6 ms·

When Phone Encryption Blocks Justice

45 points by cproctor 11y ago

JumpCrisscross 11y ago
This is an opinion piece by the City of London Police Commissioner, a Spanish drug prosecutor, a Paris chief prosecutor and a Manhattan district attorney. Hence this rubbish: "None of our agencies engage in bulk data collection or other secretive practices"
- Tloewald 11y ago
  City of London? That's rich. The United Kingdom is ground zero for bulk data collection. They're been keyword-grabbing phone calls in real time, and had London under near total video surveillance since the 90s.
  - geographomics 11y ago
    London is huge, there's nowhere near total surveillance. There's an abundance of CCTV in many areas of central London, and throughout the tube network, but it's very patchy elsewhere in the city.
    - Tloewald 11y ago
      You're right -- it's the "square mile" in particular that's under massive surveillance. But that's "The City of London". The point is that claiming the UK doesn't do mass surveillance is hilarious. They just haven't had a Snowden yet.
    - eterm 11y ago
      The City of London is different from the rest of London, complete with different police forces.
      - geographomics 11y ago
        You're correct, I had the "city of London" in mind rather than the "City of London".
    - joshuapants 11y ago
      London is huge, City of London is just about a mile square and is probably bathed in surveillance.
bcg1 11y ago
NYT should be ashamed for publishing such claptrap. Police and "justice" authorities should be ashamed of their tacit admission that they are too incompetent to do their jobs without trampling on peoples' civil rights and/or neutering technology. And I should be ashamed of myself for falling for the psy-op and believing that there aren't actually backdoors built into these systems and for forgetting that this could very likely be propaganda to make me think that all I need to do to protect my privacy is buy the latest device and/or make sure I always install the latest updates.
- bowlofstew 11y ago
  Agreed, FUD post there. There is no mention of them trying to track down the phones to the original owners, etc.
- ikeboy 11y ago
  >NYT should be ashamed for publishing such claptrap. Would you rather they only print things you agree with? Would rejecting op-eds by some general rule sufficient to exclude this one improve things? I think I'd rather live in a world in which both sides of every issue get to have their say than in which the losing side is excluded if they're sufficiently "bad". Edit: that last part isn't quite my position, poorly worded; I'm fine with excluding e.g. neo-nazis and the like, my problem is when "sufficiently bad" includes things like arguing for less encryption.
  - commentzorro 11y ago
    > Would you rather they only print things you agree with? No, I just don't want them printing things that are wrong ;-)
    - ikeboy 11y ago
      If there are factual inaccuracies, they should have an editor's note or something correcting that. (I expect they fact check op-eds as well and won't print one with outright falsehoods).
  - 11y ago
serichsen 11y ago
> Until very recently, this situation would not have occurred. Until very recently, people didn't even have smartphones that could have been suspected to contain useful information. > Apple and Google […] could no longer unlock their own products as a result. It is not "their own product". It is the customer's. He has bought it. The rest of the article is based on these false assumptions.
- 51Cards 11y ago
  >It is not "their own product". It is the customer's. He has bought it. It is still their "Product" though, yes, they no longer own it. My car is a product of General Motors. My computer is a product of Lenovo. My Phone is a product of LG. Even though all are owned by me.
  - joshontheweb 11y ago
    The point is that they shouldn't be able to unlock the product once ownership has been transferred.
  - morganvachon 11y ago
    Literally speaking, you are correct, but I believe the insinuation was that Apple and Google still control the devices apart from encryption. And really, that's true; both Apple and Google have the ability to add or remove apps, remotely lock/wipe the device, and possibly eavesdrop on communications to and from the device. The carrier also has some measure of control; they can blacklist the IMEI so the device can't be used on their service, effectively forcing the owner to change providers, and they also possibly can eavesdrop on communications. However, it seems the article author is under the assumption that Apple and Google still "own" the devices and are just leasing them to the user, which would imply that the companies should retain the ability to decrypt them at will. However, the user is the one who ultimately owns the device, and Apple and Google have started respecting that level of ownership by going hands-off with encryption and allowing the owner to choose whether to encrypt and who has access. All of that said, I'd be surprised to learn there isn't some sort of limited back door, probably in the baseband.
lawlessone 11y ago
Those passcodes aren't usually long? I'm not trying to add to the debate here but couldn't they brute force it?
- jhasse 11y ago
  Exactly! Most of the time they are 4 digits. Also what about finger prints on the phones?
- probablyfiction 11y ago
  After a certain number of failed attempts, newer devices lock themselves.
