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France looking at banning Tor, blocking public Wi-Fi

arstechnica.co.uk

21–30 of 273 posts

Re: France looking at banning Tor, blocking public Wi-Fi

#22
post #13

I think we should really investigate the writers of these two new pieces of legislation. These people are a bigger threat for all our values than all the terrorists of the world. The only good answer to terrorism is to not surrender freedom.

The cynical view is that these people are simply using the attacks as a way to push through legislation that they wanted to push through regardless. Politicians like these are just opportunists and would use any hot button issue to get their way because they know that's the easiest way to railroad through their pet laws. It's easy to get people to vote against their own interest, all you need is fear. There are many…

> using the attacks as a way to push through legislation that they wanted

This practice is culturally independent and it is as old as human corruption. Egyptians and ancient Chinese and Romans were already experts.)

Re: France looking at banning Tor, blocking public Wi-Fi

#24
post #5

All this because 130 people were killed. What would they do to prevent the 4600 people killed in road accidents in France last year? Or the 49000 people killed by alcohol [in 2009]?

And as far as I know, they did not use any encryption anyway, so I don't even see the point here, it's totally unrelated. Should we ban unencrypted connections then since that's what they used ?

Re: France looking at banning Tor, blocking public Wi-Fi

#25
post #3

Once again the French show the world what they are best in. Waiving the white flag and submitting when threatened. They even suspended parts of the human rights convention on their territory after the terror attacks in Paris.

Please calm down with the generalizations. 1. This is a leaked document, not an official one. 2. This would need to be adopted by the National Assembly, Senate, and Ethic Commission to be effective. 3. France didn't roll back on it's promise to accept Syrian refugees like others have done. Yes it is worrying, but everything is not black and white.

They did just voted in their equivalent of the Nazi party in the regional elections though so let's wait and see...

Edit: correction... vote not over yet but it's not looking good.

Re: France looking at banning Tor, blocking public Wi-Fi

#26
post #13

I think we should really investigate the writers of these two new pieces of legislation. These people are a bigger threat for all our values than all the terrorists of the world. The only good answer to terrorism is to not surrender freedom.

The cynical view is that these people are simply using the attacks as a way to push through legislation that they wanted to push through regardless. Politicians like these are just opportunists and would use any hot button issue to get their way because they know that's the easiest way to railroad through their pet laws. It's easy to get people to vote against their own interest, all you need is fear. There are many…

The slightly less cynical view is that they know that the next time something happens they know that - if encryption is involved, they will be absolutely pilloried by the popular press, opposition etc. for "not doing everything that can be done".

It takes a certain determination to stand up to that kind of threat.

Re: France looking at banning Tor, blocking public Wi-Fi

#28

I have 0 faith in governments both for understanding and acting properly in the information age. They have time and again acted bad, and seem to not even understand the medium with they try to regulate. In the information age, power does not lie with the one who has the guns. I hope everyone reading this takes some time to research how to encrypt your communication & how to use bitcoin. I also hope we will see more u…

> I have 0 faith in governments both for understanding and acting properly in the information age.

Can we go without a government that properly understand the information age? If so, how? Who would you trust instead, to organize public affairs?

If not, why does this kind of government doesn't (want to) understand it?

Re: France looking at banning Tor, blocking public Wi-Fi

#29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cynical view is that these people are simply using the attacks as a way to push through legislation that they wanted to push through regardless. Politicians like these are just opportunists and would use any hot button issue to get their way because they know that's the easiest way to railroad through their pet laws. It's easy to get people to vote against their own interest, all you need is fear. There are many…

The slightly less cynical view is that they know that the next time something happens they know that - if encryption is involved, they will be absolutely pilloried by the popular press, opposition etc. for "not doing everything that can be done". It takes a certain determination to stand up to that kind of threat.

Whether encryption is or is not involved is immaterial, we already know that you can pull off attacks like these without it, so you may assume that it is also possible pulling off attacks like these with it. That law does nothing at all to prevent future attacks and the popular press being clueless isn't news either.

Re: France looking at banning Tor, blocking public Wi-Fi

#30
post #13

I think we should really investigate the writers of these two new pieces of legislation. These people are a bigger threat for all our values than all the terrorists of the world. The only good answer to terrorism is to not surrender freedom.

The cynical view is that these people are simply using the attacks as a way to push through legislation that they wanted to push through regardless. Politicians like these are just opportunists and would use any hot button issue to get their way because they know that's the easiest way to railroad through their pet laws. It's easy to get people to vote against their own interest, all you need is fear. There are many…

It's not really cynical so much as realistic. Do you really need more proof than "never let a crisis go to waste."
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