There's the obvious security/privacy point, but I think on a technical basis it would also be useful: the internet is full of pesky middleboxes which meddle with content, and this breaks things. For example, sometimes WebSockets can't connect unless run securely because somewhere a middlebox is looking at the content and changing it, expecting it to be HTTP traffic when really it's a websocket. Encryption removes the possibility for infrastructure-breaking middleboxes.
It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
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Re: It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
#12"Everything on the Internet should be strongly encrypted all the time." -- Bob Metcalfe (Infoworld 24 June 1996)
Re: It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
#13"That means secure connections to everything from your bank site to Wired.com to the online menu at your local pizza parlor."
Oh, the irony that the article itself isn't served over HTTPS.
Re: It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
#14The question is better posed as "Can encryption put the morals of 'you know who' back in place?"
As I see it encryption works against your average trouble maker. But the current wave essays that the data needs to be protected from even more people. Definitions like GOVERNMENT, CORPORATE, etc. Traditionally the GOVT needs that info to make macro-level decisions, so it was trusted by most people. CORPS on other hand could get that info, and the GOVT was supposed to regulate that process.
Now it seems that the GOVT has gone beyond its neutral stance, but wait! it is actually not the GOVT, but the individuals at fault here. If you see this problem as something induced by corporate greed, than its possible to see this situation from a tech-security-guy-point-of-view as:
The GOVT needs to keep all the windows safe from such greed, and the CORPS just need few windows to get inside, just like in Computer Security. Now join reality with this hypothesis, and ask yourself this:
How many politicians fail to draw a line between: (1) cooperation (with CORPS) for "selfish" reasons (2) cooperation (with CORPS) for "democratic" reasons
Now yes, historically many politicians have fallen prey to this type of thing, but up to what extent? You take succumb to it sometimes or regularly on a personal level? And yes, many corporate individuals/entities feel that they are at disadvantage if they don't cheat slightly, but does it stays within the self drawn line called "slightly/just a bit" or goes beyond it?
At the end it becomes a chicken and egg problem. But is that really impossible to solve? Is the encryption alone or together with other things answer to this dilemma? And is it okay to sit at home, knowing you have the antidote to all the problems in the world, and let everyone outside "go to hell?"
PS: Seemingly, the traditional 4th party: Elite evil hackers seems to be in line, thanks to a lot of people in US security structure working against them.
Re: It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
#15"That means secure connections to everything from your bank site to Wired.com to the online menu at your local pizza parlor." Oh, the irony that the article itself isn't served over HTTPS.
That's not really irony since it is proposing a possible "future".
Re: It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
#16> You have to purchase TLS certificates from one of several certificate authorities
I'd like to stop this misconception. You don't buy certificates. You make your own certificate, which is unknown to the world, and _then_ you buy a stamp from a trusted third-party on your own certificate, so everyone can trust it.
The crux of the matter is whether you can actually trust these third-parties.
Re: It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
#17https://encrypt.today - who said the new TLDs were useless?
Re: It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
#18> You have to purchase TLS certificates from one of several certificate authorities I'd like to stop this misconception. You don't buy certificates. You make your own certificate, which is unknown to the world, and _then_ you buy a stamp from a trusted third-party on your own certificate, so everyone can trust it. The crux of the matter is whether you can actually trust these third-parties.
The point is, which third parties to trust and for how long? How to be sure always that they are worthy of the continued trust?
Re: It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
#19> You have to purchase TLS certificates from one of several certificate authorities I'd like to stop this misconception. You don't buy certificates. You make your own certificate, which is unknown to the world, and _then_ you buy a stamp from a trusted third-party on your own certificate, so everyone can trust it. The crux of the matter is whether you can actually trust these third-parties.
That's not accurate. You send them a 'Certificate Signing Request', which is a request for them to issue you with a certificate. It's not a complete certificate template just lacking a signature. In any case... semantically a certificate isn't a certificate until it's been certified, it's just meaningless paper.
In some ways this reminds me of the misconception about birth (and marriage) certificates from people new to genealogy. In the UK a birth certificate is just a piece of paper that contains markers of authentication to ensure people who read it can trust that it's true likeness of a record held at Her Majesty's GRO. It doesn't provide any guarantees about the honesty of data itself, or even if the person was ever born, in the same way me reading an x509 doesn't guarantee the data it contains is factual or was issued to the right person. Even if a CA does these checks, there's no way to insert a proof of such in to a certificate, therefore the certificate isn't such a proof...
Re: It’s Time to Encrypt the Entire Internet
#20It's time to decentralize the internet. There is no good reason why we can't have email, webpages, photos, even facebook-like social stuff housed on our own machines in our own homes (or some other place under our control). The current situation is akin to having to travel to some centralized letter-reading facility in order to read letter mail. Your grandma sends you a letter in the mail and you have to go to a cent…
> There is no good reason why we can't have email, webpages, photos, even facebook-like social stuff housed on our own machines
You know, this is exactly how the internet works, today. You can do it if you want. You will find that you're gonna have to spend some (some would say a lot of) time to amass enough knowledge to become self-sufficient. But there's no big technical issue, there only is a mindset issue. Do you actually want to spend the time, face downtimes and low speeds that having a real internet would incur, or do you want to remain in your comfy walled garden ?
I'm sure what you really meant was "It's time to decentralize the services we use".
> We put a man on the moon
"We" as in "The government and countless private contractors, all with an unlimited budget", not as in "We the people". The centralization you see today is just the same thing.