Re: [Mimi] Metadata Minimal MIMI (MIMIMI)

Hi Konrad,
Thanks for submitting this. This shows a great deal of promise and
flexibility.

Could you elaborate a bit more about the bearer token construction please?

I am concerned about the use of last-resort KeyPackages, suggested in the
draft but I don't think they is necessary. If Alice and Bob want to
communicate and can scan a unique joining code, exchange a joining code
out-of-band, or get introduced via a trusted third party, then either of
them can bootstrap the conversation with a unique KP. Once they are
established, adding each other to new groups using new distinct pseudonyms
is fairly straightforward.

In another model we use for anonymous communication, Alice is, for example,
a journalist working on a tip line and Bob is a whistleblower. Bob uses an
ephemeral pseudonym to get a KP from Alice and authenticates her strong
identity in the KP. Bob forms a two-client group and sends one message to
Alice asking for an anonymous connection, possibly including an intro
teaser to Alice. (Alice must be prepared to get many bogus requests on a
tip line). If Alice decides to continue communicating with Bob, Alice and
Bob provide new ephemeral pseudonyms and KPs inside their temporary group.
If Bob trusts that Alice is honest, they end up with a new group containing
them whose pseudonyms are uncorrelated to their real identity or Bob's
introduction identity.

thanks,
-rohan

On Fri, Apr 5, 2024, 05:34 Konrad Kohbrok <konrad.kohbrok@datashrine.de>
wrote:

> Hi folks,
>
> Raphael and I just uploaded an I-D with a proposal that sketches a
> pseudonym-based MIMI variant that aims to reduce MIMI’s metadata footprint.
> You can find it here:
> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-kohbrok-mimi-metadata-minimalization/
>
> We have been working on this approach for a while now and have already
> implemented and run a variant of what’s described in the I-D.
>
> The I-D is quite high-level for now to make the concepts easier to grasp.
> If people are interested we can fill in gaps and add details in the next
> iterations.
>
> Looking forward to continuing the discussion around metadata in the
> context of MIMI and any questions regarding our I-D!
>
> Cheers,
> Konrad
>
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