  - geographomics 11y ago
    According to this writeup, that may be worked around by resetting the device after every few attempts: http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5106 http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5106 (penultimate paragraph)
- huxley 11y ago
  You can set your iPhone to secure erase after 10 failed pass-code attempts. In addition you can use long alphanumeric pass codes and even the default new passcode option is being increased to 6 digits (though you can choose a 4 digit option). This renders the brute force option pretty useless. Which I'm fine with, I don't want to make things easier for crooks or identity thieves.
  - dtech 11y ago
    Would that work against a determined opponent with physical access? Unless the iPhone has some fairly high-grade encryption hardware I suspect you can just do fun things like copy the (encrypted) storage/key to brute-force it without the safety mechanisms kicking in.
    - huxley 11y ago
joshontheweb 11y ago
A tragedy no doubt. However, governments have proven themselves many times over of not being able to responsibly limit their snooping to legal and just instances. This isn't Google or Apple's fault. This is the consequence of decades of blatant disregard for the privacy of law abiding citizens by our governments.
- realusername 11y ago
  That's what I thought when reading the article, there has been way too much abuse on the government part from various countries to make any kind of argument about this, actions have consequences unfortunately.
- commentzorro 11y ago
  Hear, hear! If the U.S. Government hadn't broken trust then none of this would be happening. While I feel for these families, I don't think it's a fair trade-off to have the government snooping on us all the time for the sake of a bunch of scared old white people.
- Coxa 11y ago
  I could not agree more. Exactly my thoughts after having read the article!
xenophonf 11y ago
Cyrus R. Vance Jr. is the Manhattan district attorney. François Molins is the Paris chief prosecutor. Adrian Leppard is the commissioner of the City of London Police. Javier Zaragoza is the chief prosecutor of the High Court of Spain. These are the criminals from whom we protect ourselves by encrypting our data. Mr. Vance, especially, should be cognizant of constitutional guarantees to be "secure in [our] persons, houses, papers, and effects", and that full disk encryption provides technology to that effect. It's awful that someone was murdered, and it's not right that the murderer is still at large, but trying to bypass individuals' Fourth Amendment rights via third parties such as Apple or Google is even more dangerous because it threatens our entire society's freedom---never mind the fact that it would put users of those devices at risk when they are stolen or lost.
- Tloewald 11y ago
  If you're going to make these arguments you need to allow that there are two sides to the argument. It's not that the other side is completely wrong. The kinds of encryption being discussed go beyond the fourth amendment when it comes to reasonable searches and seizures. It's not an absolute right, and the kind of encryption we're talking about goes beyond any protections seen in the past (short of, perhaps, being able to physically store stuff in safety deposit boxes of banks in certain countries -- just as we might need to wait decades for encrypted data to be decrypted, it took decades for seekers of justice to access Nazi bank accounts). On the other hand, we keep so much of our lives in our phones and computers (in a sense they are extensions of our minds). If we're going to make this argument, perhaps it should be more like the fifth amendment. After all, we may literally have our personal computers built into our bodies in the future, what rights would we have over the data in them? There is some legal precedent for the fifth amendment argument -- whether personal diaries are protected is a subject of contention, and are not cell phone data stores very much like personal diaries? Unlike the fourth amendment, the fifth amendment is pretty much absolute, so it's a stronger case. The fourth amendment was not written with strong encryption in mind, just as the second amendment did not consider nuclear weapons. So far, even the NRA hasn't tried to argue that we have a second amendment right to tanks and nuclear weapons.
  - 11y ago
m82labs 11y ago
"If only people would let us put cameras in their homes, we could protect them from crime." - Fake Quote
- digital-rubber 11y ago
  i wanted to write this! +plus+ If iPhones are going to solve all the crime, what will the police be doing in the meantime? :)
Shivetya 11y ago
Got to love a police where they assume not being able to access a device encourages crime. Parts of the article state that being able to access items used by criminals is important but the majority of phones are never used as such so by their own phrasing they should never have access to one. I really will loathe the day where I am required by the cell phone company to take an update which negates the current encryption my phone has. People who think that day might not come are kidding themselves.
- justwannasing 11y ago
  ISIS, and other terrorist groups, encode all their data and use TOR in an effort to hide from efforts to catch them so, yes, encryption is used for that.
SG- 11y ago
