Encryption: Trump administration adopts Obama administration's stance

[robkelk]

POLITICO: Trump officials weigh encryption crackdown

Senior officials debated whether to ask Congress to effectively outlaw end-to-end encryption, which scrambles data so that only its sender and recipient can read it, these people told POLITICO. Tech companies like Apple, Google and Facebook have increasingly built end-to-end encryption into their products and software in recent years — billing it as a privacy and security feature but frustrating authorities investigating terrorism, drug trafficking and child pornography.

“The two paths were to either put out a statement or a general position on encryption, and [say] that they would continue to work on a solution, or to ask Congress for legislation,” said one of the people.

I know some people think the Constitution is an impediment to doing what they want to do when in power (and they're probably right - the Constitution was designed to protect The People from such abuses), but could somebody please explain the First Amendment to them anyway?

[hazard]

The problem with electronic encryption: Either everyone is secure, or nobody is secure. And this goes every way.

[Labster]

Here in America, we have the freedom of speech to say everything except 256-bit numbers.

The good news here is that it's the Trump administration pursuing it, which lacks the skill to do anything except allowing corporations to do what they want.

[Dartz]

It's unenforceable anyway.

Although, I do wonder if it's possible to create an encryption system that warns the recipients if it's been cracked or their message has been read - the act of cracking the message adds a trace.

You can buy the special envolopes the CIA use for secret materials that can't be resealed if they've been cracked. The CIA even tell you where to buy them if you ask.

[hazard]

Lab, as much as I prefer the US Democrats over the US Republicans, I would still not trust either party with the keys to every encryption system there is, even if it's just the encryption used in the USA itself. There has been a too long and well documented history of voter suppression, manipulation and abuse of civil rights.

Dartz; I don't think that's possible unless you start logging a lot of metadata in the message as it's transmitted, because you need to know exactly every action that has been taken by the network in transit when it comes to loading, storing and transmitting that message, and who and what accessed it.

Well, I suppose 'tell me if a word processor of any kind accessed this document' would go a long way. It's just that the log is just a bit of data itself, so it can be manipulated too.

Also, a well prepared spy can just do it in a new envelop and reseal it.

[Bob Schroeck]

as much as I prefer the US Democrats over the US Republicans, I would still not trust either party with the keys to every encryption system there is

Agreed. Remember, it was the Clinton administration which tried to impose the Clipper Chip and Key Escrow.

[hazard]

I wouldn't know, both too young and too foreign.

But then, I wouldn't trust any party in the Netherlands with those keys either. Including parties that avow or even base their entire agenda on data privacy. It's just too dangerous.

Let them put some work in rather than being able to trawl through whatever they want. There's a reason you need a warrant for most cases.

[robkelk]

Trusting somebody else with the key to your end-to-end encryption is like trusting somebody else with the key to your dwelling.

If it was explained to the lawmakers that way, and made clear that it would include their own front door encryption keys, maybe they'd figure it out.

[Epsilon]

The dwelling analogy doesn't work because the government does have a universal key to those, a battering ram. And this is available to everyone.

The problem with unbreakable encryption, from their perspective, is that they don't have such a ram if they need it for your data or devices.

Which, you know, is fine. I'm all for censorship of certain public data but whatever you want to say in privacy you do you.

Not like it will matter much. We're on the verge of quantum computing and once we have that all mundane encryption is breakable anyway.

[hazard]

Here's the thing with a battering ram.

Battering rams are obvious, ungainly, annoying to use, and require a clear need for them to be deployed.


Being able to force decryption is more like getting a warrant for a search, or a wiretapping warrant. Except that in both those cases they still need to take physical action. With a decryption system? All they need to do is gain access to your raw data (hardly impossible, even over the internet), download a copy of it, and let the algorithm turn it into something readable.