8 ms·

Encrypted Messaging Apps Face New Scrutiny Over Possible Role in Paris Attacks

88 points by dperfect 11y ago

nemo 11y ago
There's an interesting article on how Telegram is being used here: http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/8828.htm/ http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/8828.htm/
- jszymborski 11y ago
  Except, other than being a nice chat app, Telegram's encryption is snake oil http://unhandledexpression.com/2013/12/17/telegram-stand-back-we-know-maths/ http://unhandledexpression.com/2013/12/17/telegram-stand-bac...
  - nemo 11y ago
    The article mentioned encryption, but I was more interested in their details on how Daesh was using it as an unmoderated platform to spread tutorials on manufacturing weapons and launching cyberattacks, calls for targeted killing and lone-wolf attacks, and Daesh's use of bots on the platform.
    - toast0 11y ago
      So he's distributing the Anarchist Cookbook?
      - nemo 11y ago
        No. Not 'he', and not just distributing how-tos. Read the link if you'd like to be aware of what's happening though.
    - jszymborski 11y ago
      If they were using something federated and secure like XMPP+OTR, sure, but Telegram is as easily moderated as any other centralised solution (they might as well be operating on an FB Profile + FB Group Chat). If the DOD/NSA/CIA/WTV wanted to shut this down (which they likely don't as this probably serves as a nice stream of data) all they need to do is shut-down Telegram's US servers, which would likely cripple the entire company financially.
nmj 11y ago
Kind of sick of hearing government officials saying encryption is evil. This stance is disingenuous at best and dangerous at worst.
dewiz 11y ago
Yeah I believe also trains, cars, food, water and oxygen played a role, something should be done about those too. If that ever happens, open source to the rescue, politicians might as well make that illegal.
- mc32 11y ago
  This is all true, but it's also true "governments" had previously had [court ordered or otherwise, depending on jurisdiction] access to communications, when necessary in order to track individuals or obtain evidence. The claim is that now people can choose technologies which allow them to evade communications interception [easily] which frustrates governments when they want to intercept communications. I don't think it's far fetched to believe if not the US countries abroad will require technology vendors to provide interception systems ala BlackBerry. Big enough markets, can say, Apple, you can still sell in our country[1] but you must grant access [MITM, whatever] and you know what, Apple will not want to see its growth markets evaporate. [1] They'd also disallow non-approved apps from country app store and also disallow carriers from allowing jailbroken handsets.
  - terryf 11y ago
    Like the saying goes, if you outlaw guns, only the outlaws will have guns. Seriously. Ever heard of steganography? Police being able to listen in to communications for selected individuals, based on court orders is of course something that is necessary for safety, nobody is arguing that. The difference is the scale of the ability to survey. You can argue that the scale doesn't matter, but it does. The only difference between uber and your local taxi company with 10 cars is also scale. Being able to scale surveillance trivially is the thing that must be fought against, because it erodes the freedom of people. After all, the freedom of people to live their lives as they wish is what we're protecting after all, isn't it?
    - TeMPOraL 11y ago
      > After all, the freedom of people to live their lives as they wish is what we're protecting after all, isn't it? Is it? I thought it's freedom to live their lives as long as they follow the law?
zmmmmm 11y ago
Intelligence agencies seem to operate on a very dubious assumption that if mass consumer products weren't offering end to end encryption, terrorists would just be chattering away in the clear, rather than trivially switching to one of the plethora of alternatives that do allow secure communication (some of them open source and "unbannable"). Are they really that dumb? Or is this a cynical PR exercise?
- mc32 11y ago
  It's not that terrorists with good operational procedures would not be able to find more secure means, but migrating to those means would do two things: Fewer operatives would have the rigor to operate securely all the time. You just need one to trip up to give the house away, but with ubiquitous encr. anyone and their nona can encrypt without leaking. Two, switching to alternate means would mean a big slowdown in comms speed and throughput/dissemination and comms can be compromised/altered via interception.
  - function_seven 11y ago
    And three: The mere use of banned encryption tools can now be a crime in itself.
    - mc32 11y ago
      Not necessarily, it's what they call a "signal". Just like driving a white van does not mean yours was the one involved in the hold up, but it's a signal: "Look at white vans more suspiciously".
      - jacquesm 11y ago
        I drive a white van and I use encryption daily. Maybe I should go and invest in some bullet proof attire?
        mc32 11y ago
teaneedz 11y ago
Personally, I thought this tweet was spot on: https://twitter.com/marasawr/status/666467808071573504 https://twitter.com/marasawr/status/666467808071573504
agorabinary 11y ago
Every tragedy will be used to further the cause of totalitarianism. The contents of this article, and every identical piece that is written after every new disaster, is less worthy of HN discussion than this broader issue. Encryption is the primary facilitator of privacy in our current times, and privacy is a fundamental human right. Law enforcement doesn't understand this, they only know "getting the baddies". And in times where violence is at an all time low despite recent tragedies, "getting the baddies" is decreasingly important relative to the preservation of rights.
- namikaze 11y ago
  But it is worthy of discussion around the issue of privacy to raise awareness. Current and past events serve as an example for us discuss and show that privacy is a human right that should not be compromised.
  - benashford 11y ago
