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UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

arstechnica.com

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Re: UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

#251

Post by fluidcruft »

Silhouette wrote: post #226
fluidcruft wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of things that are publicly known but if he's signed an NDA he can't point at them or acknowledge their authenticity. Anyway Pegasus isn't even the correct ballpark lol.

Just about every confidentiality clause or NDA I've ever signed had a provision specifically excluding information independently in the public domain from its scope. I find it strange to the point of lacking credibility that someone working in a security-related field would have an NDA that required them to pretend to ignore even public domain information yet permitted them to post the kind of innuendo seen in this d…

Yeah, I agree but it could be his thought process.

Re: UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

#252

Post by NooneAtAll3 »

cmsj wrote: post #213
miohtama wrote: post #164

What could go wrong? The UK is the same country that arrests 12,000 people a year for posting online. > Now every force in the country has a team sifting through people’s posts trying to determine what crosses an undefined threshold. “It is a complete nightmare,” one officer admits Britain’s police are restricting speech in worrying ways https://www.economist.com/britain/2025/05/15/britains-police... From The Economi…

On the one hand, freedom of speech is great. On the other hand, you have whatever the fuck is going on in America these days, and that is not great. So... I dunno, neither option is good.

there was twitter cancelling before, and people that aren't fine with America now were fine back then

that's normal

Re: UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

#253

Post by tolien »

yesco wrote: post #248
tolien wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't saying the context I gave was an exhaustive list, I was suggesting that having Googled her name and maybe skimmed a couple of news articles, you might need to do some more reading before forming too much of an opinion. > She didn't throw rocks, she didn't set things on fire, she didn't stab anyone -- it was her speech that got her a multi-year jail term. Your contention seems to be that incitement shouldn't…

> That's at odds with legal systems all over the world, including the US Not true. The US has a much higher bar for prosecuting speech than the UK. Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969) - 395 U.S. 444 - https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/107965/brandenburg-v-o... - Speech must be "directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action" - AND "likely to incite or produce such action" - General statements like "burn them al…

Point taken, but incitement is still an offence in other countries. That the US has specific, and particularly permissive, laws around what constitutes speech is neither here nor there.

> You want thousands of examples?

Of people people prosecuted for innocuous speech in the UK, the original claim in this thread. Brandenburg doesn't apply there.

Re: UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

#254

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

CJefferson wrote: post #165
ryukafalz wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But also for the first time in human history, it's possible to do large-scale surveillance without large-scale human effort. The power of the network goes both ways. Phone wiretapping (until recently I suppose) and mail inspection required a human to take some action to listen in; you couldn't just monitor everyone's communications. Now you can.

I agree, there are many complex issues involved here. But I get annoyed at tech people (not saying you!) that it is self-evident that any kind of law enforcement methods of access is obviously wrong.

> I get annoyed at tech people (not saying you!) that it is self-evident that any kind of law enforcement methods of access is obviously wrong.

I don't think anybody is saying that the motivations are bad. We all want safety, right?

The closest thing I hear is, they feel that the cons often outweigh the pros. I think this correlates with their trust in authorities, given the countless abuses we see authorities perpetrating when granted power.

There's a reason "think of the children!" is literally a joke mocking safety-based pretexts for reductions in rights.

Re: UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

#255

Post by yesco »

tolien wrote: post #253
yesco wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's at odds with legal systems all over the world, including the US Not true. The US has a much higher bar for prosecuting speech than the UK. Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969) - 395 U.S. 444 - https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/107965/brandenburg-v-o... - Speech must be "directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action" - AND "likely to incite or produce such action" - General statements like "burn them al…

Point taken, but incitement is still an offence in other countries. That the US has specific, and particularly permissive, laws around what constitutes speech is neither here nor there. > You want thousands of examples? Of people people prosecuted for innocuous speech in the UK, the original claim in this thread. Brandenburg doesn't apply there.

I misunderstood what you were trying to imply but still think your premise is mistaken. My reply is merely directed at anyone implying the US's free speech-laws are somehow comparable to the authoritarian anti-free-speech laws the UK has.

