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>You either have strong encryption that works in all scenarios, both good and ill, or you have weak encryption that protects nothing. There unfortunately is no

by slg 5y ago

>You either have strong encryption that works in all scenarios, both good and ill, or you have weak encryption that protects nothing. There unfortunately is no middle ground, and plenty of people and governments have tried. This is always stated as a universal truth of the technology, but this mostly seems like a people and organizational problem. We already have encryption algorithms that can encrypt content for decryption by multiple optional keys. Why couldn't we fragment and distribute one set of those keys among multiple legal entities? That would require coordination and agreement to decrypt anything. That wouldn't be a true backdoor anymore than the original key is a backdoor, it would simply be overhead on the existing encrypted content to allow it to be decrypted by multiple keys. >Also there aren’t “central encryption authorities” that all encryption passes through. Anyone can implement modern crypto wherever, so banning it makes no sense. It’s like trying to ban the concept of Pi. This is true, but defaults matter. If the US makes a law regarding encryption, Google, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook, etc are all going to follow it. You still might be able to roll your own encryption, but the people who do that will be a tiny share of overall communication. Laws like this aren't meant to completely stop something. Putting in financial regulations to crack down on money laundering doesn't stop money laundering. The goal is to make it more difficult and prevent the most egregious cases.

kortilla 5y ago
> Why couldn't we fragment and distribute one set of those keys among multiple legal entities? Because crypto is implemented in software and it’s trivial to remove the part that encrypts for the government’s key.
- slg 5y ago
  You completely ignored the last paragraph of my comment where I addressed this type of concern.
  - gjs278 5y ago
    stop posting. you’re wrong and your idea sucks. there’s nothing else to say.
  - kortilla 5y ago
    Because it’s detached from reality and shows a misunderstanding of how deeply embedded secure crypto is into everything. Nearly every X86 processor now supports AES intrinsics that are used in the building blocks of far beyond encrypting messages (e.g. golang’s hashing). Additionally, a from scratch implementation of AES in JavaScript or any other modern programming language is a junior level task. Unless you propose trying to ban every copy of the AES algorithm, it will be trivially implemented and passed around regardless of what FAANG does. Money laundering restrictions work because everything goes through a fairly centralized banking system. Crypto has no such equivalent.
    - slg 5y ago
      >Money laundering restrictions work because everything goes through a fairly centralized banking system. Crypto has no such equivalent. You are treating encryption as an independent end goal by itself when it is only a tool that is used during communication and storage. Communication and to a lesser extent storage are highly centralized. How much of the average person's encrypted communication occurs in a channel that is not touched by some US company?
avianlyric 5y ago
> Why couldn't we fragment and distribute one set of those keys among multiple legal entities? There would be thousands if not millions of legitimate decryptions every year. At each instance all of the fragments will need to be put together, creating an opportunity for the data to be exfiltrated. Additionally your making the assumption that legal agencies will be able to securely store these keys long term (I.e forever). Regardless of your view on the operational and security competency of these agencies, it’s extreme difficulty to keep cryptographic keys secure long term if you need to be able to access them on a regular basis. Even if you don’t think most criminal organisations will manage this, you can pretty much guarantee that large nation state actors like China and Russia will find a way to get hold of these keys. You then give your largest competitors the ability to seriously damage your economy or steal secrets by either using the keys themselves, or leaking them on the internet. Suddenly every single message sent by every citizen, politician, bank, weapons company etc becomes public for all to see. > This is true, but defaults matter. If the US makes a law regarding encryption, Google, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook, etc are all going to follow it. You still might be able to roll your own encryption You will 100% be able to roll your own, and trivially too. You’ll just need to go to GitHub and grab the source code, or pre-built binaries for a working crypto system, of which there are many. Banning the big companies from using crypto isn’t enough, you also need to ban anyone from talking about crypto as well. This is very different to money laundering rules. Realistically you can’t opt out of the modern financial system, regardless of what blockchain proponents say, so introducing rules to gatekeep money flows at system choke points makes sense. Also one ability to censor money at choke points doesn’t also create an opportunity for enemies to exploit those same choke points. The money laundering equivalent of crypto censorship would be like the US deciding that it was going to switch to Bitcoin so that all transactions are public and accessible to law enforcement. Then just kinda hoping that a country like China isn’t going to launch a 51% attack.
- slg 5y ago
  Your first three paragraphs are all focusing on structural flaws with my suggestion and not technical limitations of encryption itself. The debate has already moved from this is impossible to this is impractical. We can fix impractical. For example, we can design a way for content to be reencrypted with new keys if anything ever leaks. >You will 100% be able to roll your own, and trivially too. You’ll just need to go to GitHub and grab the source code... Github is owned by Microsoft. Microsoft won't let you host code that is designed specifically to break the law. That is the point. You would need to jump through a variety of hoops in order to avoid this. It wouldn't be impossible, but it won't be the default and most people won't go through the effort to do it.