Are we supposed to believe that an iPhone 6 would contain everything needed to solve the murder? Last time I checked my iPhone isn't recording everything 24/7 and it was likely in his pocket or something too since it wasn't stolen or taken. Furthermore if someone died and used privacy tools then so be it. For all we know he likely wouldn't want his entire life (personal photos, videos and messages) to be seen by a bunch of random people.
- justwannasing 11y ago
  The info on the phone could indicate who he spoke to last and potentially who he met with when he was killed.
  - xyzzy123 11y ago
    ... which would also be available from the carrier, as would location records from both phones, etc etc. I don't get this opinion piece, the IMEI on the back of a phone should be more than enough (with a little police work) to figure out who owned it.
geographomics 11y ago
In the UK they've sidestepped this concern by making the refusal to decrypt an imprisonable offence: https://wiki.openrightsgroup.org/wiki/Regulation_of_Investigatory_Powers_Act_2000/Part_III https://wiki.openrightsgroup.org/wiki/Regulation_of_Investig... Though of course it doesn't help if the owner of the device is unknown, as alluded to in the linked article.
- dtech 11y ago
  Doesn't this directly contradict the European "right to remain silent" [1] [1]: Europe human rights court: http://www.bailii.org/eu/cases/ECHR/1996/3.html#para45 http://www.bailii.org/eu/cases/ECHR/1996/3.html#para45
  - geographomics 11y ago
    Perhaps, but it wouldn't be the only UK law to do so, for example section 2 the Criminal Justice Act 1987 requires disclosure to investigations by the Serious Fraud Office, and schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000 also compels the detainee to answer any question asked. Both of these also under penalty of imprisonment and/or fine.
- fireflash38 11y ago
  Couldn't they use other methods to figure out the owner of the device? EMEI data? Pull the SIM? Get the serial number & figure out who bought it that way? Hell, if you got that much you could pretty easily get phone records & the like via warrant. I feel like they just wanted what was on the phone, rather than who owned it.
tomp 11y ago
What bullshit. > The homicide remains unsolved. The killer remains at large. > Until very recently, this situation would not have occurred. Until very recently, people weren't carrying smartphones, so the murders would remain even more unsolved. At least the phone is a perfect medium for fingerprints. And anyways, what were the police hoping to find? A photo of the murderer? A note saying which direction the killer run? Most "useful" information (messages, phone calls, location data) is available from the network operators anyways.
- justwannasing 11y ago
  The point is, the murders might be solved if they had access to the phone's data.
  - joshstrange 11y ago
    And if we could see inside people's minds crime could be solved as well. Your parent's comment is spot on, nothing has changed at all, just now the police can blame murders they have no intention of solving on Apple/Google.
  - cgearhart 11y ago
    The authors provide no evidence that this murder would or could have been solved but for encryption. It is a tacit appeal to emotion seeking to play on the revulsion of murderers that a non-technical audience can identify with while they downplay real risks that don't evoke the same strong emotions so that they will accept compromised security.
Dodds_m 11y ago
I consider full disk encryption to be a major feature of the phone (as I'm sure do many others). Part of me is glad to see people in government complaining about it because I'm assured that it works as intended.
mathetic 11y ago
Long story short, the article is weak because a sample of one means nothing. The real reason why things are gonna be end-to-end encrypted from now on is because we can and there is nothing anyone can do about it. Technology > policy.
- justwannasing 11y ago
  Your argument is weak if you think this has happened only once and will rarely happen again.
coggy 11y ago
Somewhat related debate of law enforcement's needs vs user's need to privacy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZSr9Ao8zBY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZSr9Ao8zBY
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thrillgore 11y ago
Everyone involved in this op-ed piece, and the NY Times, can go fuck themselves. I will continue to encrypt my device.
- justwannasing 11y ago
  I wonder if the guy who was killed said the same thing.
  - mcphage 11y ago
    I wonder if TERRORISTS said the same thing, eh? Eh? Amirite?
    - TheCoelacanth 11y ago
      I bet Hitler didn't leave any smartphones unencrypted
joshstrange 11y ago
> Now, on behalf of crime victims the world over, we are asking whether this encryption is truly worth the cost. Yes, yes it is. This is an EMBARRASSINGLY sad excuse for journalism. NYT should be ashamed for publishing such crap.
- pc2g4d 11y ago
  It's not meant to be taken as journalism---it's an opinion piece.
cryoshon 11y ago
