Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption • Hacker News Board

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#361

Post by derefr » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 11:53 PM UTC

loup-vaillant wrote: post #254

IfOnlyYouKnew wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not entirely sure how those four examples are supposedly invalidated by giving them a clever nickname. I'll take the privacy side in most any discussion of privacy-vs-security, but categorically denying the possibility that some crimes could be aided by encryption seems a step to far. It's also bad PR strategy: anybody not already on your side will be put off by your apparent lack of reasoning skills. Instead, ac…

> I'm not entirely sure how those four examples are supposedly invalidated by giving them a clever nickname. They're not. A number of horrible things will happen as a result of pervasive end to end encryption. However. You have to run the numbers here. On the one hand, perhaps a bit more crime, some of which horrible. On the other hand, the privacy of everyone . It's a hard sell. Just picture a politician on live tel…

I feel like, to ensure privacy, we need an equivalent of Mutually Assured Destruction: the strategic introduction of a secondary Nash equilibrium that's so bad that it makes it obvious that we should choose the primary equilibrium. Right now, people have no clear sense on what "a gradual erosion of privacy at the hands of the government" really means. We haven't seen a 100% solid example of what any country would do with that power, yet (though China is getting close.)

But imagine if some crazy billionaire set up some sort of autonomous decentralized system that constantly attempted to MITM all the same systems the government likes wiretapping; and then, if it managed to extract any data from that attack, it would find names in that data, and put bounties out on those people on assassination markets (paid from anonymous accounts previously set up by the billionaire.)

Now the choice is between some people dead, and a lot of people dead! Everyone get on board the privacy train!

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#362

Post by dheera » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 11:54 PM UTC

questionasked wrote: post #356

greyfade wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been bouncing around the idea of a fully decentralized end-to-end encrypted chat protocol for exactly this reason, but I've been afraid to work on it for precisely the reason this thread is being discussed. I know that if my name were attached to the project, I'd be facing all kinds of unwelcome scrutiny from the government and news agencies. I'd lose the very privacy I want to maintain by designing privacy-prot…

What's the advantage of decentralisation? Is it really a problem to have centralised servers if they're just storing dumb encrypted blobs?

Governments can force the people who own the servers to stop.

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#363

Post by throw_xyzyz » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 11:54 PM UTC

IfOnlyYouKnew wrote: post #181

Kinnard wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Second Great CryptoWar: https://reason.com/2013/03/12/the-second-great-crypto-war/ > "The proponents of this process use fear tactics to win support, what the four cypherpunks dub "The Four Horsemen of the Info-pocalypse: child pornography, terrorism, money laundering, and the War on Some Drugs." In other words, laws passed to go after child pornographers, terrorists, money launderers, and drug dealers end up chi…

I'm not entirely sure how those four examples are supposedly invalidated by giving them a clever nickname. I'll take the privacy side in most any discussion of privacy-vs-security, but categorically denying the possibility that some crimes could be aided by encryption seems a step to far. It's also bad PR strategy: anybody not already on your side will be put off by your apparent lack of reasoning skills. Instead, ac…

To go for the nuclear option, are you prepared to support Auschwitz to stop child porn?

China already has the concentration camps, it's one step away from extermination camps, all empowered by the same surveillance tech we in the west are creating.

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#364

Post by foobar_ » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 11:57 PM UTC

Kinnard wrote: post #91

saagarjha wrote: post #5

> We are writing to request that Facebook does not proceed with its plan to implement end-to-end encryption across its messaging services without ensuring that there is no reduction to user safety. Oh, so you’re asking for more end-to-end encryption? > While the letter acknowledges that Facebook, which owns Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram, captures 99% of child exploitation and terrorism-related content t…

The Second Great CryptoWar: https://reason.com/2013/03/12/the-second-great-crypto-war/ > "The proponents of this process use fear tactics to win support, what the four cypherpunks dub "The Four Horsemen of the Info-pocalypse: child pornography, terrorism, money laundering, and the War on Some Drugs." In other words, laws passed to go after child pornographers, terrorists, money launderers, and drug dealers end up chi…

Child pornography - Politicians and priests. Terrorism or Freedom Fighters? Money laundering - Capitalists .. harmless in the large scheme of things. Drugs - Yeah right.

How about 24x7 surveillance for politicians and priests and no surveilance for normal folks.