by slg 5y ago

kortilla 5y ago

> Why couldn't we fragment and distribute one set of those keys among multiple legal entities? Because crypto is implemented in software and it’s trivial to remove the part that encrypts for the government’s key.

slg 5y ago
You completely ignored the last paragraph of my comment where I addressed this type of concern.
- gjs278 5y ago
  stop posting. you’re wrong and your idea sucks. there’s nothing else to say.
- kortilla 5y ago
  Because it’s detached from reality and shows a misunderstanding of how deeply embedded secure crypto is into everything. Nearly every X86 processor now supports AES intrinsics that are used in the building blocks of far beyond encrypting messages (e.g. golang’s hashing). Additionally, a from scratch implementation of AES in JavaScript or any other modern programming language is a junior level task. Unless you propose trying to ban every copy of the AES algorithm, it will be trivially implemented and passed around regardless of what FAANG does. Money laundering restrictions work because everything goes through a fairly centralized banking system. Crypto has no such equivalent.
  - slg 5y ago
    >Money laundering restrictions work because everything goes through a fairly centralized banking system. Crypto has no such equivalent. You are treating encryption as an independent end goal by itself when it is only a tool that is used during communication and storage. Communication and to a lesser extent storage are highly centralized. How much of the average person's encrypted communication occurs in a channel that is not touched by some US company?

avianlyric 5y ago

> Why couldn't we fragment and distribute one set of those keys among multiple legal entities? There would be thousands if not millions of legitimate decryptions every year. At each instance all of the fragments will need to be put together, creating an opportunity for the data to be exfiltrated. Additionally your making the assumption that legal agencies will be able to securely store these keys long term (I.e forever). Regardless of your view on the operational and security competency of these agencies, it’s extreme difficulty to keep cryptographic keys secure long term if you need to be able to access them on a regular basis. Even if you don’t think most criminal organisations will manage this, you can pretty much guarantee that large nation state actors like China and Russia will find a way to get hold of these keys. You then give your largest competitors the ability to seriously damage your economy or steal secrets by either using the keys themselves, or leaking them on the internet. Suddenly every single message sent by every citizen, politician, bank, weapons company etc becomes public for all to see. > This is true, but defaults matter. If the US makes a law regarding encryption, Google, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook, etc are all going to follow it. You still might be able to roll your own encryption You will 100% be able to roll your own, and trivially too. You’ll just need to go to GitHub and grab the source code, or pre-built binaries for a working crypto system, of which there are many. Banning the big companies from using crypto isn’t enough, you also need to ban anyone from talking about crypto as well. This is very different to money laundering rules. Realistically you can’t opt out of the modern financial system, regardless of what blockchain proponents say, so introducing rules to gatekeep money flows at system choke points makes sense. Also one ability to censor money at choke points doesn’t also create an opportunity for enemies to exploit those same choke points. The money laundering equivalent of crypto censorship would be like the US deciding that it was going to switch to Bitcoin so that all transactions are public and accessible to law enforcement. Then just kinda hoping that a country like China isn’t going to launch a 51% attack.

slg 5y ago
Your first three paragraphs are all focusing on structural flaws with my suggestion and not technical limitations of encryption itself. The debate has already moved from this is impossible to this is impractical. We can fix impractical. For example, we can design a way for content to be reencrypted with new keys if anything ever leaks. >You will 100% be able to roll your own, and trivially too. You’ll just need to go to GitHub and grab the source code... Github is owned by Microsoft. Microsoft won't let you host code that is designed specifically to break the law. That is the point. You would need to jump through a variety of hoops in order to avoid this. It wouldn't be impossible, but it won't be the default and most people won't go through the effort to do it.