Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 394 posts

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#41

Post by anon1385 »

Doctor_Fegg wrote: post #16

> She said it was a case of getting together "the best people who understand the technology, who understand the necessary hashtags" Our Government is an absolute disgrace; and unfortunately, one to which there is currently no credible, strong opposition. (from https://www.buzzfeed.com/matthewchampion/necessary-hashtags )

If you are referring to the current state of the Labour party then that's irrelevant. Even when Labour were "strong" opposition, or were in power with large majorities, they have had very authoritarian positions on this kind of thing.

Labour were supporters of the recent IP Bill (it actually applied restrictions to some of the crazy powers the last Labour government gave to the police, which gives you an indication of their general position on these things). Labour have had authoritarian positions on crime and policing issues since Blair became shadow Home Secretary (1992). It has been part of their 'tough on crime' strategy of attacking the Conservatives from the right since that point and was a core part of the New Labour strategy.

The only thing a "stronger" Labour opposition would get you in this situation is a parliament even more united in support for restrictions on encryption.

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#42

Post by Symbiote »

mattbee wrote: post #20

Amber Rudd is the UK's Home Secretary not just any minister. "We need to make sure that our intelligence services have the ability to get into situations like encrypted Whatsapp." She has said she is "calling in" technology companies this week to try to "deliver a solution". Marr asks if they refuse to do that, will you legislate to force them to change? She's not drawn on that. Interview is here: http://www.bbc.co.u…

From [1], linked elsewhere in this discussion, and referring to a failed plot in India:

"The Hindi-speaking handler guiding the men in Hyderabad also insisted on using a kaleidoscope of encrypted messaging applications, with Mr. Yazdani instructed to hop between apps so that even if one message history was discovered and cracked, it would reveal only a portion of their handiwork."

"the handler taught Mr. Yazdani how to use the Tails operating system, which is contained on a USB stick and allows a user to boot up a computer from the external device and use it without leaving a trace on the hard drive."

Even if the British government is successful with WhatsApp, can they do much against free, open source tools?

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/04/world/asia/isis-messaging...

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#43

Post by tonyedgecombe »

aluhut wrote: post #26
yellow_viper wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because we've accepted it. We know the government is watching us 24/7 and no one cares. This is the new norm. Stories like this fill me with a slight bit of hope that encryption works

I wonder how they are not even busy explaining how this could happen with all that surveillance already in place. I mean no camera jumped down the pole to stop the car...

She did admit during the interview that these incidents couldn't be completely stopped.

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#44

Post by satysin »

So they get a backdoor into WhatsApp and terrorists just move onto some other non-compromised tool. Rinse and repeat. You can't ban maths ffs.

TBH I am surprised attackers do not better destroy their electronic equipment just before they carry out their attack. Pop your phone and SSD/flash drives in the microwave on high for a few minutes is pretty much going to destroy all evidence on them, and if not then chances are you are dead anyway so whatever data they might be able to get off will most likely be useless to them anyway.

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#45

Post by nileshtrivedi »

fwn wrote: post #28
ktta wrote: post #21

Hmm, this definitely brings up an interesting discussion I don't think HN has had before, especially something in a similar vein since Apple+San Bernardino fiasco. Obviously privacy is something that HN holds very close to its heart. But I'm interested in what do people here have to say about the privacy features are used by terrible people to do terrible things. And I want to share something that I think is one of t…

I strongly believe that tools are ethically neutral. A hammer, a knife or a government can be pretty useful, or pretty violent - depending on how you use it. This alone does not imply that a hammer, a knife or a government should not exist or be banned. edit: words

What about guns, tanks or hydrogen bombs?

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#46

Post by tonyedgecombe »

dijit wrote: post #37
kelnos wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You might have an argument if he was part of a coordinated attack No. Even ignoring the erosion of privacy angle, this just doesn't work. Outlaw encryption, and only outlaws will use encryption. Provide government backdoors into the popular commercial messaging apps, and people coordinating terror attacks will just use custom, unknown, private encrypted messaging apps.

I'm going to play devils advocate here, I also dislike the erosion of privacy (enough that I even left the UK). But you _can_ make the argument that if only outlaws use encryption then they're painting a target on their back, which leads to greater scrutiny by security services. This is reasonably achieved by the current dragnet surveillance systems in place, along with ISP's logging everything. I don't agree with it…

"What could we have done to prevent this attack"

Actually there is a lot they could have done to help him in his obviously troubled life but that doesn't fit with conservative ideology.

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#47

Post by satysin »

blfr wrote: post #34
orian wrote: post #7

How do they want to prevent someone from creating his own end-to-end encryption app? It may use other protocols to encode content (images, tweets, fb posts etc.). For me it seems to be more in a direction of so called "Big Brother" than real counter-terrorism.

How do they want to prevent someone from creating his own end-to-end encryption app? That's not an issue. Writing solid encryption software is very difficult on its own. You will hear "do not roll your own crypto" all the time from security experts. We don't live in a James Bond universe and it's beyond the reach of terrorist organisations.

Nobody is saying write your own crypto just your own app. Plenty of excellent crypto libraries out there.

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#48

Post by pfortuny »

visarga wrote: post #9

> "That is my view - it is completely unacceptable, there should be no place for terrorists to hide." I am sure a ban on encryption would work. Hey, guys, I just had a great idea. Let's ban bombs, knifes, and driving into people. That would fix the terrorism problem. Once it is illegal, no terrorist would dare do it!!! I'm wondering why Churchill didn't think to ban the Enigma machine. If only England was led by smar…

Well, he wants to ban secret hiding places, not bombs. I am sure that might work.

Come to think of it...

Sorry, he is a she.

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#49

Post by JensRex »

blfr wrote: post #34
orian wrote: post #7

How do they want to prevent someone from creating his own end-to-end encryption app? It may use other protocols to encode content (images, tweets, fb posts etc.). For me it seems to be more in a direction of so called "Big Brother" than real counter-terrorism.

How do they want to prevent someone from creating his own end-to-end encryption app? That's not an issue. Writing solid encryption software is very difficult on its own. You will hear "do not roll your own crypto" all the time from security experts. We don't live in a James Bond universe and it's beyond the reach of terrorist organisations.

>do not roll your own crypto

Sure, but what's to prevent someone from building something on top of OpenSSL or PGP or whatever? Can't be that hard.

Re: UK Home Secretary says encryption on messaging services is unacceptable

#50

Post by goodplay »

ktta wrote: post #21

Hmm, this definitely brings up an interesting discussion I don't think HN has had before, especially something in a similar vein since Apple+San Bernardino fiasco. Obviously privacy is something that HN holds very close to its heart. But I'm interested in what do people here have to say about the privacy features are used by terrible people to do terrible things. And I want to share something that I think is one of t…

The thing is, banning encryption to fight terrorism makes as much difference as banning knifes to fight murder. Encryption is simple enough (in theory at least) and prevalent enough that banning it will only stop legitimate usage (e.g. personal privacy) without having any real impact on those who want to break the law. Modern steganography techniques make it easy for enterprising individuals to tunnel encrypted data over unencrypted channels; there is just too much randomness in the real world to exploit.

Regardless of what delusional politicians want, encryption is here to stay. It's just a matter of how much people are willing to give up to feel safe.

Post reply on HN