This article is a load of bull, as other people have indicated. There's almost certainly a backdoor built into these devices, and that backdoor isn't something that will get trotted out for something as "trivial" as the poor killing each other. The government can already access these data, they're just looking to escalate their level of intrusiveness by making a political case for decentralization of the backdoor exploitation. I'm really running out of "if they can do this bad thing, we'll be super fucked" because they've been able to get clearance to do or keep doing more and more invasive surveillance over the years. If local PDs can crack into our phones at will (and they are already there via stingrays and their airplane equivalents) we are going to be in for a bad time. Remember how petty and disgruntled the cops are? Now they've got the metadata and content data of your communications because you said the wrong thing at a traffic stop. That's assuming they aren't owning you from the moment your phone connects to the tower. "Exigent circumstances require it" and all.
joesmo 11y ago
I'm sorry but this article is not only stupid beyond belief, it was written by the same prosecutor who prosecuted the Sergey Aleynikov case, obviously a zealous idiot. It shows he knows nothing about encryption ... or the law for that matter. This is a matter of civil liberties. Dead people were once alive and had civil liberties. But instead, this case is the exception rather than the rule. In every other case where authorities could not search the phone, justice was served (it's called the 4th Amendment, something Vance knows nothing about). To have rights, you accept the slight increase in criminality that comes along with that. My right not to be unlawfully searched does indeed let some criminals get away because the cops can't search them. My right to privacy does indeed let some people get away with murder because the cops can't search my phone. That's the price and risk I take to have any civil liberties at all. Of course, someone like Vance who wants to remove civil liberties altogether (from this article), cannot possibly be expected to understand such an idea.
- PhantomGremlin 11y ago
  Vance is truly a scumbag (I hope there's an exception to HN's name-calling rules relating to people like him). You mention Aleynikov. Here's what Vance is doing[1]: An ex-Goldman Sachs Group Inc. programmer who twice won reversal of guilty verdicts for taking the firm’s high-frequency trading code when he left for another job isn’t yet in the clear as prosecutors press an appeal. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. will challenge the dismissal of charges against Sergey Aleynikov, whose saga helped inspire Michael Lewis’s “Flash Boys,” Joan Vollero, a spokeswoman for prosecutors, said Monday. Whatever anyone's opinion on the original merits of that case, the sheer vindictiveness of the prosecutor is appalling. A more likely explanation is that he's in thrall to Goldman Sachs. [1] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-27/aleynikov-prosecutor-will-appeal-dismissal-of-state-charges http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-27/aleynikov-...
sebnap 11y ago
Propaganda
cgearhart 11y ago
Politics & FUD aside...has anyone evaluated the technological feasibility of what they're asking for? It sounds like unobtainium. A backdoor that the manufacturer maintains that allows the State to unlock whatever data they like -- how does that not pose an unacceptable risk of future data breaches and security compromises? This is insane. I quietly hope the explanation is cynical motivation that they expect these arguments will be effective, because I am otherwise genuinely terrified that these people are in a position of power with such a poor grasp of the technologies in question as would be required to actually believe what they're saying.
skue 11y ago
For those in the US, here is contact information for the Manhattan DA's office. Although Cyrus R. Vance Jr. was speaking as an elected politician, the main operator and press office were not sure where to route incoming calls from voters, so here are a few options. Main: (212) 335-9000 Press: (212) 335-9400 Cyber: (212) 335-9600 (Hotline) If you prefer email, I was told to use press@dany.nyc.gov Please think about what you will say beforehand, be very polite, but be heard. And given that Vance wrote alongside DA's from France, UK, and Spain, there is no reason to not call if you live outside of Manhattan. We should probably share similar information for the offices in London, Paris, and Madrid.
mikhailt 11y ago
In addition to what everyone else said, there is no evidence that the criminals wouldn't just run their own encrypted tools on top of these devices. The ONLY people that will be harmed are the general public that did not violate any laws because they would be blocked by laws to use the tools to protect themselves from the criminals who does not give a flying fuck about the laws against encryption tools. These guys are fooling themselves if they think having a legal law authorizing backdoors will make everything okay. Full disk encryption has been around for a decade or more for PCs, where is the outcry about that?
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asdfgtyuiohj 11y ago
I'm confused: shouldn't the police in Evanston have a suspect and set of known associates to investigate? Wouldn't the cell service providers simply identify the owner of the phones for the police? And couldn't the providers also furnish the police with call records? It strikes me a conveniently unclear whether the “homicide remains unsolved” and “killer remains at large” because (1) encryption kept police from identifying suspects or (2) encryption kept police from building a case.