    I think everyone here is well aware of the issue. It's getting the message to people outside of the tech bubble that's missing.
    - gozo 11y ago
      I have "after Snowden" begin to doubt that. Sure, there is a lot of people who say they support privacy. But then a lot of the industry nowadays is based on shuffling peoples data around. So I wonder how "deep" peoples convictions are or if it's just more out of convenience to avoid responsibility for their own activities? Rarely is someone in technology upset over, say, the lack of use of encryption when sending e-mails. While when you talk to say lawyers or journalists, for which privacy is the basis of their activities, they are often quite upset over the tech industries cavalier attitudes. More than anything I think you can't effectively defend something if you don't know the issues or peoples concerns. It's great that there is a lingering support of privacy from hackers subculture, but if you can't oppose someone saying "but terrorism" it might not be worth very much. It might actually be more damaging, because you don't see how you could be the "bad" guy (in terms of privacy).
smegel 11y ago
Wow, going for a walk in the woods is also a pretty good way to avoid be spied on by the government. Better burn the forests down, or at least fill them with video-cameras and microphones!
- SixSigma 11y ago
  Unless you happen to be a govt advisor on Iraq. The medical report was recently sealed by the govt. for 70 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert)
  - dfc 11y ago
    I am confused, the wikipedia article you link to says "In October 2010, the postmortem—including the pathologist's 14-page report and the six-page toxicology report—was made public, re-iterating the conclusion of the Hutton report." The subtitle to the linked Guardian article is, "Government releases previously secret medical files on death of weapons inspector at centre of BBC's Iraq dossier story." What is it that you want to see?
    - SixSigma 11y ago
      Hmm maybe I have fallen for the headlines accompanying the recent sealing as though it were revelatory when really it is back to normal practice of medical records being private.
      - dfc 11y ago
        What is the recent sealing?
        SixSigma 11y ago
        Part of the Hutton report that is due any day now....
    - junto 11y ago
mtgx 11y ago
Jesus, NYT. Is it even confirmed that they couldn't see what they were doing "because they used encrypted apps", or is that just an assumption of "anonymous officials"? Upon loading the post and reading the first paragraph: > American and French officials say there is still no definitive evidence to back up their presumption that the terrorists who massacred 129 people in Paris used new, difficult-to-crack encryption technologies to organize the plot. Oh. Well there you go. I really don't see the point of these media entities letting themselves played like this by the authorities to spread their false propaganda then. The bodies weren't even cold yet and they started spreading this anti-encryption message on TV. Because they couldn't have possibly admitted that maybe - just maybe - it's the intelligence agencies that screwed up and they have to take responsibility for it, like it should happen in any democratic country, instead of pointing fingers at others. I wonder what they'll say next if we discover these terrorists weren't actually using encrypted channels to communicate.
phkn1 11y ago
"American and French officials say there is still no definitive evidence to back up their presumption that the terrorists who massacred 129 people in Paris used new, difficult-to-crack encryption technologies to organize the plot." IMO, that is the only part of the article that needs to be understood.
- mc32 11y ago
  Let's say these terrorists were naïve or technical luddites. Why would future perpetrators also be presumed to remain luddites? Second, what would you propose _if_ they are found to have used encryption to avoid detection, would that make a difference? Or do we come up with a better reason to exculpate encryption? If encryption is not a bogey-thing, then it's irrelevant whether it was used or not. We don't need confirmation it was not used.
  - jacquesm 11y ago
    Let's say they're not naive, and that they are not technical Luddites but merely clever enough to realize that if they used channels that can be listened in on easily or that are known to be monitored that their chances of success would go down and their chances of spending the rest of their miserable little lives in jail would go up. Assuming terrorists are naive, Luddites and/or dumb is a dangerous mistake, it presumes that terrorist organizations are mostly old guys with beards rather than that they draw support from all levels of society, including IT personnel. Encryption does not factor into terrorist prevention to-date as far as I can see, what terrorist plots were foiled were foiled in very old-fashioned and low-tech ways, mostly depending on a lucky break because someone saw something suspicious. Encryption does factor into the desire of the various agencies to be able to look into our private lives at every turn. Of course no such agency would ever abuse such power. If resources will be diverted from more risky and/or longer term strategies to increase the dragnet surveillance capabilities we will be doing exactly the wrong thing, given the fact that the current capabilities are far from insignificant and the fact that each and every one of the major attacks in recent history had one or more known perpetrators and plenty of early warning signs. The failure is embarrassing, but of course it is the tools that are to be blamed, not the strategy since that would imply some people are not doing their jobs too well. The whole encryption thing is a side show and does nothing to actually make the day to day lives of people in Western Europe or the Americas any safer. Finally, it's not as if the terrorist groups aren't going to be able to continue the tools they already have, which have encryption capabilities far outstripping our present day ability to break in a short enough window of time (say 48 hours) to be able to intercept a terrorist team on the way to doing their deeds. Encryption used for the purposes of terrorism doesn't have to hold forever, it only has to hold long enough to be able to carry out an attack unhindered. It's not as if these guys are going to be yakking on their cell phones to co-ordinate a group buy of Kalashnikovs and ammo via BuyWithMe.
