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>If anything, this is a really good thing, as the utility of publicly available comms are embraced by government entities, it should somewhat guarantee that us
by EthanHeilman 7y ago
>If anything, this is a really good thing, as the utility of publicly available comms are embraced by government entities, it should somewhat guarantee that us consumers will also have access to this.
I largely agree with you but a more cynical take would be that it allows the following argument to be advanced:
"If the 82nd Airborne uses it, then it is a weapon of war. Why should civilians have access to the same communication equipment as a soldier needs in a time of war."
That is, they associate the technology with combat and the military. Then, they use that association as a way to argue the technology is only inherently useful for those planning to engage in combat.
It also allows governments to advance the argument that if it useful for our soldiers then it should be denied to enemy soldiers and thus it should be tightly controlled (see night vision googles[0] or cryptography as a weapon[1]).
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night-vision_device#Legality https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night-vision_device#Legality
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_from_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_from_th...
- nitemice 7y agoIf they make that argument, it shouldn't be much of a stretch to say that the 2nd amendment should apply to this technology then.
- EthanHeilman 7y agoWell they made that argument about cryptography being a munition and I don't see anyone advancing a 2nd Amendment challenge against those laws.
- big_chungus 7y agoThere's certainly a case here. If Barr goes forward with his nutty anti-encryption push, I hope the opposition uses this argument. Google lists definition #1 for "arms" as "weapons", and definition #2 of "weapons" as "a means of gaining an advantage or defending oneself in a conflict or contest." I doubt any would argue that un-breakable (at least, theoretically) comms would provide no tactical advantage. If anyone would, I'd refer him to the second world war as a prominent example. This argument could help built a bi-partisan pro-cryptography group by pulling in support from the 2A crowd. I support cryptography remaining fully legal (even if classified as a munition or armament) for the same reason I support the 2A, practical security considerations aside.
- JackRabbitSlim 7y agoYou would think that the constitution would have included a passage about peoples right to keep and bare armaments being necessary to ensure the country stayed free... Nah. Lets redefine "arms" to mean "guns", assume for some reason the constitution needed to give the government freedom from itself, and ignore the whole thing as archaic and outdated.
- godelski 7y agoBecause they'll also want to encrypt soldiers communications back home, not just between each other. When the soldiers are talking to their friends and family. It isn't E2E if friends and family aren't using the same software. It's the whole idea behind Tor. Interests sometimes align.
- EthanHeilman 7y agoI'm not accusing them of advancing a consistent or defendable position, just that there is always a danger in the military adopting a technology. To add another example, what if signal has a flaw which allows a foreign adversary to read all signal messages and that this ends up harming US natural security. The government now has an incentive to regulate signal as "critical telecommunication infrastructure" necessary for the security of the US.
- godelski 7y agoYou could read this another way too. Now the government has an incentive to contribute to the open source project to ensure that its communications are secure. You're right that it could "weaken" signal because more people are trying to attack it which means a flaw is more likely to be found. But it can also strengthen Signal because the need for it to be strong and improve faster is higher. More people looking at it (especially with a government interest) means there are more trying to patch those flaws as well. Additionally, it can add to the popularity of Signal. Which again adds to both edges laid out above. Honestly I can't see this as anything but good. It is __GOOD__ when the government's interests align with that of the public.
- EthanHeilman 7y agoI explained myself poorly. My argument was that: 1. IF the government comes to rely heavily on the security of signal, THEN the government will want to make signal as secure as possible. 2. The approach the government may take to make signal stronger could be to regulate signal. For instance the government might require background checks on everyone authorized to push out signal updates. 3. Such regulation is likely to have the unintended effect of making signal less secure by causing the designers of signal to abandon the project. Now this is a pessimistic take. An optimistic take could be that the tool the US government uses to strengthen signal is to fund developers and give out grants for security research on signal. As another poster pointed out the US government funds TOR.
- atoav 7y agoThe army also uses toilets. Why is it then that nobody argues toilets are weapons of war? Because nobody achieves power by controlling the existence of toilets? There are people who will argue the sky is green if it fits their narrative — bending reality is what they will do, if we let them.
- microcolonel 7y agoThe funny thing is, the basis for upholding the National Firearms Act restrictions on short barreled shotguns and rifles (challenged in the '30s) was that they weren't weapons of war.
- DennisP 7y agoCryptography has always been used by militaries, and was legally considered a munition back in the 1990s. Since then, two courts have ruled that cryptographic source code is protected by the First Amendment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pretty_Good_Privacy#Criminal_investigation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pretty_Good_Privacy#Criminal_i...