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> Everything even vaguely sensitive -- that is, everything that we want kept private -- must use secure channels. I see this in a different way. The starting

by bostik 8y ago

> Everything even vaguely sensitive -- that is, everything that we want kept private -- must use secure channels. I see this in a different way. The starting point should be that everything is secured. If you use the secure messaging only for non-mundane stuff, it stands out. So you want to add as much noise into the use profile of the secure channels as possible, to make it that much harder to detect when anything of value is being transmitted. This, however, I completely agree with: > And if it's truly sensitive, it must be ~anonymous In the context of secure channels, that adds that the use of ~anonymous methods must not be any different from outside the channels. Preferably not even from the inside, because you have to assume that a portion of such a system is compromised at all times.

mirimir 8y ago
> The starting point should be that everything is secured. If you use the secure messaging only for non-mundane stuff, it stands out. That's a good point. But consider, how do I use "secure messaging" with my meatspace bank? Or with my wife, or my meatspace friends? Sure, I use HTTPS. But trying to get any of those to use truly secure channels would be pointless. And even worse, it would attract attention. For noise on secure channels, I torrent random stuff. That all goes through a VPN service. But among the torrent traffic, there are indirect VPN connections.
- bostik 8y ago
  Very good questions, and something I believe we as a society AND as a profession are only starting to realise. The truth is, people everywhere say they want security. But that's a white lie. What people really want is convenience. That is also the wedge we as a developer community can work with. I truly believe that if you can make the secure option also the more convenient option, you won't be able to keep people away.[ß] As far as usability goes, secure and/or hardened software is still atrocious. The point about meatspace bank is a really good one. Well, as it happens, WhatsApp based banking is a real thing. I found one startup doing that[0], but even before this I remember that somewhere (Philippines? Indonesia? Kenya?) WA was already used for bank customer support. Now, is that somehow more secure than a well done, well maintained, properly hardened banking app from a dedicated big player? Certainly not. But it's hell of a lot better than a MVP from a company that might be barely in their second year to a basic banking license. It has the benefit of adding useful business traffic to a reasonably secure transport. Obviously it still depends on a known-malicious third party for routing, but then again, for a truly secure communications system you have to assume that you're dealing with compromised and/or actively malicious infrastructure. Which makes it a very good first step. For any real progress, we will need at least another decade of research into usable, latency-sensitive, information-theoretically noisy communication systems. Secure and ~anonymous message routing is going to be a damn hard problem. (Without the latency part, and assuming very cheap bandwidth, something like a probabilistic K-anonymity based batched multicast might be a reasonable starting point.) Even then, the usability has to be baked in and considered from the start. > For noise on secure channels, I torrent random stuff. That all goes through a VPN service. Now that's a really nice countermeasure. Well done! ß: Global censorship and blanket bans with aggressive enforcement notwithstanding. 0: Company is apparently called "Absa".
  - taejo 8y ago
    > 0: Company is apparently called "Absa". FYI, Absa is one of South Africa's largest banks, formed in 1991 by the merger of several large, long-established banks, and by now owns all of Barclays' African operations. It's not a startup.
    - bostik 8y ago
      /me recovers foot from mouth. Thank you, I stand corrected.
  - mirimir 8y ago
    Maybe a bank could support something like Briar or Ricochet, with P2P between Tor .onion instances. With secure 2FA, using hardware tokens. I'd switch in a nanosecond. But they'd likely never satisfy KYC rules :( And I do see many banks starting to use WhatsApp. It'd be better if they (at least) used Signal, but it's a start.

by bostik 8y ago

mirimir 8y ago

> The starting point should be that everything is secured. If you use the secure messaging only for non-mundane stuff, it stands out. That's a good point. But consider, how do I use "secure messaging" with my meatspace bank? Or with my wife, or my meatspace friends? Sure, I use HTTPS. But trying to get any of those to use truly secure channels would be pointless. And even worse, it would attract attention. For noise on secure channels, I torrent random stuff. That all goes through a VPN service. But among the torrent traffic, there are indirect VPN connections.

bostik 8y ago
Very good questions, and something I believe we as a society AND as a profession are only starting to realise. The truth is, people everywhere say they want security. But that's a white lie. What people really want is convenience. That is also the wedge we as a developer community can work with. I truly believe that if you can make the secure option also the more convenient option, you won't be able to keep people away.[ß] As far as usability goes, secure and/or hardened software is still atrocious. The point about meatspace bank is a really good one. Well, as it happens, WhatsApp based banking is a real thing. I found one startup doing that[0], but even before this I remember that somewhere (Philippines? Indonesia? Kenya?) WA was already used for bank customer support. Now, is that somehow more secure than a well done, well maintained, properly hardened banking app from a dedicated big player? Certainly not. But it's hell of a lot better than a MVP from a company that might be barely in their second year to a basic banking license. It has the benefit of adding useful business traffic to a reasonably secure transport. Obviously it still depends on a known-malicious third party for routing, but then again, for a truly secure communications system you have to assume that you're dealing with compromised and/or actively malicious infrastructure. Which makes it a very good first step. For any real progress, we will need at least another decade of research into usable, latency-sensitive, information-theoretically noisy communication systems. Secure and ~anonymous message routing is going to be a damn hard problem. (Without the latency part, and assuming very cheap bandwidth, something like a probabilistic K-anonymity based batched multicast might be a reasonable starting point.) Even then, the usability has to be baked in and considered from the start. > For noise on secure channels, I torrent random stuff. That all goes through a VPN service. Now that's a really nice countermeasure. Well done! ß: Global censorship and blanket bans with aggressive enforcement notwithstanding. 0: Company is apparently called "Absa".
- taejo 8y ago
  > 0: Company is apparently called "Absa". FYI, Absa is one of South Africa's largest banks, formed in 1991 by the merger of several large, long-established banks, and by now owns all of Barclays' African operations. It's not a startup.
  - bostik 8y ago
    /me recovers foot from mouth. Thank you, I stand corrected.
- mirimir 8y ago
  Maybe a bank could support something like Briar or Ricochet, with P2P between Tor .onion instances. With secure 2FA, using hardware tokens. I'd switch in a nanosecond. But they'd likely never satisfy KYC rules :( And I do see many banks starting to use WhatsApp. It'd be better if they (at least) used Signal, but it's a start.