45 points by cproctor 11y ago

This is an opinion piece by the City of London Police Commissioner, a Spanish drug prosecutor, a Paris chief prosecutor and a Manhattan district attorney. Hence this rubbish: "None of our agencies engage in bulk data collection or other secretive practices"

Tloewald 11y ago
City of London? That's rich. The United Kingdom is ground zero for bulk data collection. They're been keyword-grabbing phone calls in real time, and had London under near total video surveillance since the 90s.
- geographomics 11y ago
  London is huge, there's nowhere near total surveillance. There's an abundance of CCTV in many areas of central London, and throughout the tube network, but it's very patchy elsewhere in the city.
  - Tloewald 11y ago
    You're right -- it's the "square mile" in particular that's under massive surveillance. But that's "The City of London". The point is that claiming the UK doesn't do mass surveillance is hilarious. They just haven't had a Snowden yet.
  - eterm 11y ago
    The City of London is different from the rest of London, complete with different police forces.
    - geographomics 11y ago
      You're correct, I had the "city of London" in mind rather than the "City of London".
  - joshuapants 11y ago
    London is huge, City of London is just about a mile square and is probably bathed in surveillance.

bcg1 11y ago

NYT should be ashamed for publishing such claptrap. Police and "justice" authorities should be ashamed of their tacit admission that they are too incompetent to do their jobs without trampling on peoples' civil rights and/or neutering technology. And I should be ashamed of myself for falling for the psy-op and believing that there aren't actually backdoors built into these systems and for forgetting that this could very likely be propaganda to make me think that all I need to do to protect my privacy is buy the latest device and/or make sure I always install the latest updates.

bowlofstew 11y ago
Agreed, FUD post there. There is no mention of them trying to track down the phones to the original owners, etc.
ikeboy 11y ago
>NYT should be ashamed for publishing such claptrap. Would you rather they only print things you agree with? Would rejecting op-eds by some general rule sufficient to exclude this one improve things? I think I'd rather live in a world in which both sides of every issue get to have their say than in which the losing side is excluded if they're sufficiently "bad". Edit: that last part isn't quite my position, poorly worded; I'm fine with excluding e.g. neo-nazis and the like, my problem is when "sufficiently bad" includes things like arguing for less encryption.
- commentzorro 11y ago
  > Would you rather they only print things you agree with? No, I just don't want them printing things that are wrong ;-)
  - ikeboy 11y ago
    If there are factual inaccuracies, they should have an editor's note or something correcting that. (I expect they fact check op-eds as well and won't print one with outright falsehoods).
- 11y ago

serichsen 11y ago

> Until very recently, this situation would not have occurred. Until very recently, people didn't even have smartphones that could have been suspected to contain useful information. > Apple and Google […] could no longer unlock their own products as a result. It is not "their own product". It is the customer's. He has bought it. The rest of the article is based on these false assumptions.

51Cards 11y ago
>It is not "their own product". It is the customer's. He has bought it. It is still their "Product" though, yes, they no longer own it. My car is a product of General Motors. My computer is a product of Lenovo. My Phone is a product of LG. Even though all are owned by me.
- joshontheweb 11y ago
  The point is that they shouldn't be able to unlock the product once ownership has been transferred.
- morganvachon 11y ago
  Literally speaking, you are correct, but I believe the insinuation was that Apple and Google still control the devices apart from encryption. And really, that's true; both Apple and Google have the ability to add or remove apps, remotely lock/wipe the device, and possibly eavesdrop on communications to and from the device. The carrier also has some measure of control; they can blacklist the IMEI so the device can't be used on their service, effectively forcing the owner to change providers, and they also possibly can eavesdrop on communications. However, it seems the article author is under the assumption that Apple and Google still "own" the devices and are just leasing them to the user, which would imply that the companies should retain the ability to decrypt them at will. However, the user is the one who ultimately owns the device, and Apple and Google have started respecting that level of ownership by going hands-off with encryption and allowing the owner to choose whether to encrypt and who has access. All of that said, I'd be surprised to learn there isn't some sort of limited back door, probably in the baseband.

lawlessone 11y ago

Those passcodes aren't usually long? I'm not trying to add to the debate here but couldn't they brute force it?