digitalzombie 11y ago
Encrypted Messaging isn't the problem. They should have better boarder control, background check on people before letting them in, communication with other countries, and better integration. Also perhaps programs for more tolerant people, and ease/integrate immigrants in instead of more religious and toward the extreme end of the spectrum. There are many other solutions without sacrificing freedom and privacy.
- danieldk 11y ago
  Indeed. Some of the terrorists were from Molenbeek, a Brussels suburb that has been out of control for the authorities for decades. The same applies to some Parisian suburbs. Rather than investing in these suburbs and getting human eyes and ears on the ground. We spend many millions more on bombs and anti terror units. Encryption is an easy scapegoat and convenient for power grabs. Saying 'we mismanaged these suburbs' takes political courage.
  - venomsnake 11y ago
    > Indeed. Some of the terrorists were from Molenbeek, a Brussels suburb that has been out of control for the authorities for decades. The same applies to some Parisian suburbs. Can you explain that a bit? There is not enough political will to impose order there or something else?
    - danieldk 11y ago
      I am not sure, since I am from a neighbouring country. Some analysts said that in the case of France, Sarkozy pulled resources from local projects and local police to form anti-terror units, etc. Some areas have regressed so much that regular policemen do not want to go there. In the case of Belgium, one of the problems is that there was never a push towards integrating North-Africans. Traditionally, the left has been in favor of 'multi-culti' -- you basically allow minorities to form their own community without much outside interference. As far as I understand, this has been strengthened in Belgium by the socialist party, which pretty much maintained this non-interference policy for votes. This leads to problems, because in other cities/countries family and friends would signal radicalisation to the authorities. Here, many people do not even speak Dutch or French and mistrust authority.
titzer 11y ago
We must resist every attempt to treat us like criminals a priori.
sarciszewski 11y ago
It doesn't matter what politicians think, really. Secure end-to-end encryption is going to happen one way or another. It's a global phenomenon, no single country can stop it. Sure, our government likes to think it controls the world, but really all it can do is threaten the world with violence. Mathematics knows no such fear.
- giaour 11y ago
  And yet, similar policies have given us "export-grade" encryption and funded projects like the clipper chip. There's no way a single country can block secure, end-to-end encryption forever, but they can sure make things hard for a while.
  - sarciszewski 11y ago
    > but they can sure make things hard for a while Only for their own citizens and trade partners that cooperate with their unrealistic demands.
    - TeMPOraL 11y ago
      Which unfortunately probably means almost everyone. Companies will cooperate, because it's unprofitable for them not to. The GenPop will cooperate because they don't understand any of it anyway.
  - bmelton 11y ago
    They don't have to block every user using unlawful encryption -- they just have to have a law that lets the penalty be enough that a few high profile convictions will deter enough law-abiding people that it isn't worth the risk. At that point, they can simply listen to all traffic and, if there are packets that aren't listenable due to encryption, assume ill intent, then be free to react appropriately. Assuming high enough signal ratios in detecting encryption, it might actually prove that encoded messages, or steganography proves to be more effective at preventing state-level eavesdropping... they won't prevent a determined state from getting your secret content, but it could be enough that, if the messages looked unencrypted, they would be passed over for the more obviously encrypted messages -- hiding in plain sight, as it were. Note, this is not an endorsement of any privacy invasions whatsoever, but musings on what a post-4th-amendment-obliteration world might look like for the privacy-minded.
nickysielicki 11y ago
Did you guys know TERRORISTS are also on TWITTER and FACEBOOK! As soon as I heard this my heart sank and I deleted my accounts. These dangerous tools are being used to recruit jihadists from our own communities!!!!! Can you believe it? I hope they ban this "cryptography" app, as well as Facebook and Twitter. /s How can people be this stupid? Better question: Why are people so uncomfortable deferring their opinions to people who know these things? I don't think you'll find a single person involved in tech who thinks banning cryptography is a good idea, let alone possible. With that in mind, why does this news article exist? How are our politicians getting away with this populist bullshit?
- vonklaus 11y ago
  > Why are people so uncomfortable deferring their opinions to people who know these things? I think you might find that a non-trivial subset, if not outright majority, do deferring their opinions to people who know these things. They often get information and analysis from the news, their government, and that "one guy who is good at computers". I use pgp and gpg, I use ssh, and I am a programmer. I know very little about how cryptography works, but likely enough to appraise someone else's ability to shepherd such discussion and policy. So what heuristic would you apply here? I love the EFF but they have not succeeded in any mainstream endeavor. I do not mean to belittle their accomplishments, but what percent of people reading this article know what the EFF is?
kijin 11y ago
