An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT • Hacker News Board

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#231

Post by banads » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:36 PM UTC

SV_BubbleTime wrote: post #224

lowdose wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you tell me more about that?

He means Trump. As seen in the leaked Podesta emails (Hillary’s campaign manager that was phished and has a password of “Pa$$w0rd” or such), Hillary Co asked their media contacts to put emphasis on Trump. To give him more coverage than the others running. They literally called him their “pied piper” candidate. They were so confident they could beat Trump that they helped prop him up. How Hillary skated by with many p…

Can someone explain why this is being heavily downvoted? Was something they said false?

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#232

Post by smt88 » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:36 PM UTC

giancarlostoro wrote: post #96

pensatoio wrote: post #17

These bills terrify me. A lot of stuff happens in politics that’s frustrating, and much of it doesn’t catch my attention. There’s something about the pure ignorance that goes into breaking encryption that I can’t comprehend. I can understand when bills come through and the extreme differences in opinion are the result of different interpretations of facts and truth, but when it comes to encryption, there is no safe p…

Whats worst is these should all be entirely illegal. Its literally warrantless searching.

As an ignorant non-lawyer, it seems to me that the "illegal search" argument won't hold up. Laypeople see encryption as a lock on a safe that the govt should be able to compel you to open.

Why not use a 1st Amendment approach? Doesn't my freedom to speak also cover the "language" (i.e. encrypted bits) I'm using?

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#233

Post by srmatto » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:37 PM UTC

Until we get encryption as a constitutional amendment we can probably expect to fight these types of laws perennially.

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#234

Post by moloch » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:37 PM UTC

dhx wrote: post #227

Encryption is only one overrepresented technological technique to achieve communication security. al-Qaeda reportedly favoured communicating in the clear with obfuscated messages, attempting to make their communications become a needle in a haystack of mundaneness that no one would raise an eyebrow to[1]. In World War 2, the United States hired native American speakers to communicate in the clear, knowing that the Na…

None of your cited examples are "secure," they're the very definition of "security by obscurity," which is to say insecure.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerckhoffs%27s_principle

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#235

Post by zelphirkalt » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:39 PM UTC

mratsim wrote: post #103

zelphirkalt wrote: post #51

> Incentivizes technical innovation What a load of bs. Because those tech-freaks always find a way right? Innovation will simply appear without any doing on our part. We can just create non-sense bills and laws and they will make it work. They will magically find a way. These imbeciles do not even understand the simplest things about encryption, but want to make laws for it. Ridiculous. I would laugh right now, if it…

This would be in breach of various privacy laws in the EU. Companies have been sued for using weak encryption (cough plaintext passwords).

Of course, yes, but does it stop any of these politicians to come up with stupid ideas? I don't think so. Do we need more tests of what is OK in front of the European courts? 'cause once these politicians are sufficiently "incentivized" they wont stop pushing "their" ideas.

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#236

Post by Buttons840 » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:40 PM UTC

mindslight wrote: post #199

sitkack wrote: post #131

Do we need an amendment to the constitution? We can't keep fighting these fights. Eventually they will win.

We need secure software in the hands of everyone making these attempts plainly unenforceable, rather than the current status quo of everyone's software destiny being administered by centralized companies that will comply with totalitarian shit at the drop of a hat.

Then we need good UI libraries for good languages.

I thought of UI toolkits as just niceties until recently. Now I realize that being able to make something pretty with good usability is power.

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#237

Post by chungus_khan » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:44 PM UTC

mratsim wrote: post #111

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #2

This bill will be sold to the right as helping fight against foreign terrorists living in the US. It will be sold to the left as helping against the alt-right organizing and spreading hate. And it will be sold to everyone as helping stop child exploitation. In addition, there is already a lot going on in the country to keep the average person from focusing on this issue. It seems like allowing the government to spy o…

The 4 horsemen of the infocalypse: - terrorists, - drug dealers, - pedophiles, - organized crime. Quoting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocalyp... Have a target "thing" you wish to stop, yet lack any moral, or practical reasons for doing so? 1. Pick a fear common to lots of people, something that will evoke a gut reaction: terrorists, pedophiles, serial killers. 2. Scream loudly to the media th…

Everyone needs to remember: a constitution does nothing to protect your freedoms. It can serve as a rallying banner, but the only thing that will actually protect you is mass-will to enforce those freedoms. Simply having ideals on a piece of paper does nothing unless people actually fight for them, and those working against them aren't going to fight fair or say it out loud.

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#238

Post by hedora » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:46 PM UTC

xedrac wrote: post #153

As someone who typically votes conservative, this is the kind of ignorance that makes me seriously reconsider my stances. This would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and go a long way toward emulating China. No thank you! Time to double down on encryption efforts and Tor usage.

I hate to break it to you, but if this bill bothers you, then you’re best bet is to vote for the progressives. Welcome to the left wing, comrade. :-)

Over the years, I’ve watched most of my conservative friends defect to the democrats as the Republican party morphed from “small (but efficient) government” to starting the War on Science and War on the Climate, not to mention all the useless wars against the Middle East, etc.

At the same time, the Democratic party also veered to the right, and I’ve watched my liberal friends (and now, some of those conservative defectors) move to the progressive part of the democratic party.

It’s not that people’s opinions have changed, it’s that the parties have sold out their core values to appease big donors.

Prior generations in the US became more conservative as they aged. I don’t see that happening with my generation. Between that and demographic shifts, the Republican party is representing a rapidly shrinking minority of the population. I just wish the senate wasn’t so skewed toward conservative states and against city dwellers. 42 votes are controlled by a group of people the size of California.

Worse, the senate gets to appoint federal judges, so a minority of the US is electing the people that have exclusive control over court appointments (they simply refuse to appoint judges when there is a Democrat in the white house) and they’ve packed them with radicals.

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#239

Post by ipnon » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:50 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #178

CivBase wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This might be an unpopular opinion, but I don't think we should encourage people to vote as much as we do. Voting is an opportunity to make your voice heard. If you have nothing to say about the issues facing a particular office, don't vote. I do not vote for candidates who I am not informed about, but many people do. Those uninformed votes just drown out the voice of the informed voters and reinforce the party-line…

> Those uninformed votes just drown out the voice of the informed voters I've always been a fan of general election ballots showing names, in a randomized order, with no reference to party.

Taiwan lists the candidates in a random order but includes their picture and their number in that order on the ballot. The candidates know their number from the beginning of their campaigns and wear the number on their clothing.

Re: An even worse anti-encryption bill than EARN IT

#240

Post by ipnon » Thu, Jun 25, 2020, 3:52 PM UTC

SamuelAdams wrote: post #172

sitkack wrote: post #131

Do we need an amendment to the constitution? We can't keep fighting these fights. Eventually they will win.

Yes, I'm surprised there is no "right to privacy" spelled out in clear terms. Sounds like that would be a wonderful thing to add directly to the Constitution.

The 4th amendment is supposed to guarantee this right. The Senators are old men who don't understand technology, so they believe that the protections that applied to letters at the time of the constitution don't apply to the medium that has replaced letters, namely email and messaging.