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5 ways tech companies distort the encryption debate
- JoshTriplett 11y agoEvery word in this article is utter nonsense, and yet the Washington Post gave it a platform. This is being treated as a serious debate, with sides and perspectives, and nobody is laughing these people off the stage. And if we engage with such arguments in the slightest, or give them the slightest bit of credibility, we're taking a serious risk of allowing an Overton window (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window). There are issues with sides. This is not one of them. There is no middle ground on this issue; there is "broken" and "not broken". "Privacy" and "security" do not mean "except from the government" or "except for the company selling the device". And it doesn't matter whether a search is lawful; if it is possible without the consent of the owner, the device has a critical security bug. A court can determine a search is lawful all they like; that gives them the right to perform the search. You've got a warrant? Here's the device, go right ahead. No, I don't want it back; I have backups. Governments wonder why technologists want to make it impossible to comply with their demands, and protect users even from themselves? Because their demands look like this and we're tired of losing. How do we reach a point where people like this get laughed off the stage, the way they would if they talked about how much simpler maps would be for a flat earth? How do we not just "win" this "debate" but prevent every future such "debate"? How do we stop losing? How do we end the fight completely and permanently?