In the same way that an "encrypt everything" future decreases the current power of a warrant, the current power of a warrant is far above its historical level.

In the same way that an "encrypt everything" future decreases the current power of a warrant, the current power of a warrant is far above its historical level. The transition from physical to digital massively increased the amount of data being stored. Your "papers" never recorded your historic location, biometrics, metadata and contents of all (or most) of your communication, etc. It used to be that the government could never access most of that information, warrant or not. Now they can, because our smartphones track all that stuff. The more I think about it, the more I see our digital assistants as extensions of the mind rather than an ever-growing stack of "papers and effects;" it's a difference in magnitude that produces a difference in kind. I'd argue that the encrypt everything future is more similar to the pre-digital past than not. Before the telephone, law enforcement could never access the contents of a private conversation without physically putting a person in the room or questioning someone involved. I wouldn't say that it's exactly the same; there's a big difference in effort between using Signal and enciphering all of your physical letters, which will admit a difference in adoption rates. Like the other commenter said, it brings back the importance of HUMINT. But like you said, adding a law enforcement loophole to encryption is not the answer; that would only serve to increase government surveillance power, even if it was gated with a warrant. It's the equivalent of putting a surveillance device in everyone's pocket. Historically unprecedented, even if you need a warrant to access the data on it. Problem is that law enforcement desperately wants to keep that power now that they have it.