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German court forces mail provider Tutanota to insert a backdoor

heise.de

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Re: German court forces mail provider Tutanota to insert a backdoor

#11

Post by sneeze-slayer »

From my understanding of the article (non-native), it seems like it is only one specific mailbox that is to be monitored

> "Tutanota sieht sich nun gezwungen, bis Jahresende eine Funktion zu programmieren...dieses Postfach zu überwachen."

and that nothing else will change for the other users

> "Für die anderen Nutzer soll sich dadurch nichts ändern, ihre Mails sollen weiter standardmäßig verschlüsselt werden"

As other users have pointed out, it will only be for new emails for the specific mailbox, as the rest are already encrypted

> "betrifft die Überwachungsmaßnahme nur die neu eingehenden unverschlüsselten E-Mails"

We may have to wait until tomorrow for some more native speakers to wake up and translate.

Re: German court forces mail provider Tutanota to insert a backdoor

#13

Post by Sunny_Tarnkappe »

To this topic there is a more recent statement from tutanota on a german scene site.

https://tarnkappe.info/tutanota-will-beschwerde-vor-dem-bgh-...

A recent interview with Tutanota can also be found there. https://tarnkappe.info/tutanota-der-deutsche-e-mail-dienst-i...

Re: German court forces mail provider Tutanota to insert a backdoor

#14

Post by cpach »

sneeze-slayer wrote: post #11

From my understanding of the article (non-native), it seems like it is only one specific mailbox that is to be monitored > "Tutanota sieht sich nun gezwungen, bis Jahresende eine Funktion zu programmieren...dieses Postfach zu überwachen." and that nothing else will change for the other users > "Für die anderen Nutzer soll sich dadurch nichts ändern, ihre Mails sollen weiter standardmäßig verschlüsselt werden" As othe…

It’s not so late here in Europe yet. At least not for hackers :) And there ought to be some German-speaking persons over the pond as well. We’ll see :)

Re: German court forces mail provider Tutanota to insert a backdoor

#16

Post by sgjohnson »

floatingatoll wrote: post #4

A relevant machine-translated paragraph appears to indicate that they are only required to implement monitoring of a single mailbox: > This is about a blackmail that had been sent to an automotive supplier from a Tutanota mailbox. Tutanota is now forced to program a function by the end of the year that allows the State Criminal Police Office of North Rhine-Westphalia to monitor this mailbox. Lacking the ability to re…

It sets an extremely dangerous precedent whether it's just a single mailbox or not.

Re: German court forces mail provider Tutanota to insert a backdoor

#17

Post by eicnix »

floatingatoll wrote: post #4

A relevant machine-translated paragraph appears to indicate that they are only required to implement monitoring of a single mailbox: > This is about a blackmail that had been sent to an automotive supplier from a Tutanota mailbox. Tutanota is now forced to program a function by the end of the year that allows the State Criminal Police Office of North Rhine-Westphalia to monitor this mailbox. Lacking the ability to re…

It only affects new incoming mails as they cannot decrypt the old ones.

My understanding of the German wiretapping law is also that they can only record messages from the point of the wiretapping court order so no older messages can be accessed by it.

Re: German court forces mail provider Tutanota to insert a backdoor

#18

Post by uallo »

sneeze-slayer wrote: post #11

From my understanding of the article (non-native), it seems like it is only one specific mailbox that is to be monitored > "Tutanota sieht sich nun gezwungen, bis Jahresende eine Funktion zu programmieren...dieses Postfach zu überwachen." and that nothing else will change for the other users > "Für die anderen Nutzer soll sich dadurch nichts ändern, ihre Mails sollen weiter standardmäßig verschlüsselt werden" As othe…

German native here. Your translation is mostly correct.

The court seems to have forced Tutanota to store new incoming non-encrypted emails in plaintext for a specific mailbox that was used to blackmail an automotive supplier.

But the article is not entirely clear on whether that is for that specific mailbox only. At one point, the article mentions that storing emails in plain text could be used on "specific mailboxes" (plural).

> Ein Urteil des Landgerichts Köln zwingt das hannoversche Unternehmen nun jedoch zum Einbau einer Funktion, mit der Ermittler einzelne Postfächer überwachen und Mails im Klartext lesen können.

Re: German court forces mail provider Tutanota to insert a backdoor

#19

Post by pintxo »

uallo wrote: post #18
sneeze-slayer wrote: post #11

From my understanding of the article (non-native), it seems like it is only one specific mailbox that is to be monitored > "Tutanota sieht sich nun gezwungen, bis Jahresende eine Funktion zu programmieren...dieses Postfach zu überwachen." and that nothing else will change for the other users > "Für die anderen Nutzer soll sich dadurch nichts ändern, ihre Mails sollen weiter standardmäßig verschlüsselt werden" As othe…

German native here. Your translation is mostly correct. The court seems to have forced Tutanota to store new incoming non-encrypted emails in plaintext for a specific mailbox that was used to blackmail an automotive supplier. But the article is not entirely clear on whether that is for that specific mailbox only. At one point, the article mentions that storing emails in plain text could be used on "specific mailboxes…

IANAL, but if I am not mistaken, German law requires telecommunication providers (above a certain threshold) to provide law enforcement with a way to look into customer communication via the provider. Meaning here, they need to implement a way for law enforcement to look into any mailbox they can come up with a warrant for.

Re: German court forces mail provider Tutanota to insert a backdoor

#20

Post by BlackLotus89 »

sneeze-slayer wrote: post #11

From my understanding of the article (non-native), it seems like it is only one specific mailbox that is to be monitored > "Tutanota sieht sich nun gezwungen, bis Jahresende eine Funktion zu programmieren...dieses Postfach zu überwachen." and that nothing else will change for the other users > "Für die anderen Nutzer soll sich dadurch nichts ändern, ihre Mails sollen weiter standardmäßig verschlüsselt werden" As othe…

Yeah german here you are correct.

> Tutanota will Beschwerde gegen den Beschluss einlegen, diese hat jedoch keine aufschiebende Wirkung

Tutanota wants to appeal in court against this, but is forced to comply (right now).

> "Tutanota sieht sich nun gezwungen, bis Jahresende eine Funktion zu programmieren...dieses Postfach zu überwachen."

Tutanota sees no other possibility than to program a function (until the end of the year) that can monitor this inbox. and that nothing else will change for the other users

> "Für die anderen Nutzer soll sich dadurch nichts ändern, ihre Mails sollen weiter standardmäßig verschlüsselt werden"

For other users nothing changes.

> "betrifft die Überwachungsmaßnahme nur die neu eingehenden unverschlüsselten E-Mails"

Only the new mails will be stored unencrypted. Already encrypted mails can't be unencrypted and it's only for this inbox.

> Für die anderen Nutzer soll sich dadurch nichts ändern, ihre Mails sollen weiter standardmäßig verschlüsselt werden. Gleichwohl sieht Tutanota eine einmalige Umgehung der Verschlüsselung als Datenschutz- und Sicherheitsrisiko für letztlich alle Kunden an.

For other users nothing changes. Tutanota sees through this "onetime" circumvention of the encryption a big risk in data protection and security for all other users.

And I agree. I won't feel good using a secure mail provider that promises to encrypt all my mails so that nobody else can read them, knowing they once had to implement a backdoor to circumvent exactly that.

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