If the latest James Bond movie were released 15 years ago, I would not have found the villain's plan convincing at all. Using random terrorist attacks as an incentive for governments to participate in global surveillance? Give me a break. Now, the Bond villain's agenda so obviously makes sense that it took all the suspension-of-disbelief fun out of the movie. I watched it the day after the Paris attacks. I couldn't help but feel as if Spectre were just a historical piece with some fictional characters added for dramatic effect. Of course that's how surveillance creeps into modern societies. We don't even need cheesy villains to act as masterminds of a convoluted plot. The assholes at Daesh can get the job done just as effectively, thank you very much.
dbg31415 11y ago
So if the government is complaining that ISIS now uses technologies that it can't yet crack... and they know this... who exactly are they intending to spying on? Not ISIS, just the rest of us.
callesgg 11y ago
I am more afraid of the bs lobying people try to push using terror attacks than i am of actually dying in an attack. Just by looking at the numbers and the actual risks involved in being effected.
spdustin 11y ago
Typical. They blame Snowden, too. 'Hey, look, a chicken!' https://theintercept.com/2015/11/15/exploiting-emotions-about-paris-to-blame-snowden-distract-from-actual-culprits-who-empowered-isis/ https://theintercept.com/2015/11/15/exploiting-emotions-abou... More people should read that story.
voynich61 11y ago
Tech-savvy people often miss the forest for the trees on this one. Once you get past the engrossment in implementation details, the fundamentalist political philosophizing, and the harping on spurious and mostly anecdotal evidence for Western police states, there actually is good reason for government surveillance of W/Obama scale. There is a distinct threat that global terror will increase in scope by orders of magnitude, due to a) gains in message efficacy, b) positive feedback loops for recruitment (i.e., bombing Iraq over and over again), c) weapon availability gains, d) geopolitical posturing, or e) a black swan. Of what has been revealed from Snowden's leaks, the worst intentional (read: potentially malicious) invasion of privacy was NSA employees making fun of tapped conversations. If that and you not being able to torrent 24-bit flacs off of what.cd is the cost we have to pay for security in a future which is less certain than is widely acknowledged, sign me up.
- benashford 11y ago
  The worst thing for me about the Snowden leaks wasn't that. It was the deliberate interference in secure protocols (e.g. the flawed random number generators), combined with the pressure to leave open accidental flaws. This makes everyone vulnerable to J. Random Cybercriminal when those same flaws are finally discovered by the non-secret services. Being a victim of an identity thief is a lot less terrifying than being in the middle of a automatic weapon massacre, but it's a lot more likely to happen. The framing of the debate as "encryption = only used for evil" is not only wrong, but very dangerous from that point-of-view. I don't have any easy answers that keeps everyone happy. But neither does anyone else.
- mbrock 11y ago
  You are already signed up. There is no opt-out and no democracy. Thank you for your cooperation.
lvs 11y ago
It's almost like they were ready and waiting with the talking points... Hmmm... https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150916/15570332276/having-lost-debate-backdooring-encryption-intelligence-community-plans-to-wait-until-next-terrorist-attack.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150916/15570332276/havin...
chei0aiV 11y ago
More on this: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/11/paris_attacks_b.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/11/paris_attacks...
dijit 11y ago
I was reading an article yesterday about how the attacks in paris were coordinated via the playstation network. This tells me, unequivocally, that the news outlets can't possibly understand what is secure and usable, vs what isn't. My girlfriend (whom is not very technical) was saying that PSN should open itself to police, and then I showed her the security record of Sony, and then showed her how messages are sent unencrypted over the wire.. and then showed her the wiki page on Tempora. It's very clear to me that they're going to blame everything and anything- and we should very clearly ask the question to these publishers; "whats your evidence of any wrongdoing"; "what's your ideal situation?"; "why do you feel that way"
kriro 11y ago
I think the sensible argument for advocates of strong privacy has been touched upon in the article when they mentioned China. At least that's my "debate tactic". The argument is basically "we need strong crypto because it allows people living in ISIS dominated regions to communicate safely and escape without the danger of having their communication intercepted and having a kill team visit them"
spoiler 11y ago
I fail to see how privacy/crypto apps helped them. They could've as well used DIY "apps" or alternate channels of communication (which could be encrypted).
LoSboccacc 11y ago
the sad part is that this is the only actual quote I could find, all the rest is just speculation and security theater "The working assumption is that these guys were very security aware, and they assumed they would be under some level of observation, and acted accordingly" and the ps4 quote about encryption is completely unrelated: http://www.xpats.com/brussels-weakest-link-europes-fight-against-terrorism http://www.xpats.com/brussels-weakest-link-europes-fight-aga... just think about it: if problem was just the encryption, the logical assumption is that they were aware of the person involved but couldn't read the messages you have to find the person you need to monitor first, encryption or not. you can't track every message, even if you force the whole word to communicate without encryption, because of the sheer amount of false positives. https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2006/03/data_mining_for.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2006/03/data_mining_f...
btreecat 11y ago
>American and French officials say there is still no definitive evidence to back up their presumption that the terrorists who massacred 129 people in Paris used new, difficult-to-crack encryption technologies to organize the plot. Everything you need to know in the first paragraph.

