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Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

feinstein.senate.gov

191–200 of 275 posts

Re: Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

#191

I'm getting pretty deep into bets on Twitter AGAINST this bill having a chance of passing. My logic is simple: this bill outlaws all sorts of things huge corporations use to protect their networks. No big company I've ever done security work for has ever been OK with crypto keys being escrowed by vendors; in fact, we were often instructed to look for exactly those kinds of features as disqualifiers for products. I do…

If it passes, what are the chances of it being struck down as a first amendment violation?

Re: Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

#192

Apologies, this will be an unpopular opinion. If encryption is deemed illegal for whatever reason, then perhaps start creating new things that legally don't fall under the category of encryption, but accomplish the same thing. There are countless creative, imaginative and intelligent people on this site. PR teams, please let folks brainstorm first.

I'm more of the feeling that if the US outlaws encryption, business should move elsewhere. Many electronic services could operate just fine without a physical US presence.

Re: Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

#193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's what happens when legislators have precisely no domain knowledge. I used to be surprised at the naiveté and ignorance when politicians spoke on topics I knew a little about. I'm too old to be surprised any more.

It's very ironic that you talk about naiveté. You think legislators do not understand the subject because of what they said? You believe what the politicians say?

> You think legislators do not understand the subject because of what they said?

Depends. Frequently not as can be seen when the policy to achieve "x" does nothing of the sort, loses them the election or becomes some sort of personal vanity thing. Of course it depends on if the views expressed are of the politician or the party after you've attempted to pick out the double meaning. :)

> You believe what the politicians say?

If it's an independent I might. A party politician of any colour, usually not.

Re: Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

#194

It feels like everyone would be better served if the tech community admitted the legitimacy of the government's (and many, MANY people's) security concerns and stopped pretending that the right to privacy always trumps the right to security of the person. (All occurrences of the string "secur" in that EFF letter[1], for instance, are in reference to data and computer systems. Not one is in [direct] reference to peopl…

Why do you feel that decreasing your IT security will increase your security?

Two responses to that.

Firstly because, well, that's just the way it is sometimes. Putting a gate in your wall can let in bad guys who can plunder your city, yes. But it can also let in good guys who can fortify it. You just need to design and use your gate well...and, I suppose, think of the government as good guys. (Soz, I've been indulging in some nostalgia with AOE 2: HD recently....)

And two: who says this has to involve decreasing IT security? I haven't seen enough evidence of cooperation between the gov't and the tech industry on this for me to believe that an agreement on this would require decreasing IT security.

Re: Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

#196

It feels like everyone would be better served if the tech community admitted the legitimacy of the government's (and many, MANY people's) security concerns and stopped pretending that the right to privacy always trumps the right to security of the person. (All occurrences of the string "secur" in that EFF letter[1], for instance, are in reference to data and computer systems. Not one is in [direct] reference to peopl…

Government serves its people. Period. We are not surfs, we are not subjects. Without the trust of its people, a government is not legitimate, has no "right" to look at its people's behavior, is simply afraid of losing power. If instead of spying, governments focused on increasing overall goodwill there could be trust, not suspicion, on both sides of this encryption line.

There's a lot of trust of the government here[1] and in general[2] -- though, as that Gallup link shows, it MASSIVELY depends on which arm of the government you're talking about.

Again, not many people live in or around the libertarian bubble. And there are lots of intelligent people who avoid it for very, very good reasons.

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1. http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2016/02/apple-fb...

2. http://www.gallup.com/poll/1597/confidence-institutions.aspx

Re: Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

#197
post #178

I'm not a lawyer, but it seems like complying with this law would preclude compliance with HIPAA, ISO 9001, various NSA-IAD directives, etcetera. Compliance with standards like those is often written into government contracts and sometimes required by statute or policy. If this law passed in its current form, wouldn't entire industries have to choose which laws to break when storing data?

I was wondering about this, but the data can remain encrypted and compliant as long as it's ultimately accessible by court order. I then assume the existing laws regarding courts accessing private health data apply.

Re: Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

#198
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because Harvey Milk and George Moscone are dead - she wasn't killed by Dan White[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscone%E2%80%93Milk_assassina... (Edit: What I'm trying to say is that she was the person that found Harvey Milk shot and was one of the people that police asked to identify the bodies of both Milk and Moscone. Certainly being that close to the aftermath of violence changes a person.)

Wow, I had no idea Feinstein was so close to the assassinations. That's traumatic. I wonder if those events lead to her positions on defense and privacy which are so uncharacteristic of the rest of her party.

I highly recommend a book called Season of the Witch by David Talbot. It's a great history of SF in the 50s-80s with a strong focus on the 60s and the counterculture. It's some amazing history that many people don't know much about.

If the 60s counterculture and the rest of America had been geographically segregated like the South and the North in the 1860s, you'd have had secession and civil war.

Re: Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

#199

Government is trying to make it illegal for one person to keep secrets and whisper them into another's ear. We can argue all day about how the law doesn't prevent criminals from using technologies (it doesn't, which makes the law idiotic, from a logic perspective), but that's not the important part. The important part is that this group of folks we're calling Government is trying to prevent us from being allowed to h…

I think probably the right way to go after this bill is not to tell people that they need to protect their secrets from the government, but that they need to protect their secrets from 'criminals'.

Point out all the times that government databases have been hacked, and that if their secrets are swept up in government dragnets, it's only a matter of time before blackmailers and identity thieves get hold of them.

Re: Intelligence Committee Leaders Release Discussion Draft of Encryption Bill

#200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lindsey Graham changed his mind [1]. It isn't a massive conspiracy. I wouldn't say Feinstein is well-informed. Watch some of the hearings where she interacts with other members. It's awkward and clear they don't enjoy working with her. [1] https://youtu.be/uk4hYAwCdhU?t=6m53s

Why does wanting more power have to be a "massive conspiracy"? It seems like pretty common sense wisdom that being in power usually leads to wanting more power, and also that power often corrupts. One does not need to be a "conspiracy theorist" to come to this conclusion. The real conspiracy is the apparently concerted effort to call anyone that believes the government is busy grabbing power a "conspiracy theorists".

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