface with Mixmaster: Omnimix: http://www.danner-net.de/om.htm Quicksilver: https://www.sec3.net/www.quicksilvermail.net/qslite.html These are all developed independently of the main Mixmaster distribution. Please do not contact the Mixmaster development team or the Administrator of the Anonymous Remailer with questions about this software. For more information about Mixmaster or to contribute to the development of Mixmaster, please see the following URL's: Official Mixmaster Project Site: http://sourceforge.net/projects/mixmaster/ The mailing list there is still usable although the rest of the project is neglected. General Information about Remailers and Remailer "how-to" Guides: http://www.faqs.org/faqs/privacy/anon-server/ **** You can use PGP to encrypt messages sent to this remailer if you for some reason are unable to use the Mixmaster client software. However, while PGP will securely encrypt the content of a message that you are sending to the remailer, submitting messages to the remailer that are merely PGP encrypted without the use of the Mixmaster client software greatly increases the risk of third parties being able to determine the identity of the sender (you). This remailer primarily supports the ability to submit messages for remailing without requiring the Mixmaster client software for backwards compatibility with older remailer client software. If you are able to use the Mixmaster software with your operating system (chances are you can), it is highly recommended that you use the Mixmaster client software instead. See the earlier section in this help file on how to obtain a copy of the Mixmaster client software. If you cannot use the Mixmaster software, want to use an anonymous remailer, and are willing to accept reduced security, you can do the following: Send email with Subject: remailer-key to to obtain a copy of the remailer's PGP key. Then do the following: 1) create a file containing your message 2) insert a BLANK LINE as the first line of the file 3) Insert a "::" as the second line of the file 4) Insert "Anon-To: final_recipient@destination_domain.com" as the third line of the file. At this time, the file should look as follows: ================================================================== :: Anon-To: final_recipient@destination_domain.com This is some anonymized email. ================================================================== 5) Now encrypt the file with the PGP key of this remailer. Finally, email the encrypted file to as shown in the example below. The line "Encrypted: PGP" instructs the remailer to decrypt the message and process its contents. ================================================================== From: remailer_user@sender_domain.com To: mix@franxial.com Subject: anonymous message :: Encrypted: PGP -----BEGIN PGP MESSAGE----- Version: 2.6.3i owE1jMsNwjAUBH3gZMk9PClnUoBPUANpwElW2OBPZD8H0gd1UCP2gduuNDNfIcSH T4zCbQmtlbzGFM9T0jSD7QVvEzaPcUlBSSWHQclbnR9YWJNp5BFSLdR9CijF3NGx ybry/1Rsqn4la3a0JiIhLvnYGCu9HFtiC8oIxnlkeuIYe+EH =HgDq -----END PGP MESSAGE----- ================================================================== Even though PGP encryption in itself is very secure, not using the Mixmaster client exposes some information to parties desiring to compromise your privacy. This information leakage permits what is known as "traffic analysis". For example, if someone receives anonymous messages soon after you sent encrypted messages to a remailer it is likely that you are the sender of those messages. To partially compensate for this information leak, you can instruct the remailer to delay your messages for some time or send the remailer empty messages to make such analysis harder: If you use the line "Null:" instead of "Anon-To:", the remailer will simply discard your message. You can add a "Latent-Time:" header to the remailer to retain your message for some time before forwarding it. "Latent-Time: +2:00" would delay the message for two hours. You can use a random delay by adding "r", for example "Latent-Time: +5:00r" would delay the message for up to five hours. For example: ================================================================== :: Anon-To: final_recipient@destination_domain.com Latent-Time: +2:00 This is some anonymized email. ================================================================== You can chain remailers by using another remailer to send the message to anonymously. For example, take the message ================================================================== :: Anon-To: mix@franxial.com :: Encrypted: PGP -----BEGIN PGP MESSAGE----- Version: 2.6.3i owE1jMsNwjAUBH3gZMk9PClnUoBPUANpwElW2OBPZD8H0gd1UCP2gduuNDNfIcSH T4zCbQmtlbzGFM9T0jSD7QVvEzaPcUlBSSWHQclbnR9YWJNp5BFSLdR9CijF3NGx ybry/1Rsqn4la3a0JiIhLvnYGCu9HFtiC8oIxnlkeuIYe+EH =HgDq -----END PGP MESSAGE----- ================================================================== Next, encrypt the message with the PGP key of the Fannie Remailer and send the twice-encrypted message to . Similar to a nested Russian matryoshka doll, containing increasingly smaller dolls inside the each outer doll, you can layer multiple encryption layers and remailer hops around your message. If this sounds confusing, just use the Mixmaster client software instead. If you send your messages through a chain of several independent remailers, it will be become increasingly difficult, though not necessarily impossible, to trace the anonymous message back to you. A vastly more secure solution is to use the Mixmaster client software to send your anonymous mail. Some remailers supporting PGP encrypted messages offer pseudonymous "nym" service that allow you to not only send emails privately, but also receive emails without enabling the sender to determine your recipient destination email address. For more information about such nym services, see the following URLs. ***** Abuse Policy: Unfortunately, there will always be a very small percentage of individuals that choose to abuse the anonymity that this and similar systems worldwide afford to send otherwise unwelcome email. The Frannie Remailer does not condone such messages, or their content, in any way. Just as the Post Office is unable to prevent abuse of the mail system as long as there are public mailboxes into which a person can drop a letter without including a return address, the Anonymous Remailer cannot preemptively prevent irresponsible individuals from using this system to send inappropriate messages. However, unlike the Post Office, this remailer enables you to assure that you will not be inconvenienced by users of this remailer in the future. To block the users of this remailer from sending email to your address, please send a message to containing the line destination-block echolot+help.76=1735261501=02a82e5e@lion.openchaos.org anywhere in the body text of the email. You can simply reply to this message using your email program and send back this entire message for your current email address to be permanently blocked from users of the Frannie Remailer. For additional information on this remailer's abuse policy, instructions on how to block more than one email address, and to reach the Anonymous Remailer operator, please send email to . Thank you for your interest in secure and private communications, -- The Frannie Remailer Administrator