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As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

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Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#161

Post by MarkHarmon »

shoeless wrote: post #112
rdl wrote: post #20

Sounds like not "the death of public key encryption" but the golden age of building technical controls into hardware/software which cannot be subverted by the operator, even in the face of a state agent with a gun. Assuming the right tech is developed and deployed, this is going to be far better for everyone in a few years. Yes, it will be shitty for a year or two, but by 2020, if we actually have real technical secu…

Just wondering - will older, but still decent hardware, start to become increasingly valuable since the hardware controls don't exist there? Will the value of my circa 2000 Dell PowerEdge take on new life?

Maybe we need a manufacturer to step up and make a line of computers that is open source and contains self auditing features such as checksums for all hardware. There has to be a way to do it. Some of the latest Kickstarter projects that are hardware based would be in a good position to try and pull that off.

Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#162

Post by mrt0mat0 »

rafcavallaro wrote: post #133
northernmonkey wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tepid? The response has been cooler than that.

You apparently missed the fact that the Obama administration had a full scale Democratic congressional revolt on its hands yesterday - a majority of congressional Dems voted to defund the NSA collection of bulk call records under FISA - the White House was seriously afraid the Amash Ammendment would pass - it only failed narrowly - 217 to 205. So in objective terms, the response has been far worse than the administra…

i think the issue is: 10% of the people are informed enough to realize what's going, and yes, some of them are acting. the majority of Americans don't know what's going on, and many of them don't care, which is sad.

Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#163

Post by joering2 »

downandout wrote: post #98

This kind of thing makes me think the Snowden disclosures actually emboldened the NSA in some ways. Their nightmare scenario occurred, and nothing happened. Nobody even got fired or "resigned". The public's tepid reaction has brought our nightmare scenario to life - we taught secretive government agencies that they can now do anything they want without fear of public backlash. These kinds of requests can now dramatic…

Like with everything else than maybe virus outbreak, most changes takes time to affect entire community, economy or a country. Rome wasn't built in a day, so the Rome Empire didn't collapse in a day neither.

Take me as an example. I am 8 years in US, married to US citizen. Green Card holder now and couple years ago our plan was for me to become a US Citizen and us to raise our kids on US soil. Not anymore.

With all the outcoming gov scandals, with government forcing you to vaccine your kids, with you or your children going to jail for drawing a gun, for swat team breaking into your house because you are selling raw milk, for all this growing nonsense and my personal disgust with president that calls death of 4 us officials in Bengazi a "phony scandal", I am genuinely sick and disgusted of this to my deeper core. And here comes important part: so you say to me in response: if you don't like it, move out! And you are damn right!

We made this decision recently and right now my wife is learning my native language while I am shifting more towards doing more remote programming gigs. Surprisingly after I moved here from the country of communism, now it seems safer and more sane back in Europe than here! Europe has its problems of course, but honestly I believe Europe will deteriorate much slower than US. Here everything is on fast forward and yes examples like Manning or Snowden revelations and lack of echo makes it hard to believe anything will change for better in the future.

I believe I am not the only one who draw this conclusion lately. I also think that many smart people coming to this country to live "american dream" are also smart enough to realize the economical situation become so unstable that its better to "wait and see" back home.

Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#164

Post by SkyMarshal »

thewarrior wrote: post #79

Have no doubt about it, this marks the beginning of the end of online privacy. Now that even the U.S. govt is asking for the TLS Certificates there is no country that has the moral high ground on this issue. I'm from India and when I heard that the Indian government was asking Blackberry for its encryption keys I thought "Hah these people are so ignorant! They don't even know how public key encryption works!!". In hi…

>Recently some governments tried to orchestrate a power grab of the internet via the ITU but the US vetoed it. I thought it would be better for the US govt. to have control rather than untrustworthy foreign govts. Recent developments have shattered even that impression.

Yes, this is the thing that worries me the most. It may very well be the beginning of the end of the "multi-stakeholder model" of internet governance. There's no one left with any kind of moral high ground to fight off these attempts.

Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#165

Post by jwoah12 »

northernmonkey wrote: post #109
jwoah12 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree with your usage of the past tense here. This is far from over, and I don't think the public's reaction was tepid.

Tepid? The response has been cooler than that.

I don't know what would have to happen for you to consider the response substantial. Would citizens need to be forming militias and actively marching in the streets? That's just not how people react anymore.

Tens of thousands of people called their congresspeople on a day's notice to express their support for the Amash Amendement. That amendment lost by only 12 votes. A large majority of people polled think that the NSA dragnet is infringing on privacy rights. I think that's pretty good for a notoriously apathetic populace. This issue is far from over.

Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#166

Post by 7s »

cmircea wrote: post #63
phlo wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Azure is , as far as I'm aware, still run by Microsoft (a US company).

IIRC it's run by Microsoft Ireland in the EU. Even then, if the US would be to access EU-hosted data, with no real justification, the EU will not take that kindly. Especially private data.

Yes it will. There is a huge scandal brooding in Germany about the Goverment Agencies sharing wiretaps etc. with US goverment, and high-ranking politicians not only seem to. have been informed but are even justifying actions like this in general. (Knowing that the EU is only as strong as its members, these revelations are really disconcerting to me even before I can see the extent of surveillance data shared)

Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#167

Post by 7s »

cmircea wrote: post #63
phlo wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Azure is , as far as I'm aware, still run by Microsoft (a US company).

IIRC it's run by Microsoft Ireland in the EU. Even then, if the US would be to access EU-hosted data, with no real justification, the EU will not take that kindly. Especially private data.

Yes it will. There is a huge scandal brooding in Germany about the Goverment Agencies sharing wiretaps etc. with US goverment, and high-ranking politicians not only seem to. have been informed but are even justifying actions like this in general. (Knowing that the EU is only as strong as its members, these revelations are really disconcerting to me even before I can see the extent of surveillance data shared)

Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#168

Post by moens »

chongli wrote: post #115
northernmonkey wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tepid? The response has been cooler than that.

If you're talking about the media, what did you expect? The mainstream media is just a mouthpiece for the government at this point.

Unfortunately I believe @northernmonkey and all OP's are talking about the "average American" and maybe the "average human". After all, in the US anyway, aren't we-the-people the government? That would make the MSM a mouthpiece for... the average American. I believe that is more or less true as sad as it is.

Aware and concerned tech-heads are trying to protect a drunken fool (the public) from a hungry bear (whoever it is that actually runs the intelligence networks). Either one is dangerous enough on its own, trying to save one from the other is like trying to settle a domestic dispute... not sure it can happen.

I don't have an answer, just an analysis.

Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#169

Post by r4pha »

Shish2k wrote: post #30
zokier wrote: post #11

There is just so much more to public key crypto than public web SSL/TLS.

And the feds can demand the keys to those other things too :P

Yes, that's true, but there is a big difference between you being responsible for (not) handing over something that is in your possession and being unaware of a presumed safe channel being unsafe.

Re: As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption

#170

Post by rdl »

tlrobinson wrote: post #88
rdl wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's a win because the government is not the only, and in most cases not the worst, threat. Insiders (like Snowden and Manning, ironically) are one of the biggest threats. Being attacked by non-USG outsiders is a major threat ("hackers", state sponsored or not). Your business partners being hacked, or having lax security, is another threat. USG is probably near the bottom of the list of actual threats for most pe…

I always assumed "zombie apocalypse" was code for "civil uprising" anyway.

Even in Oakland, I am way more worried about things like an earthquake, blackout, etc than a civil war, though.
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