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It's easy to see why there are divided opinions on this. When someone sends an email, the recipient often wants to be able to prove that they did so. We think o
by syrrim 6y ago
It's easy to see why there are divided opinions on this. When someone sends an email, the recipient often wants to be able to prove that they did so. We think of email as something capable of leaving a paper trail, proof that certain people sent certain emails. It's reasonable for secure messaging to want to fill a different niche, more like private conversation. I've seen messaging apps advertised on the basis that they will delete all messages after a certain time, making them basically equivalent to talking to someone, in terms of non-repudiation and being ephemeral by default. But people frequently want email to be more like letter writing than private conversation. The tradition with letters was to sign your letters to prove that you sent them. People talk about having a certain thing "in writing", so that they can use it in litigation. Insofar as email is supposed to fill that niche, its reasonable to expect it to provide repudiable messaging.
- tptacek 6y agoMy problem isn't that people have divided opinions on this. My problem is that people who oppose it write as if they're just now discovering that the opposite opinion exists --- in one case on this thread, someone suggested that the only reason Matthew Green held this opinion at all was political. A serious argument against deniable messaging would start by acknowledging deniability as one of the shibboleths of the field of messaging cryptography, and then tackle the idea. Nobody on this thread has done that, and I think the reason why is that they're simply not aware that there is such a field.
- tigger0jk 6y agoI appreciate the re-framing of this comment and its parent. Personally I found the original article's argument to feel more like "people shouldn't be accountable for their correspondence" than "the default mode of email should be more of private secure messaging". Both are advocating for the same changes but only one seems reasonable to me. That may just be my flawed reading of the blog post, but regardless, I can better understand the positions now.
- tptacek 6y agoPeople shouldn't be accountable for their correspondence! That's the whole point of secure messaging!
- yew 6y agoSpeech has consequences. Given the good done in holding rogue "politicians" accountable, not seeing that as axiomatically desirable is at least a little bit suspicious...
- tptacek 6y agoLet's see your mail spool. After all, how else can we know you're not having illicit conversations with politicians that we all deserve to know about?
- yew 6y agoNow you're just spouting non sequiturs. Publication and retention are two separate questions. And not being a politician, and certainly not the one currently trying to hold the White House hostage, I don't see the public interest anyway.
- cortesoft 6y agoI am not following... we are talking about gmail and email in general, not specifically the White House. If you think White House emails should be signed and archived indefinitely, that is one thing. That is not what we are talking about.