jhasse 11y ago
Exactly! Most of the time they are 4 digits. Also what about finger prints on the phones?
probablyfiction 11y ago
After a certain number of failed attempts, newer devices lock themselves.
- geographomics 11y ago
  According to this writeup, that may be worked around by resetting the device after every few attempts: http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5106 http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5106 (penultimate paragraph)
huxley 11y ago
You can set your iPhone to secure erase after 10 failed pass-code attempts. In addition you can use long alphanumeric pass codes and even the default new passcode option is being increased to 6 digits (though you can choose a 4 digit option). This renders the brute force option pretty useless. Which I'm fine with, I don't want to make things easier for crooks or identity thieves.
- dtech 11y ago
  Would that work against a determined opponent with physical access? Unless the iPhone has some fairly high-grade encryption hardware I suspect you can just do fun things like copy the (encrypted) storage/key to brute-force it without the safety mechanisms kicking in.
  - huxley 11y ago

joshontheweb 11y ago

A tragedy no doubt. However, governments have proven themselves many times over of not being able to responsibly limit their snooping to legal and just instances. This isn't Google or Apple's fault. This is the consequence of decades of blatant disregard for the privacy of law abiding citizens by our governments.

realusername 11y ago
That's what I thought when reading the article, there has been way too much abuse on the government part from various countries to make any kind of argument about this, actions have consequences unfortunately.
commentzorro 11y ago
Hear, hear! If the U.S. Government hadn't broken trust then none of this would be happening. While I feel for these families, I don't think it's a fair trade-off to have the government snooping on us all the time for the sake of a bunch of scared old white people.
Coxa 11y ago
I could not agree more. Exactly my thoughts after having read the article!

xenophonf 11y ago

Cyrus R. Vance Jr. is the Manhattan district attorney. François Molins is the Paris chief prosecutor. Adrian Leppard is the commissioner of the City of London Police. Javier Zaragoza is the chief prosecutor of the High Court of Spain. These are the criminals from whom we protect ourselves by encrypting our data. Mr. Vance, especially, should be cognizant of constitutional guarantees to be "secure in [our] persons, houses, papers, and effects", and that full disk encryption provides technology to that effect. It's awful that someone was murdered, and it's not right that the murderer is still at large, but trying to bypass individuals' Fourth Amendment rights via third parties such as Apple or Google is even more dangerous because it threatens our entire society's freedom---never mind the fact that it would put users of those devices at risk when they are stolen or lost.

Tloewald 11y ago
If you're going to make these arguments you need to allow that there are two sides to the argument. It's not that the other side is completely wrong. The kinds of encryption being discussed go beyond the fourth amendment when it comes to reasonable searches and seizures. It's not an absolute right, and the kind of encryption we're talking about goes beyond any protections seen in the past (short of, perhaps, being able to physically store stuff in safety deposit boxes of banks in certain countries -- just as we might need to wait decades for encrypted data to be decrypted, it took decades for seekers of justice to access Nazi bank accounts). On the other hand, we keep so much of our lives in our phones and computers (in a sense they are extensions of our minds). If we're going to make this argument, perhaps it should be more like the fifth amendment. After all, we may literally have our personal computers built into our bodies in the future, what rights would we have over the data in them? There is some legal precedent for the fifth amendment argument -- whether personal diaries are protected is a subject of contention, and are not cell phone data stores very much like personal diaries? Unlike the fourth amendment, the fifth amendment is pretty much absolute, so it's a stronger case. The fourth amendment was not written with strong encryption in mind, just as the second amendment did not consider nuclear weapons. So far, even the NRA hasn't tried to argue that we have a second amendment right to tanks and nuclear weapons.
- 11y ago

m82labs 11y ago

"If only people would let us put cameras in their homes, we could protect them from crime." - Fake Quote

digital-rubber 11y ago
i wanted to write this! +plus+ If iPhones are going to solve all the crime, what will the police be doing in the meantime? :)

Shivetya 11y ago

Got to love a police where they assume not being able to access a device encourages crime. Parts of the article state that being able to access items used by criminals is important but the majority of phones are never used as such so by their own phrasing they should never have access to one. I really will loathe the day where I am required by the cell phone company to take an update which negates the current encryption my phone has. People who think that day might not come are kidding themselves.

justwannasing 11y ago
ISIS, and other terrorist groups, encode all their data and use TOR in an effort to hide from efforts to catch them so, yes, encryption is used for that.