88 points by dperfect 11y ago

nemo 11y ago

There's an interesting article on how Telegram is being used here: http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/8828.htm/ http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/8828.htm/

jszymborski 11y ago
Except, other than being a nice chat app, Telegram's encryption is snake oil http://unhandledexpression.com/2013/12/17/telegram-stand-back-we-know-maths/ http://unhandledexpression.com/2013/12/17/telegram-stand-bac...
- nemo 11y ago
  The article mentioned encryption, but I was more interested in their details on how Daesh was using it as an unmoderated platform to spread tutorials on manufacturing weapons and launching cyberattacks, calls for targeted killing and lone-wolf attacks, and Daesh's use of bots on the platform.
  - toast0 11y ago
    So he's distributing the Anarchist Cookbook?
    - nemo 11y ago
      No. Not 'he', and not just distributing how-tos. Read the link if you'd like to be aware of what's happening though.
  - jszymborski 11y ago
    If they were using something federated and secure like XMPP+OTR, sure, but Telegram is as easily moderated as any other centralised solution (they might as well be operating on an FB Profile + FB Group Chat). If the DOD/NSA/CIA/WTV wanted to shut this down (which they likely don't as this probably serves as a nice stream of data) all they need to do is shut-down Telegram's US servers, which would likely cripple the entire company financially.

nmj 11y ago

Kind of sick of hearing government officials saying encryption is evil. This stance is disingenuous at best and dangerous at worst.

dewiz 11y ago

Yeah I believe also trains, cars, food, water and oxygen played a role, something should be done about those too. If that ever happens, open source to the rescue, politicians might as well make that illegal.

mc32 11y ago
This is all true, but it's also true "governments" had previously had [court ordered or otherwise, depending on jurisdiction] access to communications, when necessary in order to track individuals or obtain evidence. The claim is that now people can choose technologies which allow them to evade communications interception [easily] which frustrates governments when they want to intercept communications. I don't think it's far fetched to believe if not the US countries abroad will require technology vendors to provide interception systems ala BlackBerry. Big enough markets, can say, Apple, you can still sell in our country[1] but you must grant access [MITM, whatever] and you know what, Apple will not want to see its growth markets evaporate. [1] They'd also disallow non-approved apps from country app store and also disallow carriers from allowing jailbroken handsets.
- terryf 11y ago
  Like the saying goes, if you outlaw guns, only the outlaws will have guns. Seriously. Ever heard of steganography? Police being able to listen in to communications for selected individuals, based on court orders is of course something that is necessary for safety, nobody is arguing that. The difference is the scale of the ability to survey. You can argue that the scale doesn't matter, but it does. The only difference between uber and your local taxi company with 10 cars is also scale. Being able to scale surveillance trivially is the thing that must be fought against, because it erodes the freedom of people. After all, the freedom of people to live their lives as they wish is what we're protecting after all, isn't it?
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    > After all, the freedom of people to live their lives as they wish is what we're protecting after all, isn't it? Is it? I thought it's freedom to live their lives as long as they follow the law?

zmmmmm 11y ago

Intelligence agencies seem to operate on a very dubious assumption that if mass consumer products weren't offering end to end encryption, terrorists would just be chattering away in the clear, rather than trivially switching to one of the plethora of alternatives that do allow secure communication (some of them open source and "unbannable"). Are they really that dumb? Or is this a cynical PR exercise?

mc32 11y ago
It's not that terrorists with good operational procedures would not be able to find more secure means, but migrating to those means would do two things: Fewer operatives would have the rigor to operate securely all the time. You just need one to trip up to give the house away, but with ubiquitous encr. anyone and their nona can encrypt without leaking. Two, switching to alternate means would mean a big slowdown in comms speed and throughput/dissemination and comms can be compromised/altered via interception.
- function_seven 11y ago
  And three: The mere use of banned encryption tools can now be a crime in itself.
  - mc32 11y ago
    Not necessarily, it's what they call a "signal". Just like driving a white van does not mean yours was the one involved in the hold up, but it's a signal: "Look at white vans more suspiciously".
    - jacquesm 11y ago
      I drive a white van and I use encryption daily. Maybe I should go and invest in some bullet proof attire?
      - mc32 11y ago

teaneedz 11y ago

Personally, I thought this tweet was spot on: https://twitter.com/marasawr/status/666467808071573504 https://twitter.com/marasawr/status/666467808071573504

agorabinary 11y ago

Every tragedy will be used to further the cause of totalitarianism. The contents of this article, and every identical piece that is written after every new disaster, is less worthy of HN discussion than this broader issue. Encryption is the primary facilitator of privacy in our current times, and privacy is a fundamental human right. Law enforcement doesn't understand this, they only know "getting the baddies". And in times where violence is at an all time low despite recent tragedies, "getting the baddies" is decreasingly important relative to the preservation of rights.

