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... for now. I am very pleased to see that the _current_ administration came to their senses and listened to reason. However, this is a fight i am afraid we wi

... for now. I am very pleased to see that the _current_ administration came to their senses and listened to reason. However, this is a fight i am afraid we will always have to fight over and over again unless right to encryption is codified in EU constitution or a similar document.

trompetenaccoun 5y ago
Even constitutions only offer very limited protection. There was a recent case in Germany where the government simply ignored the ruling of the supreme court (Federal Constitutional Court). And keep in mind that this is the government with leading influence on the EU. I don't know about everywhere else but at least in Europe rule of law isn't as strong as people assume.
- throw10920 5y ago
  The US constitution also offers limited protection - it's subject to interpretation by judges, and re-interpretation by a growing body of people who think that it "needs to be updated" and "is a living document" and "is not absolute". Your fight for your rights will never end, as evil people will always be elected to office. Just because your officials are not literally Hitler doesn't mean that they won't be trying to infringe upon your rights.
  - wbsss4412 5y ago
    It’s normal for interpretation to change over time as the society within which we live changes. You’d likely be disappointed by the 18th century interpretation of the first amendment, for example.
  - wbsss4412 5y ago
    Since you (or realistically anyone) downvoted me rather than engaging, i feel like I should elaborate. Our modern understanding of rights is not wholesale received from the time that the constitution was written. The concept itself has evolved over time into what you cherish now. 200 years ago, the constitutional protections one received were far more limited than they are now.
prof-dr-ir 5y ago
Article 7 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, which was adopted with the Lisbon treaty, reads (in its entirety): "Everyone has the right to respect for his or her private and family life, home and communications." On the short term a change to the treaties of the Union is not realistic, in my opinion. So I am afraid we might be stuck with having "to fight over and over again", using the above as a foundation. I guess I think of it as educating the politicians. Fortunately the pro-privacy voices in the EU seem loud enough. For example, in this case the Belgian national privacy authority had already complained about the proposed law. And Germany seems to have adopted the right to encryption in its latest coalition agreement.
- 1337shadow 5y ago
  > I guess I think of it as educating the politicians. What about the other way around? What makes you think it's not police hackers who value privacy just like us, and who strive to protect us, who requested this to politicians? That seems more likely.
- mytailorisrich 5y ago
  Yes, but this article of the Charter (and other laws) does not prevent lawful interception. This is the crux of the issue: the so-called "pro-privacy" camp wants absolute privacy of communications. Law enforcement and intelligence services are not against privacy, they are against systems that provide absolute privacy because these systems prevent even lawful interception. Voice calls on your smartphone are private but may be lawfully intercepted. This is so because mobile networks are in the hands a few licensed and heavily policed operators. On the other hands, we've reached a point where it is simple to develop and publish software apps that allow anyone to communicate in a way that is impossible to intercept as far as we know. This is not a simple issue. There is a valid concern but at the same time the potential ways to address it (e.g. backdoors, etc) are not very satisfactory.
  - vasco 5y ago
    There's no such thing as kind of private. Either you cannot decrypt private citizen communications or you can. And if you can for any reason you also can for no reason at all.
netcan 5y ago
If it's a "fight over and over" situation, the ratcheting dynamics are important. IE, "we" need to walk away from a win with something more than "status quo defended." Otherwise, the situation is "hold ground until we fail."
hellojesus 5y ago
I don't think encryption backdoors will ever be enforceable, even if it becomes a legal requirement. What's to stop someone from just doing it anyway if we use protocols that allow for plausible deniability?
bitcharmer 5y ago
Came to say this. It's only temporary victory, sadly. The efforts to ban encryption won't stop here.
- randomNumber7 5y ago
  > The efforts to ban encryption won't stop here. How is this supposed to work? Can't the bad guys just send each other encryped emails anyway? Or hack together some peer-to-peer messenger?
- jhgb 5y ago
  Time for all companies to stop providing online services in Belgium, then.
  - ben_w 5y ago
    Right after winning a battle is the worst possible time to give up.
  - scrollaway 5y ago
    The above applies to every single country in the planet. Time for all companies to stop providing online services anywhere period? We need actual workable ideas, not empty statements. It is frustrating that this fight doesn't end. If you have real suggestions, I'd like to hear them.
    - jhgb 5y ago
      Well I'm not aware of any such efforts in my country. I thought the comment above about "the current administration" was about Belgium.
      - scrollaway 5y ago
        Which country is that? You probably haven't dug deep. If you live anywhere in north america, the EEA, china, russia, india or australia, then I'm aware of such efforts and I don't exactly follow this closely. I just live in Belgium...
ben_w 5y ago
Encryption is necessary for the entire modern economy, but also worthless when keystrokes can be remote-sensed, faces and other biometrics generated by the same AI that scan for them, and displays can be Van Eck phreaked. Our near-term future has both unbreakable encryption and omniscient surveillance in the hands of low-budget and non-technical people, and in a fight between the two, surveillance wins. I don’t know where the world goes from here, but I’m confident the status quo won’t be for much longer.
- eitland 5y ago
  Everytime something good happens someone have to come up with something to make our efforts seem hopeless. I'll say our efforts are not without hope for now.
- jack_pp 5y ago
  Except remote sensing keystrokes isn't as scalable as mass intercepting unencrypted network traffic
  - 1337shadow 5y ago
    But you don't need that, you'd only get too much information you don't need. You need to intercept suspect network traffic only, otherwise you're most likely to fail to find anything useful at all.
  - danuker 5y ago
    Indeed, you would need a rootkit in each target, logging and transmitting the keys. Something like a proprietary instant messaging client or keyboard application.
    - 19870213 5y ago
      Remote sensing in this case is listening to the individual sound a key makes when pressed by the victim, and wear on the keys means that frequently used keys (such as 'e' or the space bar) would make a slightly different sound than the other keys, as does the hand/finger position used to press a key.
snarf21 5y ago
Agreed, I think we need to change the narrative to get the politicians to "get it". Instead of all the talk about protecting us from __________ (random evil), we need to highlight the consequence of these plans. We need journalists to ask politicians to hand over their unlocked phones with the "promise" that they won't share anything they learn. That is what these backdoors would enable. We need to make them understand the downside because all "save the kids" will always have public support.

