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France rejects backdoor mandate

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Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would like to know what the public opinion on these issues is before blaming politician's ignorance, considering that to them the relevant knowledge is knowledge of what voters will support or tolerate. The impossible promise of backdoors that France can enter but no other country, organized criminal syndicate or petty government-employed stalker can find is only one impossible promise among the many we can hear fr…

French want less criminals and immigrants in the street. Whatever it takes. I'm french, i have not heard any people, work, street, even television or internet speak about that. The sad truth is that it wouldn't even solve the issue, criminals will always be able to use encrypted communications. there are open source software that can't be tampered with, software that doesn't use a single server where backdoor can be…

Moi aussi je suis francais.

> French want less criminals and immigrants in the street. Whatever it takes.

Maybe it's because I spent most of my time in big cities hanging out with relatively well-educated, often left-leaning, relatively young people, but I'm not getting that vibe at all.

Yes, you do have pathological cases of badly integrated immigrant communities - for example the quartiers Nord de Marseille, and yes, I've known more working class people who have to endure abuse from anti-social immigrant drug dealers to express some pretty far right views, but I'm not sure that reflects the majority of the French population. I don't watch the news much, but when I do I don't see anything about issues with integration, mostly stuff about Ukraine and Trump.

Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> French want less criminals and immigrants in the street. Whatever it takes. What about using the probability that a specific race or religion will commit crimes then target those people with aggressive tactics. As for the public they could make those people feel unwelcomed through constant harassment in the hopes they leave the country. Thus reducing the crime rate by any means. ---- I checked the murder rate and i…

In France, like a lot of other countries, they are blaming everything on the immigrants. Crime? Immigrants are doing it. Retirement age? Immigrants are spending the money. These things are not backed up by data, but just like the US, or Nazi Germany, nobody cares, simply easier to choose an easy "solution" and blame immigrants.

Immigrants commit a bit less crimes than the locals in France.

Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#93
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> to them the relevant knowledge is knowledge of what voters will support or tolerate That's relevant knowledge. It's not the relevant knowledge. Another piece of relevant knowledge is facts about complex things like political science, cryptography, etc. Since politicians actually need to decide and implement things, as a side gig to being popular, lack of the proper knowledge to do so is a shortcoming. > I would lik…

Here in Sweden the answer from the general public often is "yes, I am honest and have nothing to hide". Unlike French media, Swedish media does not have a well-developed tradition of confronting those in power and/or demanding accountability. I often get frustrated by how easily interviewees dodge direct questions by answering something completely different, and get a "thank you" from the journalist in return, instea…

It's not just our media, it's our culture.

We have a looong and storied tradition of not liking the government, starting with our first revolution in 1789, continuing in 1830 and 1848, and further reinforced by the Nazi occupation during WW2. When I went to England, I heard the joke "where are all the French people? Oh right, probably on strike again".

I feel like some people would probably go out and protest if the government went so far as to suggest that maybe regular tooth brushing might be a good idea, just out of principle.

Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

French want less criminals and immigrants in the street. Whatever it takes. I'm french, i have not heard any people, work, street, even television or internet speak about that. The sad truth is that it wouldn't even solve the issue, criminals will always be able to use encrypted communications. there are open source software that can't be tampered with, software that doesn't use a single server where backdoor can be…

> French want less criminals and immigrants in the street. Whatever it takes. What about using the probability that a specific race or religion will commit crimes then target those people with aggressive tactics. As for the public they could make those people feel unwelcomed through constant harassment in the hopes they leave the country. Thus reducing the crime rate by any means. ---- I checked the murder rate and i…

> I haven't check other stats but what if your views on crime are being manipulated by people who have agenda that normally wouldn't be possible if the true reason was revealed?

Actually, you're right about murders, but you're wrong overall i'd say. Organized crime is on the rise since 2004? Maybe a bit before.

Politicians "reformed" the police, removed our "proximity police" which were basically social workers with physical and weapon training, who also were a great point of contact for future informants as it built a lot of trust in some cities (mostly western and northern France: it didn't work as well in the south and in Paris, but it worked truly great were i lived and their removal killed a lot of initiatives. My bet is that the failure in Marseille and Paris killed the initiative which worked great in small to medium cities).

And then circa 2008 they added another police reform that basically pushed police towards targeting petty criminals. Petty criminals turned to organized crime "en masse", and nowaday you have basically 3 crime families who run most of the crime in France. They reached Paris around 2011-2014, divided it cleanly around 2017 (i've heard multiple people talking about a missile launcher sighted in the 93 around 2015-2016 when i lived there, in at least 2 different location) and now politicians act surprised.

Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#95
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

French want less criminals and immigrants in the street. Whatever it takes. I'm french, i have not heard any people, work, street, even television or internet speak about that. The sad truth is that it wouldn't even solve the issue, criminals will always be able to use encrypted communications. there are open source software that can't be tampered with, software that doesn't use a single server where backdoor can be…

Moi aussi je suis francais. > French want less criminals and immigrants in the street. Whatever it takes. Maybe it's because I spent most of my time in big cities hanging out with relatively well-educated, often left-leaning, relatively young people, but I'm not getting that vibe at all. Yes, you do have pathological cases of badly integrated immigrant communities - for example the quartiers Nord de Marseille, and ye…

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Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Just like for other big challenges like biodiversity and climate change, it feels like it often boils down to the politicians just not understanding enough to take rational decisions. Of course they can't all have a PhD in cryptography, but they should also not have no clue at all. They would argue about the damages drugs do. I think they know what they are doing. Digital privacy has no lobby outside of EEF. We don…

The "war" on drugs is what brings all of the violence and crime associated with drugs, not the drugs themselves. But it finances the police industrial complex and so many people would lose out (or be forced to focus on actual crimes rather than people consensually trading plants or chemicals) that it will never happen.

The pharmaceutical industry has a pretty big lobby, so does big tobacco, and don't even get me started on the alcohol industry.

If one of them finds a way to patent drugs that are currently illegal or otherwise profit from it, legalization will happen.

Honestly, in many places, legalization has already happened, look at the coffee shops in the Netherlands and the dispensaries in North America.

The police industrial complex might be attached to their cash cow, but everyone else in the capitalist system wants to get rich too, and I suspect in the long run that'll win out.

Also, much as how after a few thousand years of civilization people eventually wised up to human sacrifice wasn't actually a good idea and was not in any way required to make the sun come up, maybe at some point in the future we'll realize that harsh criminal penalties don't actually solve the drug problem.

France has some of the strictest laws against cannabis use in Europe, and also some of the highest rates of consumption, or at least it did last time I checked.

Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#97
post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> French want less criminals and immigrants in the street. Whatever it takes. What about using the probability that a specific race or religion will commit crimes then target those people with aggressive tactics. As for the public they could make those people feel unwelcomed through constant harassment in the hopes they leave the country. Thus reducing the crime rate by any means. ---- I checked the murder rate and i…

> I haven't check other stats but what if your views on crime are being manipulated by people who have agenda that normally wouldn't be possible if the true reason was revealed? That is a known fact. Criminality rate drops but french people are feeling more and more insecure. There is a media oligarchy in France (by billionaires) that pushes anything but left ideas (the left want an exit tax and a wealth tax, the las…

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Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#98
post #85
post #3

Just like for other big challenges like biodiversity and climate change, it feels like it often boils down to the politicians just not understanding enough to take rational decisions. Of course they can't all have a PhD in cryptography, but they should also not have no clue at all. Over an over again, politicians are asking for backdoors. To me it just proves that they don't understand the very basic of how encryptio…

> To me it just proves that they don't understand the very basic of how encryption works. Even if you don't have the encryption keys you can read messages by breaking into a phone and taking screenshots, for example.

If you've broken into the phone/app, you've got access to the key...

Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#99

I've found the original debates video on the National Assembly website. My French is good enough for that (not enough for cooking et al. though), so I believe I understood. I'm positively surprised by some deputies remarks. But Bruno (interior minister) Retailleau is either totally incompetent technically, with his advisors as well, or is a liar. "We will apply the math selectively, only for those that are a threat a…

As a Frenchman, this really grinds my gears.

Our state is already one of the biggest arms dealers on the planet, and, like all modern nation states, fundamentally a coercive protection racket (note that I don't actually have a problem with coercive protection rackets. You remember that scene in The Godfather where everyone is thanking Vito Corleone as he saunters through the street? That's me thanking the French welfare state for taking my taxes and giving me universal healthcare and environmental regulation).

Why don't we just get in on the drug trade ourselves, undercut the dealers and start a government monopoly like Sweden has with alcohol?

Re: France rejects backdoor mandate

#100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In France, like a lot of other countries, they are blaming everything on the immigrants. Crime? Immigrants are doing it. Retirement age? Immigrants are spending the money. These things are not backed up by data, but just like the US, or Nazi Germany, nobody cares, simply easier to choose an easy "solution" and blame immigrants.

Immigrants commit a bit less crimes than the locals in France.

Yes, but inmate population is mostly immigrant descendants (for various reasons, poverty and been unable to work are the main ones).
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