namikaze 11y ago
But it is worthy of discussion around the issue of privacy to raise awareness. Current and past events serve as an example for us discuss and show that privacy is a human right that should not be compromised.
- benashford 11y ago
  I think everyone here is well aware of the issue. It's getting the message to people outside of the tech bubble that's missing.
  - gozo 11y ago
    I have "after Snowden" begin to doubt that. Sure, there is a lot of people who say they support privacy. But then a lot of the industry nowadays is based on shuffling peoples data around. So I wonder how "deep" peoples convictions are or if it's just more out of convenience to avoid responsibility for their own activities? Rarely is someone in technology upset over, say, the lack of use of encryption when sending e-mails. While when you talk to say lawyers or journalists, for which privacy is the basis of their activities, they are often quite upset over the tech industries cavalier attitudes. More than anything I think you can't effectively defend something if you don't know the issues or peoples concerns. It's great that there is a lingering support of privacy from hackers subculture, but if you can't oppose someone saying "but terrorism" it might not be worth very much. It might actually be more damaging, because you don't see how you could be the "bad" guy (in terms of privacy).

smegel 11y ago

Wow, going for a walk in the woods is also a pretty good way to avoid be spied on by the government. Better burn the forests down, or at least fill them with video-cameras and microphones!

SixSigma 11y ago
Unless you happen to be a govt advisor on Iraq. The medical report was recently sealed by the govt. for 70 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert)
- dfc 11y ago
  I am confused, the wikipedia article you link to says "In October 2010, the postmortem—including the pathologist's 14-page report and the six-page toxicology report—was made public, re-iterating the conclusion of the Hutton report." The subtitle to the linked Guardian article is, "Government releases previously secret medical files on death of weapons inspector at centre of BBC's Iraq dossier story." What is it that you want to see?
  - SixSigma 11y ago
    Hmm maybe I have fallen for the headlines accompanying the recent sealing as though it were revelatory when really it is back to normal practice of medical records being private.
    - dfc 11y ago
      What is the recent sealing?
      - SixSigma 11y ago
        Part of the Hutton report that is due any day now....
  - junto 11y ago

mtgx 11y ago

Jesus, NYT. Is it even confirmed that they couldn't see what they were doing "because they used encrypted apps", or is that just an assumption of "anonymous officials"? Upon loading the post and reading the first paragraph: > American and French officials say there is still no definitive evidence to back up their presumption that the terrorists who massacred 129 people in Paris used new, difficult-to-crack encryption technologies to organize the plot. Oh. Well there you go. I really don't see the point of these media entities letting themselves played like this by the authorities to spread their false propaganda then. The bodies weren't even cold yet and they started spreading this anti-encryption message on TV. Because they couldn't have possibly admitted that maybe - just maybe - it's the intelligence agencies that screwed up and they have to take responsibility for it, like it should happen in any democratic country, instead of pointing fingers at others. I wonder what they'll say next if we discover these terrorists weren't actually using encrypted channels to communicate.

phkn1 11y ago

"American and French officials say there is still no definitive evidence to back up their presumption that the terrorists who massacred 129 people in Paris used new, difficult-to-crack encryption technologies to organize the plot." IMO, that is the only part of the article that needs to be understood.

mc32 11y ago
Let's say these terrorists were naïve or technical luddites. Why would future perpetrators also be presumed to remain luddites? Second, what would you propose _if_ they are found to have used encryption to avoid detection, would that make a difference? Or do we come up with a better reason to exculpate encryption? If encryption is not a bogey-thing, then it's irrelevant whether it was used or not. We don't need confirmation it was not used.
- jacquesm 11y ago
  Let's say they're not naive, and that they are not technical Luddites but merely clever enough to realize that if they used channels that can be listened in on easily or that are known to be monitored that their chances of success would go down and their chances of spending the rest of their miserable little lives in jail would go up. Assuming terrorists are naive, Luddites and/or dumb is a dangerous mistake, it presumes that terrorist organizations are mostly old guys with beards rather than that they draw support from all levels of society, including IT personnel. Encryption does not factor into terrorist prevention to-date as far as I can see, what terrorist plots were foiled were foiled in very old-fashioned and low-tech ways, mostly depending on a lucky break because someone saw something suspicious. Encryption does factor into the desire of the various agencies to be able to look into our private lives at every turn. Of course no such agency would ever abuse such power. If resources will be diverted from more risky and/or longer term strategies to increase the dragnet surveillance capabilities we will be doing exactly the wrong thing, given the fact that the current capabilities are far from insignificant and the fact that each and every one of the major attacks in recent history had one or more known perpetrators and plenty of early warning signs. The failure is embarrassing, but of course it is the tools that are to be blamed, not the strategy since that would imply some people are not doing their jobs too well. The whole encryption thing is a side show and does nothing to actually make the day to day lives of people in Western Europe or the Americas any safer. Finally, it's not as if the terrorist groups aren't going to be able to continue the tools they already have, which have encryption capabilities far outstripping our present day ability to break in a short enough window of time (say 48 hours) to be able to intercept a terrorist team on the way to doing their deeds. Encryption used for the purposes of terrorism doesn't have to hold forever, it only has to hold long enough to be able to carry out an attack unhindered. It's not as if these guys are going to be yakking on their cell phones to co-ordinate a group buy of Kalashnikovs and ammo via BuyWithMe.

