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Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

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Re: Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

#21

Post by StavrosK »

Freak_NL wrote: post #11
sdoering wrote: post #3

I strongly believe we have lost the war for privacy and security (against state level actors) already. Once the net adopted the platform model, we were screwed. Platforms are as easy to regulate, as for example the telephone companies were back in the days. They were easily forced to comply with wiretapping demands of the government. The moment a central platform controlled (most of) our communication and was able to…

> They were easily forced to comply with wiretapping demands of the government. Of some governments. If you are not one of the five (or whatever) eyes, you probably won't get your hand in WhatsApp's panties; much to the annoyance of those governments (e.g., the Dutch government which in its current incarnation seems to have developed a dislike for end-to-end encryption as well). For American citizens to be spied on b…

> China sidesteps this issue completely by using home-grown platforms like WeChat of course.

How is that different from what the US does? It seems to me an error to think that US companies are somehow the default, and any other country using its own services is sidestepping the issue.

Re: Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

#22

Post by mytailorisrich »

choward wrote: post #7
mytailorisrich wrote: post #5

I think that the key point that should be addressed by those against this bill and these laws in general is: How to conduct legitimate law enforcement business and police investigations at a time when most communications have moved online? The reason the Attorney General and the DOJ want some sort of access to communications is not to undermine free speech and to take over the world, it is because they know that with…

> they know that without legal provisions technology can make it impossible to access communication during legitimate police investigations > How do we solve this problem? It's called a search warrant.

Well, no. That's the issue!

If you only have peer-to-peer encryption with communications still passing through servers unencrypted then, sure, you can get a warrant to force disclosure.

With end to end encryption, however you can show up with a warrant all you want it makes no difference because they physically cannot hand you clear-text communications.

Same for encryption at rest. The strength of the encryption algorithms we have today makes it near impossible to recover the clear-text data.

Re: Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

#23

Post by Aozi »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #5

I think that the key point that should be addressed by those against this bill and these laws in general is: How to conduct legitimate law enforcement business and police investigations at a time when most communications have moved online? The reason the Attorney General and the DOJ want some sort of access to communications is not to undermine free speech and to take over the world, it is because they know that with…

>How do we solve this problem?

We don't, we accept that encryption is part of the modern world and learn to live with it. Because there's nothing else you can do about it.

See encryption is just math, and you can't really outlaw or limit how math is used.

If we have bad actors who want to encrypt their communication, they absolutely can with or without this bill.

Even if Whatsapp/Telegram/Whatever has to provide the US government with a backdoor to decrypt all messages, anyone can make their own communication platform and simply not give the government a back door. Implementing secure encryption isn't difficult and it's very easy to research how to accomplish it.

Grab a few devs and they can create a simple encrypted messaging app in a few days.

You don't even need to distribute it through official channels. Android allows you to sideload apps from anywhere and you can jailbreak iPhones to install apps from anywhere. So our bad actors can create secure encrypted communication platforms and distribute them without anyone ever knowing about it.

How will this bill prevent that? How will it prevent a few random developers from whipping up their own apps? How will it make it impossible for anyone, anywhere at any time to implement encryption into any app or platform?

Re: Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

#24

Post by mytailorisrich »

Jon_Lowtek wrote: post #19
mytailorisrich wrote: post #5

I think that the key point that should be addressed by those against this bill and these laws in general is: How to conduct legitimate law enforcement business and police investigations at a time when most communications have moved online? The reason the Attorney General and the DOJ want some sort of access to communications is not to undermine free speech and to take over the world, it is because they know that with…

How was it solved before modern communication tech made it possible to automatically record, transcribe and search peoples private communication?

The key problem is not automation, it's access.

It's simple to read a letter. It's not difficult to eavesdrop on a phone copper wire. But it's impossible to intercept communications encrypted end-to-end, or encrypted at rest, considering the strength of the algorithms freely available today.

Re: Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

#26

Post by ceilingcorner »

Freak_NL wrote: post #11
sdoering wrote: post #3

I strongly believe we have lost the war for privacy and security (against state level actors) already. Once the net adopted the platform model, we were screwed. Platforms are as easy to regulate, as for example the telephone companies were back in the days. They were easily forced to comply with wiretapping demands of the government. The moment a central platform controlled (most of) our communication and was able to…

> They were easily forced to comply with wiretapping demands of the government. Of some governments. If you are not one of the five (or whatever) eyes, you probably won't get your hand in WhatsApp's panties; much to the annoyance of those governments (e.g., the Dutch government which in its current incarnation seems to have developed a dislike for end-to-end encryption as well). For American citizens to be spied on b…

> China sidesteps this issue completely by using home-grown platforms like WeChat of course.

Chinese avoid the problem of being spied on by their government?

Re: Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

#27

Post by monocasa »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #22
choward wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they know that without legal provisions technology can make it impossible to access communication during legitimate police investigations > How do we solve this problem? It's called a search warrant.

Well, no. That's the issue! If you only have peer-to-peer encryption with communications still passing through servers unencrypted then, sure, you can get a warrant to force disclosure. With end to end encryption, however you can show up with a warrant all you want it makes no difference because they physically cannot hand you clear-text communications. Same for encryption at rest. The strength of the encryption algo…

A search warrant for the endpoints.

Re: Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

#28

Post by mytailorisrich »

monocasa wrote: post #27
mytailorisrich wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, no. That's the issue! If you only have peer-to-peer encryption with communications still passing through servers unencrypted then, sure, you can get a warrant to force disclosure. With end to end encryption, however you can show up with a warrant all you want it makes no difference because they physically cannot hand you clear-text communications. Same for encryption at rest. The strength of the encryption algo…

A search warrant for the endpoints.

And I will refuse to cooperate because I know what my "endpoint" contains, because of course my device is also encrypted and/or will be destroyed if I think I'm about to get caught.

Your script kiddie might break at the suggestion that refusing to cooperate means 2 to 5 years in jail but organised crime, or people who are risking a much harsher penalty, won't.

These are the real, down to Earth issues, not utopian discussions about individual liberties.

Re: Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

#29

Post by tieze »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #26
Freak_NL wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They were easily forced to comply with wiretapping demands of the government. Of some governments. If you are not one of the five (or whatever) eyes, you probably won't get your hand in WhatsApp's panties; much to the annoyance of those governments (e.g., the Dutch government which in its current incarnation seems to have developed a dislike for end-to-end encryption as well). For American citizens to be spied on b…

> China sidesteps this issue completely by using home-grown platforms like WeChat of course. Chinese avoid the problem of being spied on by their government?

I read this as 'China took a direct route to spying'.

Re: Stop the Earn IT Bill Before It Breaks Encryption

#30

Post by 0x0 »

irrational wrote: post #4

Would this have any affect on software developed outside of the USA? The USA is becoming increasingly irrelevant on the world stage. Couldn’t a company in some other country create a browser with encryption that any of us could use? Could Apple move iOS development offshore and continue creating a mobile OS with encryption?

Already today, as a European iOS developer with your apple developer program contract counterparty being their European corp, you still have to deal with US export restrictions and self reporting paperwork if you make a single HTTPS call in your iOS app (because somehow, your app is being exported from "iTunes in the US" even when both you, your app, your target audience, and the counterpart of your development program are European entities)...
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