7 ms·

My thought is that if we implement a back door policy, the public will have communication links which are much easier to compromise by any party, while terroris

My thought is that if we implement a back door policy, the public will have communication links which are much easier to compromise by any party, while terrorists can still easily use encryption and/or steganography to secure their communications. All the back doors accomplish in the end is harming the general public.

kfcpanda 11y ago
Indeed. Also, combine your steganography argument with this image http://www.friendmosaic.com/images/example-mosaic.jpg http://www.friendmosaic.com/images/example-mosaic.jpg and it's pretty easy to see that this avenue of thought --- that we will put our efforts toward finding a way to ban encryption --- is totally ridiculous.
snowwrestler 11y ago
It's not just that federally-mandated backdoors increase the chance of compromise (although they certainly do). If the U.S. government can mandate that technology companies provide access through encryption, then so can other countries. Sovereignty is still a powerful concept under international law. So imagine if Apple, upon condition of selling iPhones within China, must provide the Chinese government with a backdoor through Apple's encryption. Do you know how many federal employees use Apple technology? Including the President himself, who totes an iPad everywhere? I don't think that federal intelligence and law enforcement officials calling for backdoors have fully thought through the consequences.
- freshhawk 11y ago
  > I don't think that federal intelligence and law enforcement officials calling for backdoors have fully thought through the consequences I think assuming that level of incompetence is a big claim. It's simply much more likely that the actual plans/goals and the talking points and press releases about the plans/goals are mostly unrelated, as usual. You can infer that those calling for backdoors have decided that calling for backdoors is the best thing to say, inferring anything more requires more information.
  - TillE 11y ago
    > I think assuming that level of incompetence is a big claim. Not really. Have you listened to the average member of Congress lately? Incompetence runs deep throughout all levels of government.
    - Asbostos 11y ago
      I think largely politicians are very intelligent and competent. What they're not though, is open about their own thoughts. That's not their job. Their job is to reflect what their supporters (financially and votingly) want. If their supporters have wild nonsense ideas, they have to promote those ideas to keep their job. That's why they were elected. We don't choose politicians because they're smart and have good ideas. We choose them because they tell us our own foolish ideas back to us.
      - jbooth 11y ago
        The best salesman is someone who believes in the product. I'm willing to take them at their word.
      - odbol_ 11y ago
        They key point here though is that their "supporters" are NOT the American public. They are private corporations and banks with their own agendas, usually contrary to the public's well being.
  - snowwrestler 11y ago
    It's not fair to say incompetent; I didn't say that. Instead, look at it this way: everyone has their area of responsibility. The head of the CIA is charged with providing the best possible situational awareness for the U.S. government. He's going to make proposals and requests that will help him do that. He's not charged with balancing all possible consequences from his requests, and he's not going to do so.
    - tripzilch 11y ago
Asbostos 11y ago
It would help conventional law enforcement. Most violent criminals probably don't put enough forethought into their spontaneous attacks to properly avoid notice by the NSA. Unfortunately the NSA doesn't seem to use their resources to secure the nation, and just ignores all the large scale violent crime that goes on daily.
- maxerickson 11y ago
  It's largely outside of the NSA mandate to monitor the communications of US citizen criminals. It is not the fault of the NSA that Congress has not passed a law telling them to spy on domestic criminals. I get that some of the controversy lately is about how well they stick to their mandate, but that doesn't change what the mandate is.
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  > Unfortunately the NSA doesn't seem to use their resources to secure the nation, and just ignores all the large scale violent crime that goes on daily. The NSA is part of the Department of Defense charged with foreign signals intelligence for national security purposes, its not a law enforcement agency. (And many of the tools it uses would be flagrantly unconstitutional if used for domestic law enforcement.) Generally, blurring of the military and law enforcement roles is not a healthy thing; it may be good for order, but rarely for liberty.
rjsw 11y ago
One of the reports on the Osama Bin Laden raid stated that he had a porn stash, I wondered at the time if this was for use as a starting point for steganographic communications.
dawnbreez 11y ago
Many regulations do. The real trick is giving even the terrorists reasons to behave. It sounds impossible, of course, but that's just because we're not sure where these guys put their goals; some may be fighting for lack of another purpose in their life, while others may be motivated by personal loss or a thorough belief in the violent interpretation of Islam. So what we really need to do is find a common thread among all the terrorists, and pull on it.