digitalzombie 11y ago

Encrypted Messaging isn't the problem. They should have better boarder control, background check on people before letting them in, communication with other countries, and better integration. Also perhaps programs for more tolerant people, and ease/integrate immigrants in instead of more religious and toward the extreme end of the spectrum. There are many other solutions without sacrificing freedom and privacy.

danieldk 11y ago
Indeed. Some of the terrorists were from Molenbeek, a Brussels suburb that has been out of control for the authorities for decades. The same applies to some Parisian suburbs. Rather than investing in these suburbs and getting human eyes and ears on the ground. We spend many millions more on bombs and anti terror units. Encryption is an easy scapegoat and convenient for power grabs. Saying 'we mismanaged these suburbs' takes political courage.
- venomsnake 11y ago
  > Indeed. Some of the terrorists were from Molenbeek, a Brussels suburb that has been out of control for the authorities for decades. The same applies to some Parisian suburbs. Can you explain that a bit? There is not enough political will to impose order there or something else?
  - danieldk 11y ago
    I am not sure, since I am from a neighbouring country. Some analysts said that in the case of France, Sarkozy pulled resources from local projects and local police to form anti-terror units, etc. Some areas have regressed so much that regular policemen do not want to go there. In the case of Belgium, one of the problems is that there was never a push towards integrating North-Africans. Traditionally, the left has been in favor of 'multi-culti' -- you basically allow minorities to form their own community without much outside interference. As far as I understand, this has been strengthened in Belgium by the socialist party, which pretty much maintained this non-interference policy for votes. This leads to problems, because in other cities/countries family and friends would signal radicalisation to the authorities. Here, many people do not even speak Dutch or French and mistrust authority.

titzer 11y ago

We must resist every attempt to treat us like criminals a priori.

sarciszewski 11y ago

It doesn't matter what politicians think, really. Secure end-to-end encryption is going to happen one way or another. It's a global phenomenon, no single country can stop it. Sure, our government likes to think it controls the world, but really all it can do is threaten the world with violence. Mathematics knows no such fear.

giaour 11y ago
And yet, similar policies have given us "export-grade" encryption and funded projects like the clipper chip. There's no way a single country can block secure, end-to-end encryption forever, but they can sure make things hard for a while.
- sarciszewski 11y ago
  > but they can sure make things hard for a while Only for their own citizens and trade partners that cooperate with their unrealistic demands.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    Which unfortunately probably means almost everyone. Companies will cooperate, because it's unprofitable for them not to. The GenPop will cooperate because they don't understand any of it anyway.
- bmelton 11y ago
  They don't have to block every user using unlawful encryption -- they just have to have a law that lets the penalty be enough that a few high profile convictions will deter enough law-abiding people that it isn't worth the risk. At that point, they can simply listen to all traffic and, if there are packets that aren't listenable due to encryption, assume ill intent, then be free to react appropriately. Assuming high enough signal ratios in detecting encryption, it might actually prove that encoded messages, or steganography proves to be more effective at preventing state-level eavesdropping... they won't prevent a determined state from getting your secret content, but it could be enough that, if the messages looked unencrypted, they would be passed over for the more obviously encrypted messages -- hiding in plain sight, as it were. Note, this is not an endorsement of any privacy invasions whatsoever, but musings on what a post-4th-amendment-obliteration world might look like for the privacy-minded.

nickysielicki 11y ago

Did you guys know TERRORISTS are also on TWITTER and FACEBOOK! As soon as I heard this my heart sank and I deleted my accounts. These dangerous tools are being used to recruit jihadists from our own communities!!!!! Can you believe it? I hope they ban this "cryptography" app, as well as Facebook and Twitter. /s How can people be this stupid? Better question: Why are people so uncomfortable deferring their opinions to people who know these things? I don't think you'll find a single person involved in tech who thinks banning cryptography is a good idea, let alone possible. With that in mind, why does this news article exist? How are our politicians getting away with this populist bullshit?

vonklaus 11y ago
> Why are people so uncomfortable deferring their opinions to people who know these things? I think you might find that a non-trivial subset, if not outright majority, do deferring their opinions to people who know these things. They often get information and analysis from the news, their government, and that "one guy who is good at computers". I use pgp and gpg, I use ssh, and I am a programmer. I know very little about how cryptography works, but likely enough to appraise someone else's ability to shepherd such discussion and policy. So what heuristic would you apply here? I love the EFF but they have not succeeded in any mainstream endeavor. I do not mean to belittle their accomplishments, but what percent of people reading this article know what the EFF is?

