Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

theguardian.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 173 posts

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

#101

Post by NoZebra120vClip »

tialaramex wrote: post #17
Digit-Al wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Signal said they may have to pull out of the UK if the bill is enacted as well. This would be a major setback for communications here. We'd basically have to go back to SMS/MMS and email as far as I can tell. I don't know this is a fight the UK government can win. Does anyone else remember that the American government tried to ban encryption (back in the 90's I think it was)? They eventually had to give up because pe…

The US said that encryption (well, good encryption) was a munition and so you needed an export license to make it available outside the US, e.g. by putting it on a web site. Such rules are not unusual for physical objects - why sell your enemies or even potential enemies the rope they will hang you with? But for encryption it doesn't make sense because it's just information, and unlike physical objects, after writing…

And not a few folks commissioned Perl tattoos with crypto code, thereby becoming human munitions and daring Customs to stop them in ports of entry.

And then came the Clipper Chip...

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

#102

Post by NoZebra120vClip »

twelve40 wrote: post #96
jupp0r wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's relatively easy for people to switch, compared to other social networks.

What?? if all your contacts are on messenger X, it's easy for you to switch to messenger Y? and do what there, message yourself? It's exactly as hard as any other social network! P.S. I'm always shocked how people suggest "just use Signal" or something, it's really not up to me what to pick what to use at all, but up to the people I'm trying to connect with. It seems like a very difficult concept for the "just use Si…

Well that's reciprocal, isn't it? You can either be the guy who accommodates all your friends' networks by having accounts everywhere, or you could instead be the guy who's only using Signal, so anyone who wants to stay in touch with you had better get on Signal!

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

#103

Post by abdullahkhalids »

martincmartin wrote: post #83
Quarrelsome wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From my limited understanding of WhatsApp revenues were healthy prior to the buyout. I have seen some revenue estimates since the buyout that could justify the sale price, should they be accurate.

WhatsApp stopped charging users, and doesn't run ads. It has no revenue.

Whatsapp has a Business accounts feature that has some pricing built in https://business.whatsapp.com/

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

#104

Post by nicoburns »

brundolf wrote: post #5
Kim_Bruning wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They say that 98% of users are outside the UK (and those users very likely won't want reduced encryption), so whatsapp would probably just exit the UK.

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 would say that WhatsApp is probably the most commonly used chat app in the UK. But most people are also using at least one other chat service such as Facebook Messenger or Instagram's messages. And of course due to the way WhatsApp uses phone numbers as an id, most people also have people's phone numbers and can fall back to SMS if need be.

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

#105

Post by nicoburns »

jupp0r wrote: post #13
Digit-Al wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Signal said they may have to pull out of the UK if the bill is enacted as well. This would be a major setback for communications here. We'd basically have to go back to SMS/MMS and email as far as I can tell. I don't know this is a fight the UK government can win. Does anyone else remember that the American government tried to ban encryption (back in the 90's I think it was)? They eventually had to give up because pe…

What does it mean for Signal to "pull out" of the UK? How can the UK government enforce this law against an app whose makers have no physical presence inside the country? Force phone makers to ban the app from app stores?

Yeah, app store releases are per-region. They'd just untick the UK region.

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

#106

Post by acqbu »

Instead of removing end-to-end encryption, there may be alternative solutions to address law enforcement concerns. For example, law enforcement agencies could work with WhatsApp to develop lawful access mechanisms that allow them to access messages in specific cases where they have a legitimate need to do so. These mechanisms could be subject to strict oversight and transparency to prevent abuse.

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

#107

Post by seanw444 »

nsenifty wrote: post #89
d33 wrote: post #60

It's intriguing which battles they choose. It wasn't long since there was a discussion where some people were arguing that they can't make moral judgements because disobeying the law would put them in a very difficult situation: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35028107&

The above case was with FB messenger which is (was?) not e2e encrypted and since Meta already had the data they were obliged to comply with a court-issued warrant. With E2EE, they can legally skirt such demands since they can claim they don't have the data so that's a win for them as well.

E2EE on platforms like FB Messenger means absolutely nothing to me if their client apps are closed-source.

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

#108

Post by seanw444 »

eddsh1994 wrote: post #23
ridiculous_leke wrote: post #19

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

It allows criminals to do bad things, common examples would be CP or terrorism.

The human race is doomed. We never learn from even the most common tropes used to do harm to innocent people.

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

#109

Post by FalconSensei »

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 it truly E2E encryption if it has a backdoor?

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

#110

Post by seanw444 »

saddlerustle wrote: post #88
Laaas wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Source for 64-bit key part? Seems unreasonably low.

It's false. The OP is probably confusing it for the option of encrypting the backup with a 64- digit key (which is ~212 bits)

Which, depending on the type of encryption, is still too low.
Post reply on HN