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Illegal Math

blog.prakashvenkat.com

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Re: Illegal Math

#21

Post by programmer_dude »

dingusoo wrote: post #15
RockyMcNuts wrote: post #4

Seems a little like saying, you burn some gas and your car goes, and if it goes 80mph, that's just physics. You can't make it illegal to obey the laws of physics? Plants are just biology and burning things is just chemistry. You can't make it illegal for a plant to grow and for a human burn it and inhale it, can you? Well...if you pass a law that pi=3 it doesn't change the nature of the universe, but it does regulate…

It's more like saying if you draw a picture of a car going 80mph, that's just a drawing. Doing physics or chemistry can directly harm people. Doing math or drawing pictures can't.

>Doing physics or chemistry can directly harm people. Doing math or drawing pictures can't.

Like the article said analogies are no fun. I agree with your premise but not with your conclusion.

You will perhaps agree that encryption has the potential to directly harm people just as physics or chemistry?

Re: Illegal Math

#22

Post by x5n1 »

chimeracoder wrote: post #19
slg wrote: post #14

>Various government agencies are crooning that they should be able to knock down whichever doors they please because they're the government. I think this analogy is apt but it actually works against the author's point. Our government has legally been allowed to knock down whichever door it has wanted to for centuries assuming it has received the proper warrants. An encryption door cannot be knocked down. That is a ve…

> Things like personal notes, journals, communications all used to be accessible to the government through warrants. Now that information is all locked away behind encryption. The government already has plenty of ways to collect evidence through legal means. A judge can compel you to provide access to your company files, to unlock your home, to decrypt your computer, etc. If you don't comply with the discovery proces…

People die all the time after committing nefarious crimes. In this case the police killed them. Maybe the police is to blame for the fact that we can not get to the truth about the crime. If there is any truth to be found, other than disillusioned religious people go on a murderous rampage all on their own. I mean justice, well in many cases there can't be justice. The long arm of the law can't reach everyone anywhere, especially after death.

Re: Illegal Math

#23

Post by kelnos »

kenningrmd wrote: post #11

Serious question: Even if a government makes encryption illegal, if I have the source code to gpg then I can still encrypt anything I want right? In other words, even if we lose secure access via SSL because of a master cipher, nobody can make the gpg source code, for example, disappear entirely.

Sure, but that same government can jail you for using it, or jail you for refusing to turn over the passphrase to your encryption key.

Re: Illegal Math

#24

Post by chm »

tptacek wrote: post #13
natch wrote: post #12

Buried in the article below the clever though not original point that encryption is not math, is a much more important point: This debate should really be about whether or not people have the right to have secrets. If your answer is "no" then you ought to explain how you square that with the fact that many of our everyday activities can be considered criminal in some jurisdictions.

I understand where the sentiment is coming from, but the point you are making here is incoherent . Your argument is literally this: people need encryption so that they can conceal evidence of crimes . I think next time you pose this argument, you should remove the bit about how your actions might be illegal in some jurisdiction or other. It isn't doing the work for you that you think it is.

I perceived his point as more subtle than what you make it out to be.

The whole debate is about what's grey vs what's gray. I don't think there's a clear cut answer either way to the question "Is encryption an inviolable right?" The exercise here is to try and find a border between gray and grey, preferably avoiding any knee-jerk reaction such as backdooring every encryption scheme.

Note that I'm assuming such a border exists, which is, to be honest, not on such solid ground. It might very well be that this is an "all or nothing" deal, considering the nature of encryption...

Re: Illegal Math

#25

Post by saulrh »

RockyMcNuts wrote: post #4

Seems a little like saying, you burn some gas and your car goes, and if it goes 80mph, that's just physics. You can't make it illegal to obey the laws of physics? Plants are just biology and burning things is just chemistry. You can't make it illegal for a plant to grow and for a human burn it and inhale it, can you? Well...if you pass a law that pi=3 it doesn't change the nature of the universe, but it does regulate…

> Seems a little like saying, you burn some gas and your car goes, and if it goes 80mph, that's just physics.

So, if you want to try to use this metaphor, the situation is actually a little bit different. Try this:

"Seat belts make it safe to go faster than 20 MPH, and tolerable to go faster than 80 MPH. Unfortunately, sometimes bank robbers use them while going faster than 80 MPH, so we have to ban seat belts entirely to prevent them from robbing banks."

Re: Illegal Math

#26

Post by mirimir »

Well, encryption is already effectively illegal in the UK. Using unauthorized VPNs is illegal in Saudi Arabia. And Iran, I believe. Tor and VPNs are effectively illegal in China, although mostly they just block access.

So it will be interesting to see where the US goes on this. The lines are being drawn.

Re: Illegal Math

#27

Post by CamperBob2 »

programmer_dude wrote: post #21
dingusoo wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's more like saying if you draw a picture of a car going 80mph, that's just a drawing. Doing physics or chemistry can directly harm people. Doing math or drawing pictures can't.

>Doing physics or chemistry can directly harm people. Doing math or drawing pictures can't. Like the article said analogies are no fun. I agree with your premise but not with your conclusion. You will perhaps agree that encryption has the potential to directly harm people just as physics or chemistry?

Doing physics or chemistry can directly harm people. Doing math or drawing pictures can't.

This argument might have worked, up until the point when they criminalized cartoon child pornography.

You will perhaps agree that encryption has the potential to directly harm people just as physics or chemistry?

No.

Re: Illegal Math

#28

Post by mc808 »

slg wrote: post #14

>Various government agencies are crooning that they should be able to knock down whichever doors they please because they're the government. I think this analogy is apt but it actually works against the author's point. Our government has legally been allowed to knock down whichever door it has wanted to for centuries assuming it has received the proper warrants. An encryption door cannot be knocked down. That is a ve…

> Now that information is all locked away behind encryption.

Moreover, more and more of that persistent information is casual communication that historically would have been securely erased by the whispering winds of time. No judge can grant investigators a time machine to travel back and spy on thousands of conversations over the last 5 years to fish for evidence. But now they can have the next-best thing (and getting better).

Re: Illegal Math

#29

Post by dingusoo »

programmer_dude wrote: post #21
dingusoo wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's more like saying if you draw a picture of a car going 80mph, that's just a drawing. Doing physics or chemistry can directly harm people. Doing math or drawing pictures can't.

>Doing physics or chemistry can directly harm people. Doing math or drawing pictures can't. Like the article said analogies are no fun. I agree with your premise but not with your conclusion. You will perhaps agree that encryption has the potential to directly harm people just as physics or chemistry?

> You will perhaps agree that encryption has the potential to directly harm people just as physics or chemistry?

I would not agree. Encryption can only indirectly harm people, in the same vein as speech.

Re: Illegal Math

#30

Post by dinkumthinkum »

This is sort of how I have always felt about the idea of "legal or exportable levels of encryption." It seems a very strange thing. However, even though we may be right that it lacks sense, I don't think the government is moved by such an argument.
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