kijin 11y ago

If the latest James Bond movie were released 15 years ago, I would not have found the villain's plan convincing at all. Using random terrorist attacks as an incentive for governments to participate in global surveillance? Give me a break. Now, the Bond villain's agenda so obviously makes sense that it took all the suspension-of-disbelief fun out of the movie. I watched it the day after the Paris attacks. I couldn't help but feel as if Spectre were just a historical piece with some fictional characters added for dramatic effect. Of course that's how surveillance creeps into modern societies. We don't even need cheesy villains to act as masterminds of a convoluted plot. The assholes at Daesh can get the job done just as effectively, thank you very much.

dbg31415 11y ago

So if the government is complaining that ISIS now uses technologies that it can't yet crack... and they know this... who exactly are they intending to spying on? Not ISIS, just the rest of us.

callesgg 11y ago

I am more afraid of the bs lobying people try to push using terror attacks than i am of actually dying in an attack. Just by looking at the numbers and the actual risks involved in being effected.

spdustin 11y ago

Typical. They blame Snowden, too. 'Hey, look, a chicken!' https://theintercept.com/2015/11/15/exploiting-emotions-about-paris-to-blame-snowden-distract-from-actual-culprits-who-empowered-isis/ https://theintercept.com/2015/11/15/exploiting-emotions-abou... More people should read that story.

voynich61 11y ago

Tech-savvy people often miss the forest for the trees on this one. Once you get past the engrossment in implementation details, the fundamentalist political philosophizing, and the harping on spurious and mostly anecdotal evidence for Western police states, there actually is good reason for government surveillance of W/Obama scale. There is a distinct threat that global terror will increase in scope by orders of magnitude, due to a) gains in message efficacy, b) positive feedback loops for recruitment (i.e., bombing Iraq over and over again), c) weapon availability gains, d) geopolitical posturing, or e) a black swan. Of what has been revealed from Snowden's leaks, the worst intentional (read: potentially malicious) invasion of privacy was NSA employees making fun of tapped conversations. If that and you not being able to torrent 24-bit flacs off of what.cd is the cost we have to pay for security in a future which is less certain than is widely acknowledged, sign me up.

benashford 11y ago
The worst thing for me about the Snowden leaks wasn't that. It was the deliberate interference in secure protocols (e.g. the flawed random number generators), combined with the pressure to leave open accidental flaws. This makes everyone vulnerable to J. Random Cybercriminal when those same flaws are finally discovered by the non-secret services. Being a victim of an identity thief is a lot less terrifying than being in the middle of a automatic weapon massacre, but it's a lot more likely to happen. The framing of the debate as "encryption = only used for evil" is not only wrong, but very dangerous from that point-of-view. I don't have any easy answers that keeps everyone happy. But neither does anyone else.
mbrock 11y ago
You are already signed up. There is no opt-out and no democracy. Thank you for your cooperation.

lvs 11y ago

It's almost like they were ready and waiting with the talking points... Hmmm... https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150916/15570332276/having-lost-debate-backdooring-encryption-intelligence-community-plans-to-wait-until-next-terrorist-attack.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150916/15570332276/havin...

chei0aiV 11y ago

More on this: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/11/paris_attacks_b.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/11/paris_attacks...

dijit 11y ago

I was reading an article yesterday about how the attacks in paris were coordinated via the playstation network. This tells me, unequivocally, that the news outlets can't possibly understand what is secure and usable, vs what isn't. My girlfriend (whom is not very technical) was saying that PSN should open itself to police, and then I showed her the security record of Sony, and then showed her how messages are sent unencrypted over the wire.. and then showed her the wiki page on Tempora. It's very clear to me that they're going to blame everything and anything- and we should very clearly ask the question to these publishers; "whats your evidence of any wrongdoing"; "what's your ideal situation?"; "why do you feel that way"

kriro 11y ago

I think the sensible argument for advocates of strong privacy has been touched upon in the article when they mentioned China. At least that's my "debate tactic". The argument is basically "we need strong crypto because it allows people living in ISIS dominated regions to communicate safely and escape without the danger of having their communication intercepted and having a kill team visit them"

spoiler 11y ago

I fail to see how privacy/crypto apps helped them. They could've as well used DIY "apps" or alternate channels of communication (which could be encrypted).

LoSboccacc 11y ago

the sad part is that this is the only actual quote I could find, all the rest is just speculation and security theater "The working assumption is that these guys were very security aware, and they assumed they would be under some level of observation, and acted accordingly" and the ps4 quote about encryption is completely unrelated: http://www.xpats.com/brussels-weakest-link-europes-fight-against-terrorism http://www.xpats.com/brussels-weakest-link-europes-fight-aga... just think about it: if problem was just the encryption, the logical assumption is that they were aware of the person involved but couldn't read the messages you have to find the person you need to monitor first, encryption or not. you can't track every message, even if you force the whole word to communicate without encryption, because of the sheer amount of false positives. https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2006/03/data_mining_for.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2006/03/data_mining_f...

btreecat 11y ago

>American and French officials say there is still no definitive evidence to back up their presumption that the terrorists who massacred 129 people in Paris used new, difficult-to-crack encryption technologies to organize the plot. Everything you need to know in the first paragraph.