SG- 11y ago

Are we supposed to believe that an iPhone 6 would contain everything needed to solve the murder? Last time I checked my iPhone isn't recording everything 24/7 and it was likely in his pocket or something too since it wasn't stolen or taken. Furthermore if someone died and used privacy tools then so be it. For all we know he likely wouldn't want his entire life (personal photos, videos and messages) to be seen by a bunch of random people.

justwannasing 11y ago
The info on the phone could indicate who he spoke to last and potentially who he met with when he was killed.
- xyzzy123 11y ago
  ... which would also be available from the carrier, as would location records from both phones, etc etc. I don't get this opinion piece, the IMEI on the back of a phone should be more than enough (with a little police work) to figure out who owned it.

geographomics 11y ago

In the UK they've sidestepped this concern by making the refusal to decrypt an imprisonable offence: https://wiki.openrightsgroup.org/wiki/Regulation_of_Investigatory_Powers_Act_2000/Part_III https://wiki.openrightsgroup.org/wiki/Regulation_of_Investig... Though of course it doesn't help if the owner of the device is unknown, as alluded to in the linked article.

dtech 11y ago
Doesn't this directly contradict the European "right to remain silent" [1] [1]: Europe human rights court: http://www.bailii.org/eu/cases/ECHR/1996/3.html#para45 http://www.bailii.org/eu/cases/ECHR/1996/3.html#para45
- geographomics 11y ago
  Perhaps, but it wouldn't be the only UK law to do so, for example section 2 the Criminal Justice Act 1987 requires disclosure to investigations by the Serious Fraud Office, and schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000 also compels the detainee to answer any question asked. Both of these also under penalty of imprisonment and/or fine.
fireflash38 11y ago
Couldn't they use other methods to figure out the owner of the device? EMEI data? Pull the SIM? Get the serial number & figure out who bought it that way? Hell, if you got that much you could pretty easily get phone records & the like via warrant. I feel like they just wanted what was on the phone, rather than who owned it.

tomp 11y ago

What bullshit. > The homicide remains unsolved. The killer remains at large. > Until very recently, this situation would not have occurred. Until very recently, people weren't carrying smartphones, so the murders would remain even more unsolved. At least the phone is a perfect medium for fingerprints. And anyways, what were the police hoping to find? A photo of the murderer? A note saying which direction the killer run? Most "useful" information (messages, phone calls, location data) is available from the network operators anyways.

justwannasing 11y ago
The point is, the murders might be solved if they had access to the phone's data.
- joshstrange 11y ago
  And if we could see inside people's minds crime could be solved as well. Your parent's comment is spot on, nothing has changed at all, just now the police can blame murders they have no intention of solving on Apple/Google.
- cgearhart 11y ago
  The authors provide no evidence that this murder would or could have been solved but for encryption. It is a tacit appeal to emotion seeking to play on the revulsion of murderers that a non-technical audience can identify with while they downplay real risks that don't evoke the same strong emotions so that they will accept compromised security.

Dodds_m 11y ago

I consider full disk encryption to be a major feature of the phone (as I'm sure do many others). Part of me is glad to see people in government complaining about it because I'm assured that it works as intended.

mathetic 11y ago

Long story short, the article is weak because a sample of one means nothing. The real reason why things are gonna be end-to-end encrypted from now on is because we can and there is nothing anyone can do about it. Technology > policy.

justwannasing 11y ago
Your argument is weak if you think this has happened only once and will rarely happen again.

coggy 11y ago

Somewhat related debate of law enforcement's needs vs user's need to privacy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZSr9Ao8zBY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZSr9Ao8zBY

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thrillgore 11y ago

Everyone involved in this op-ed piece, and the NY Times, can go fuck themselves. I will continue to encrypt my device.

justwannasing 11y ago
I wonder if the guy who was killed said the same thing.
- mcphage 11y ago
  I wonder if TERRORISTS said the same thing, eh? Eh? Amirite?
  - TheCoelacanth 11y ago
    I bet Hitler didn't leave any smartphones unencrypted

joshstrange 11y ago

> Now, on behalf of crime victims the world over, we are asking whether this encryption is truly worth the cost. Yes, yes it is. This is an EMBARRASSINGLY sad excuse for journalism. NYT should be ashamed for publishing such crap.

pc2g4d 11y ago
It's not meant to be taken as journalism---it's an opinion piece.

