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U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

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Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#251

Post by dragontamer »

gnarbarian wrote: post #8

They are going straight into "think of the children mode" " Smartphone communication is “going to be the preferred method of the pedophile and the criminal. We are going to lose a lot of investigative opportunities." Apparently "what about the terrorists?" isn't as effective anymore. Let's hope the public will see through their manipulative talking points.

Law Enforcement (aka FBI / DEA) battles pedophiles and drug dealers. These guys typically make the "think of the children" arguments.

Defense (Army / CIA / NSA) battles terrorists.

Keep an eye on the names of the agencies involved. This is an FBI / Law Enforcement story, so the excuses are going to be different than the NSA-case a few months ago.

Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#252

Post by bsder »

xnull wrote: post #103

I hypothesize that this is a coordinated yet simple ruse to rebuild trust in these brands post-Snowden [1][2]. There was similar press coverage regarding the DEA and iCloud encryption that was misreported in a similar way [3]. The Intercept (where Glenn Greenwald is now reporting from) has a story on what data Apple can still easily give away if you do believe they can't decrypt individual machines [4]. But maybe you…

You can be technically unable to decrypt the messages, but the metadata is still available.

Once they have your metadata matching, they can subject you to increased scrutiny.

Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#253

Post by dragontamer »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #239
GHFigs wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand where you're coming from. I have an uncle that feels the exact same way about black people and Muslims. Wait, what?

To the extent police work is someone's religion, I'd submit that these are exactly the police I'm talking about.

So you're a bigot against Police _and_ Muslims.

Got it. At least you're consistent.

Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#254

Post by nanoscopic »

If this annoys you at all, you should check out the 'blackphone'. It's not cheap, but if you value your privacy and security it is the phone for you. Full disclosure: I have nothing to do with this phone; it's just a cool related project.

Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#255

Post by CamperBob2 »

dragontamer wrote: post #253
CamperBob2 wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To the extent police work is someone's religion, I'd submit that these are exactly the police I'm talking about.

So you're a bigot against Police _and_ Muslims. Got it. At least you're consistent.

Yes, my simplistic worldview often gets me into trouble. But this will come as no surprise to you, I'm sure.

Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#256

Post by psykovsky »

seanflyon wrote: post #240
jn1234 wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole point of the updated system is that they don't have your decryption key. They will still turn over encrypted data, but LE won't be able to decrypt. That might be a leap of faith though.

So you are saying that if you lose your device there is no way to recover your data?

No, he's saying the decryption key will be a simple passcode for an encrypted private key stored on apple's servers, or something even worse than that. Promising, ain't it? ...with the examples we have of the type of passwords people use...

Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#257

Post by seanflyon »

psykovsky wrote: post #256
seanflyon wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you are saying that if you lose your device there is no way to recover your data?

No, he's saying the decryption key will be a simple passcode for an encrypted private key stored on apple's servers, or something even worse than that. Promising, ain't it? ...with the examples we have of the type of passwords people use...

Is the decryption key something the user chooses like a password, or is it random noise generated on the device that the user does not need to know?

Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#258

Post by xnull »

tomsthumb wrote: post #217
xnull wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's extremely difficult to implement cryptography correctly, and then cryptography != security != privacy. You should also look through the other linked articles. Some of them include features built into iOS devices that already circumvent encryption.

> It's extremely difficult to implement cryptography correctly The smartest CS undergrad at any vaguely reputable school could probably do this correctly. It shouldn't be a problem at all for one of the biggest companies in America if they actually care. > then cryptography != security != privacy Which is a more interesting point and assuming the left side was taken care of we could rapidly approach the right side by…

> The smartest CS undergrad at any vaguely reputable school could probably do this correctly. It shouldn't be a problem at all for one of the biggest companies in America if they actually care.

You are very wrong about this.

> assuming the left side was taken care of we could rapidly approach the right side by doing things like providing more granular permissions to applications

It's actually an unsolved problem. Granular permissions have been tried before.

Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#259

Post by delecti »

whistlecrackers wrote: post #163
TheRealDunkirk wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think anyone's unclear about the violations, but when our system of government is limited to 2 parties, and BOTH of them are bought and sold to various companies and departments with interest in violating that premise, the ideal is doomed.

Is it really two parties? Are they really that different? What's the difference between ISIS and WMDs? Barack Obama and George W. Bush?

I would say there are two parties, but it's not "Democrats/Republicans", it's "Tea Party/Everybody else".

There's a small group of people making Republican politicians do crazy things (shutting down the government, blockading Obama, various social issues [gay marriage/abortion]), but by and large the Democrats and Republicans are the same.

Re: U.S. Law Enforcement Seeks to Halt Apple-Google Encryption of Mobile Data

#260

Post by csandreasen »

alasdair_ wrote: post #93
slg wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't support what the government is trying to do here, but minimizing this issue like this is not doing us any favors. The issue isn't that law enforcement can no longer "look around" your phone. The issue is that they can no longer get a warrant and use what is on your phone as evidence in an investigation or court case without the phone owner's cooperation. Basically your phone goes from being personal property…

We should ban the ownership of non-trivial safes for the same reason then. We should also prevent people from writing things in non-approved languages, in case in makes the understanding of things more difficult when a warrant is served. Hell, if I just hide my information in a stack of a million other paper files, that would be enough to thwart all but the most determined investigator from accessing it without my co…

A long time ago I worked in a guarded military vault with lots of safes - I've never seen one that would take more than an hour or two to break into. The idea is to slow an attacker down long enough that they can be detected and security can get on the scene to deal with them.

None of your examples would prevent an investigator from finding evidence, only delay them. Strong encryption enabled by default could slow down an investigation to the point where it would go on past the heat death of the universe.

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