kfcpanda 11y ago

Indeed. Also, combine your steganography argument with this image http://www.friendmosaic.com/images/example-mosaic.jpg http://www.friendmosaic.com/images/example-mosaic.jpg and it's pretty easy to see that this avenue of thought --- that we will put our efforts toward finding a way to ban encryption --- is totally ridiculous.

snowwrestler 11y ago

It's not just that federally-mandated backdoors increase the chance of compromise (although they certainly do). If the U.S. government can mandate that technology companies provide access through encryption, then so can other countries. Sovereignty is still a powerful concept under international law. So imagine if Apple, upon condition of selling iPhones within China, must provide the Chinese government with a backdoor through Apple's encryption. Do you know how many federal employees use Apple technology? Including the President himself, who totes an iPad everywhere? I don't think that federal intelligence and law enforcement officials calling for backdoors have fully thought through the consequences.

freshhawk 11y ago
> I don't think that federal intelligence and law enforcement officials calling for backdoors have fully thought through the consequences I think assuming that level of incompetence is a big claim. It's simply much more likely that the actual plans/goals and the talking points and press releases about the plans/goals are mostly unrelated, as usual. You can infer that those calling for backdoors have decided that calling for backdoors is the best thing to say, inferring anything more requires more information.
- TillE 11y ago
  > I think assuming that level of incompetence is a big claim. Not really. Have you listened to the average member of Congress lately? Incompetence runs deep throughout all levels of government.
  - Asbostos 11y ago
    I think largely politicians are very intelligent and competent. What they're not though, is open about their own thoughts. That's not their job. Their job is to reflect what their supporters (financially and votingly) want. If their supporters have wild nonsense ideas, they have to promote those ideas to keep their job. That's why they were elected. We don't choose politicians because they're smart and have good ideas. We choose them because they tell us our own foolish ideas back to us.
    - jbooth 11y ago
      The best salesman is someone who believes in the product. I'm willing to take them at their word.
    - odbol_ 11y ago
      They key point here though is that their "supporters" are NOT the American public. They are private corporations and banks with their own agendas, usually contrary to the public's well being.
- snowwrestler 11y ago
  It's not fair to say incompetent; I didn't say that. Instead, look at it this way: everyone has their area of responsibility. The head of the CIA is charged with providing the best possible situational awareness for the U.S. government. He's going to make proposals and requests that will help him do that. He's not charged with balancing all possible consequences from his requests, and he's not going to do so.
  - tripzilch 11y ago

Asbostos 11y ago

It would help conventional law enforcement. Most violent criminals probably don't put enough forethought into their spontaneous attacks to properly avoid notice by the NSA. Unfortunately the NSA doesn't seem to use their resources to secure the nation, and just ignores all the large scale violent crime that goes on daily.

maxerickson 11y ago
It's largely outside of the NSA mandate to monitor the communications of US citizen criminals. It is not the fault of the NSA that Congress has not passed a law telling them to spy on domestic criminals. I get that some of the controversy lately is about how well they stick to their mandate, but that doesn't change what the mandate is.
dragonwriter 11y ago
> Unfortunately the NSA doesn't seem to use their resources to secure the nation, and just ignores all the large scale violent crime that goes on daily. The NSA is part of the Department of Defense charged with foreign signals intelligence for national security purposes, its not a law enforcement agency. (And many of the tools it uses would be flagrantly unconstitutional if used for domestic law enforcement.) Generally, blurring of the military and law enforcement roles is not a healthy thing; it may be good for order, but rarely for liberty.

rjsw 11y ago

One of the reports on the Osama Bin Laden raid stated that he had a porn stash, I wondered at the time if this was for use as a starting point for steganographic communications.

dawnbreez 11y ago

Many regulations do. The real trick is giving even the terrorists reasons to behave. It sounds impossible, of course, but that's just because we're not sure where these guys put their goals; some may be fighting for lack of another purpose in their life, while others may be motivated by personal loss or a thorough belief in the violent interpretation of Islam. So what we really need to do is find a common thread among all the terrorists, and pull on it.