cryoshon 11y ago

This article is a load of bull, as other people have indicated. There's almost certainly a backdoor built into these devices, and that backdoor isn't something that will get trotted out for something as "trivial" as the poor killing each other. The government can already access these data, they're just looking to escalate their level of intrusiveness by making a political case for decentralization of the backdoor exploitation. I'm really running out of "if they can do this bad thing, we'll be super fucked" because they've been able to get clearance to do or keep doing more and more invasive surveillance over the years. If local PDs can crack into our phones at will (and they are already there via stingrays and their airplane equivalents) we are going to be in for a bad time. Remember how petty and disgruntled the cops are? Now they've got the metadata and content data of your communications because you said the wrong thing at a traffic stop. That's assuming they aren't owning you from the moment your phone connects to the tower. "Exigent circumstances require it" and all.

joesmo 11y ago

I'm sorry but this article is not only stupid beyond belief, it was written by the same prosecutor who prosecuted the Sergey Aleynikov case, obviously a zealous idiot. It shows he knows nothing about encryption ... or the law for that matter. This is a matter of civil liberties. Dead people were once alive and had civil liberties. But instead, this case is the exception rather than the rule. In every other case where authorities could not search the phone, justice was served (it's called the 4th Amendment, something Vance knows nothing about). To have rights, you accept the slight increase in criminality that comes along with that. My right not to be unlawfully searched does indeed let some criminals get away because the cops can't search them. My right to privacy does indeed let some people get away with murder because the cops can't search my phone. That's the price and risk I take to have any civil liberties at all. Of course, someone like Vance who wants to remove civil liberties altogether (from this article), cannot possibly be expected to understand such an idea.

PhantomGremlin 11y ago
Vance is truly a scumbag (I hope there's an exception to HN's name-calling rules relating to people like him). You mention Aleynikov. Here's what Vance is doing[1]: An ex-Goldman Sachs Group Inc. programmer who twice won reversal of guilty verdicts for taking the firm’s high-frequency trading code when he left for another job isn’t yet in the clear as prosecutors press an appeal. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. will challenge the dismissal of charges against Sergey Aleynikov, whose saga helped inspire Michael Lewis’s “Flash Boys,” Joan Vollero, a spokeswoman for prosecutors, said Monday. Whatever anyone's opinion on the original merits of that case, the sheer vindictiveness of the prosecutor is appalling. A more likely explanation is that he's in thrall to Goldman Sachs. [1] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-27/aleynikov-prosecutor-will-appeal-dismissal-of-state-charges http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-27/aleynikov-...

sebnap 11y ago

Propaganda

cgearhart 11y ago

Politics & FUD aside...has anyone evaluated the technological feasibility of what they're asking for? It sounds like unobtainium. A backdoor that the manufacturer maintains that allows the State to unlock whatever data they like -- how does that not pose an unacceptable risk of future data breaches and security compromises? This is insane. I quietly hope the explanation is cynical motivation that they expect these arguments will be effective, because I am otherwise genuinely terrified that these people are in a position of power with such a poor grasp of the technologies in question as would be required to actually believe what they're saying.

skue 11y ago

For those in the US, here is contact information for the Manhattan DA's office. Although Cyrus R. Vance Jr. was speaking as an elected politician, the main operator and press office were not sure where to route incoming calls from voters, so here are a few options. Main: (212) 335-9000 Press: (212) 335-9400 Cyber: (212) 335-9600 (Hotline) If you prefer email, I was told to use press@dany.nyc.gov Please think about what you will say beforehand, be very polite, but be heard. And given that Vance wrote alongside DA's from France, UK, and Spain, there is no reason to not call if you live outside of Manhattan. We should probably share similar information for the offices in London, Paris, and Madrid.

mikhailt 11y ago

In addition to what everyone else said, there is no evidence that the criminals wouldn't just run their own encrypted tools on top of these devices. The ONLY people that will be harmed are the general public that did not violate any laws because they would be blocked by laws to use the tools to protect themselves from the criminals who does not give a flying fuck about the laws against encryption tools. These guys are fooling themselves if they think having a legal law authorizing backdoors will make everything okay. Full disk encryption has been around for a decade or more for PCs, where is the outcry about that?

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asdfgtyuiohj 11y ago

I'm confused: shouldn't the police in Evanston have a suspect and set of known associates to investigate? Wouldn't the cell service providers simply identify the owner of the phones for the police? And couldn't the providers also furnish the police with call records? It strikes me a conveniently unclear whether the “homicide remains unsolved” and “killer remains at large” because (1) encryption kept police from identifying suspects or (2) encryption kept police from building a case.