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WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

theguardian.com

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Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#41

Post by Quarrelsome »

rwaksmunski wrote: post #33

Dark patterns trick WhatsApp users to enable backups to Google and Apple. If you have them disabled odds are good the other side got tricked into them. Even if your backups are encrypted, it's using only a 64bit key. That means Five Eyes have near real-time access to your "encrypted" messages. Hell, I have to decline backups every time I use WhatsApp on my iPhone, yet after a phone reset all my messages were still th…

> It's naive to think WhatsApp was bought for a different purpose.

Sorry, is it naive to think that Facebook bought WhatsApp for its userbase and technology?

Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#42

Post by spoiler »

developer93 wrote: post #38
yosser wrote: post #26

Isn't this a red herrring? I thought the law didn't require the removal of E2E encryption, but rather mandated the addition of a back door that submits some kind of meta data summary to a third party service?

Is that better? The effect is the same.

I think they meant to say that this is just a PR stunt by saying they won't remove encryption (because they don't even need to to comply)

Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#43

Post by brundolf »

baby wrote: post #37
brundolf wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know in some non-US countries, WhatsApp is the default way of communicating (like SMS is in the US). Is that true in the UK? That could put significant pressure on the government

I live in the bay area in the US and whatsapp is the default way of communicating here as well

Interesting. I live in Texas and I've used it like... once, many years ago (haven't had it installed on my last two phones). Defaults for me and mine are SMS (iMessage when available), Discord, and then I've got a couple people on Signal

Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#44

Post by [deleted] »

323 wrote: post #11
mariojv wrote: post #3

“If the company refused to do, it could face fines of up to 4% of its parent company Meta’s annual turnover – unless it pulled out of the UK market entirely.” Wow. I wonder if it got to that point if Meta would change course and disable end to end encryption for UK users and people messaging UK users, if that would be sufficient to comply. If this lobbying causes the UK to change course, I wonder what impact that wou…

UK politicians themselves use WhatsApp a lot. They will strike the law down a day after WhatsApp stops working in UK. 2 days after there will be massive public outrage since everybody uses WhatsApp in UK. It's an empty threat, just like the internet porn law.

[deleted]

Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#45

Post by 29083011397778 »

developer93 wrote: post #38
yosser wrote: post #26

Isn't this a red herrring? I thought the law didn't require the removal of E2E encryption, but rather mandated the addition of a back door that submits some kind of meta data summary to a third party service?

Is that better? The effect is the same.

That depends entirely upon who gets to define "End-to-end", and whether they are held to task for any inaccuracies in that definition

Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#46

Post by spoiler »

andrejguran wrote: post #34
danbruc wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which always makes me wonder, what is the extend of the child pornography problem? How big is the nail compared to the proposed hammer? If I had to guess, I would guess this is hammer affecting 80+ % of the population to go after a group constituting a fraction of a percent of the population.

That's a very good question: how to quantify child suffering to one of the worst crimes imaginable? I am not saying I am for or against. I am just trying to point how really difficult is to quantify both sides of the equation.

This will do a grand total of nothing to reduce CP, though. It's probably not even going to be an inconvenience. They're already breaking the law and probably jumping through hoops to get access to it.

Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#47

Post by mr_mitm »

jacooper wrote: post #9
rany_ wrote: post #2

I can't believe Meta is fighting the good fight for once.

They have been on the side of encryption since the beginning really. I think had WhatsApp not added E2EE in 2014, Encryption wouldn't be that wide spread today.

Wasn't that right before WhatsApp was bought though? From what I remember they made an effort to implement E2EE before Facebook had any say in it.

Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#48

Post by baby »

brundolf wrote: post #43
baby wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in the bay area in the US and whatsapp is the default way of communicating here as well

Interesting. I live in Texas and I've used it like... once, many years ago (haven't had it installed on my last two phones). Defaults for me and mine are SMS (iMessage when available), Discord, and then I've got a couple people on Signal

I try to avoid iMessage because when I'm abroad I never know if it's going to fallback on SMS and I'll have to pay for a text

Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#49

Post by Quarrelsome »

ridiculous_leke wrote: post #19

What are the government's arguments against end-to-end encryption?

In this case certain child protection groups are suggesting that encryption is a hinderance to protecting children in some scenarios. Specifically it allows social media companies a convenient get out in terms of accepting responsibility.

I think there's two ways to interpret that:

a) At face value, in that its boomer mindset popular among the Tory voting base to want to convert the internet back into the pre-internet world and its possible the blues are just genuinely representing these concerns.

b) these child protection groups in years to come will be revealed to have links to MI5, given MI5 is one of the few agencies that the government does tend to listen to. Its worth remembering that the UK used to predominantly communicate using text messages which are sent over clear so the universal adoption of encryption post Snowden revelations has been a thorn in the side of intelligence agencies for many years now.

Re: WhatsApp would not remove end-to-end encryption for UK law, says chief

#50

Post by andrejguran »

spoiler wrote: post #46
andrejguran wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a very good question: how to quantify child suffering to one of the worst crimes imaginable? I am not saying I am for or against. I am just trying to point how really difficult is to quantify both sides of the equation.

This will do a grand total of nothing to reduce CP, though. It's probably not even going to be an inconvenience. They're already breaking the law and probably jumping through hoops to get access to it.

I disagree that it will be nothing. It will be something larger than 0. First question is how to predict the impact. But more interestingly when we have the impact analysis how to quantify the suffering that will be reduced in comparison with reducing security and how to quantify even that and put these into comparison. (Again I am not on either side just pointing how hard it is to quantify these things)
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