Re: UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

#256

Post by tolien »

yesco wrote: post #255
tolien wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Point taken, but incitement is still an offence in other countries. That the US has specific, and particularly permissive, laws around what constitutes speech is neither here nor there. > You want thousands of examples? Of people people prosecuted for innocuous speech in the UK, the original claim in this thread. Brandenburg doesn't apply there.

I misunderstood what you were trying to imply but still think your premise is mistaken. My reply is merely directed at anyone implying the US's free speech-laws are somehow comparable to the authoritarian anti-free-speech laws the UK has.

Do expand on that point then.

Edit: If I remove the reference to Brandenburg, I'm not sure my point substantially changes:

Incitement is an offence in the UK and also in other countries. You can argue whether that should be the case or not but that's completely orthogonal.

Gathering a whole lot of offenses which happened to include online activity to produce a big number of people who you can claim were prosecuted for something that you can claim is as innocuous as "online posts" is dishonest.

Re: UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

#258

Post by Hikikomori »

freedomben wrote: post #120
bsimpson wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm not sure the Trump administration actually has a coherent position That seems to be the most salient property of his presidency. His position on any issue is whatever he just said, with no regard to what it might have been yesterday.

For anyone that wants a good (and fair) example of this, check out his positions on the debt ceiling going back to 2012 (and then on every time it's come up since). When he isn't in power raising the debt ceiling is Unamerican, a political ploy and bad. When he is in power, it should be scrapped entirely and should be above politics. He was remarkably frank about it in an interview a year or two ago when he was runni…

That's just regular old two Santas playbook republicans been running since Reagan.

Re: UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

#259

Post by andyferris »

wkat4242 wrote: post #184
ascorbic wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still European though.

Geographically, yes. But they've made it clear they don't want anything to do with us. Also, the 3-year period after brexit with all the whining about their 'deal' (knowing that what they wanted was legally impossible) was so annoying I'm kinda done with them. Too much drama for too long. So I've stopped buying UK products and services (eg raspberry pi) and don't consider traveling there anymore. Just like I'm doing…

I think from the point of view of the US and elsewhere, the UK is in Europe and is European. They are aware they are not in the EU, but that doesn't matter as it's inappropriate to make EU synonymous with Europe. (The distinction is much like North America vs USA; if you said the former you definitely don't mean _just_ the latter).

Re: UK backing down on Apple encryption backdoor after pressure from US

#260

Post by yesco »

tolien wrote: post #256
yesco wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I misunderstood what you were trying to imply but still think your premise is mistaken. My reply is merely directed at anyone implying the US's free speech-laws are somehow comparable to the authoritarian anti-free-speech laws the UK has.

Do expand on that point then. Edit: If I remove the reference to Brandenburg, I'm not sure my point substantially changes: Incitement is an offence in the UK and also in other countries. You can argue whether that should be the case or not but that's completely orthogonal. Gathering a whole lot of offenses which happened to include online activity to produce a big number of people who you can claim were prosecuted fo…

You're playing a shell game with definitions to justify authoritarian speech laws.

> lumping together arrests for stalking, incitement to violence and other forms of harassment to produce a big scary number

But that's exactly the problem - the UK defines "incitement" and "harassment" so broadly that ordinary political speech becomes criminal:

UK "Harassment" includes:

- Misgendering someone online

- Posting offensive jokes

- Retweeting protest footage

- Criticizing immigration policy "grossly"

UK "Incitement" includes:

- Lucy Connolly's Facebook post (31 months)

- Jordan Parlour's "every man and their dog should smash [hotel] up" (20 months)

- Tyler Kay's "set fire to all the hotels" retweet (38 months)

NONE of these would meet Brandenburg's standard in the US. They lack:

- Directed at specific individuals

- Imminent timeframe

- Likelihood of producing immediate action

> if the stated number is true, there should be thousands of examples every year

There ARE thousands. In 2023:

- 3,537 arrested for online speech

- 1,991 convicted under Section 127 Communications Act

- Hundreds more under Public Order Act

You don't hear about most because "UK citizen arrested for offensive tweet" stopped being newsworthy years ago.

You're using the word "incitement" to equate UK thought policing with legitimate US restrictions on speech that creates immediate danger. That's like defending China's censorship because "every country bans fraud."

The definitions matter. The UK criminalizes hurt feelings. The US criminalizes immediate threats to public safety.

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