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#365

Post by michaelmrose » Thu, Oct 03, 2019, 11:57 PM UTC

IfOnlyYouKnew wrote: post #181

Kinnard wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Second Great CryptoWar: https://reason.com/2013/03/12/the-second-great-crypto-war/ > "The proponents of this process use fear tactics to win support, what the four cypherpunks dub "The Four Horsemen of the Info-pocalypse: child pornography, terrorism, money laundering, and the War on Some Drugs." In other words, laws passed to go after child pornographers, terrorists, money launderers, and drug dealers end up chi…

I'm not entirely sure how those four examples are supposedly invalidated by giving them a clever nickname. I'll take the privacy side in most any discussion of privacy-vs-security, but categorically denying the possibility that some crimes could be aided by encryption seems a step to far. It's also bad PR strategy: anybody not already on your side will be put off by your apparent lack of reasoning skills. Instead, ac…

It's not necessary to prove that the benefits outweigh the risks. It's trivial to show that in a free country where people are allowed to control their own devices and create and install software of their choosing its trivial for bad guys to communicate in such a fashion as to be 100% immune to any sort of dragnet style surveillance while being equally vulnerable to targeted surveillance whether end to end encryption is banished from mainstream platforms.

There is no benefit to outweigh. For there to be benefits one must convince oneself that we will actively prosecute bad actors via intelligence gathered via holes we will publicly announce we are drilling into previously secure platforms and drug dealers and terrorists will never figure out how to embrace free open source p2p software that doesn't share these disadvantages. There isn't even one smart person among the bad guys or even among the good guys who will create a platform one can connect to with a few clicks amenable to even techno morons. What could possibly go wrong.

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#366

Post by judge2020 » Fri, Oct 04, 2019, 12:00 AM UTC

autoexec wrote: post #237

colejohnson66 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On iOS, you can disable automatic app updates in the Settings.

Some apps (like Signal) force you to upgrade or they eventually stop working. It's a terrible practice.

Can't speak for Signal but an app might reasonably require an update when the API also had a breaking change.

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#367

Post by kazagistar » Fri, Oct 04, 2019, 12:01 AM UTC

Kalium wrote: post #280

brunoTbear wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure what the logical fallacy is you're referring to. I'm not advocating that we backdoor encryption. I'm asking what's the nuance in privacy vs crime prevention. I guess your position is one of an absolute, and therefore, to me, not especially interesting. I am curious what you think are the ways we can fight child abuse. It seems to me we have some obligation as technologists to see that our works aren't us…

> I'm asking what's the nuance in privacy vs crime prevention. If someone has an idea that can help prevent abuses and protect privacy without enabling abusive governments, I'm all ears. Unfortunately, to date all we've seen are proposals like the Clipper chip which amount to a backdoor to everything. Understandably, experts are somewhat skeptical of replaying the experience. > I am curious what you think are the way…

The ability for the citizenry to oversee and monitor the government should be required to be higher then the ability for government to oversee and monitor the citizenry. Do away with the veil of secrecy over government entirely (no NSA, no CIA, so secret ongoing investigation, no privacy for meetings among politicians, etc); that would slow abuse to the point where maybe we could trust the government to keep an eye on us.

I would personally even go one further and say that anyone or anything beyond a certain level of power should be radically transparent, and privacy should be reserved for the weak. If you want some privacy, step down from power and influence, and donate your money, because transparency is the only way we can even start to wield democracy properly and prevent the gross abuses of power we see in our society.

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#368

Post by 9HZZRfNlpR » Fri, Oct 04, 2019, 12:04 AM UTC

posix_compliant wrote: post #114

saagarjha wrote: post #5

> We are writing to request that Facebook does not proceed with its plan to implement end-to-end encryption across its messaging services without ensuring that there is no reduction to user safety. Oh, so you’re asking for more end-to-end encryption? > While the letter acknowledges that Facebook, which owns Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram, captures 99% of child exploitation and terrorism-related content t…

99% of domestic disturbances happen in private homes. Should they put cameras there, too?

We need to put them to homes of politicians, judges, lobbyist, diplomats etc since they are the biggest threat to national security. Also their close ones that might be even greater target.

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#369

Post by kazagistar » Fri, Oct 04, 2019, 12:05 AM UTC

ddoolin wrote: post #10

> While the letter acknowledges that Facebook, which owns Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram, captures 99% of child exploitation and terrorism-related content through its own systems, it also notes that "mere numbers cannot capture the significance of the harm to children." Ah yes, "think of the children!" This is so tired, I'm (just a bit) surprised they fell into this argument.

I will believe that anyone in politics gives a shit about children when the US stops bombing children in other countries.

Re: Attorney General will ask Zuckerberg to halt plans for end-to-end encryption

#370

Post by stockkid » Fri, Oct 04, 2019, 12:09 AM UTC

> prioritize public safety in designing its encryption by enabling law enforcement to gain access to illegal content

I don't think it works that way. Serious criminals that we really want to catch are probably not coordinating their activities using unencrypted channels anyway.