trompetenaccoun 5y ago

Even constitutions only offer very limited protection. There was a recent case in Germany where the government simply ignored the ruling of the supreme court (Federal Constitutional Court). And keep in mind that this is the government with leading influence on the EU. I don't know about everywhere else but at least in Europe rule of law isn't as strong as people assume.

throw10920 5y ago
The US constitution also offers limited protection - it's subject to interpretation by judges, and re-interpretation by a growing body of people who think that it "needs to be updated" and "is a living document" and "is not absolute". Your fight for your rights will never end, as evil people will always be elected to office. Just because your officials are not literally Hitler doesn't mean that they won't be trying to infringe upon your rights.
- wbsss4412 5y ago
  It’s normal for interpretation to change over time as the society within which we live changes. You’d likely be disappointed by the 18th century interpretation of the first amendment, for example.
- wbsss4412 5y ago
  Since you (or realistically anyone) downvoted me rather than engaging, i feel like I should elaborate. Our modern understanding of rights is not wholesale received from the time that the constitution was written. The concept itself has evolved over time into what you cherish now. 200 years ago, the constitutional protections one received were far more limited than they are now.

prof-dr-ir 5y ago

Article 7 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, which was adopted with the Lisbon treaty, reads (in its entirety): "Everyone has the right to respect for his or her private and family life, home and communications." On the short term a change to the treaties of the Union is not realistic, in my opinion. So I am afraid we might be stuck with having "to fight over and over again", using the above as a foundation. I guess I think of it as educating the politicians. Fortunately the pro-privacy voices in the EU seem loud enough. For example, in this case the Belgian national privacy authority had already complained about the proposed law. And Germany seems to have adopted the right to encryption in its latest coalition agreement.

1337shadow 5y ago
> I guess I think of it as educating the politicians. What about the other way around? What makes you think it's not police hackers who value privacy just like us, and who strive to protect us, who requested this to politicians? That seems more likely.
mytailorisrich 5y ago
Yes, but this article of the Charter (and other laws) does not prevent lawful interception. This is the crux of the issue: the so-called "pro-privacy" camp wants absolute privacy of communications. Law enforcement and intelligence services are not against privacy, they are against systems that provide absolute privacy because these systems prevent even lawful interception. Voice calls on your smartphone are private but may be lawfully intercepted. This is so because mobile networks are in the hands a few licensed and heavily policed operators. On the other hands, we've reached a point where it is simple to develop and publish software apps that allow anyone to communicate in a way that is impossible to intercept as far as we know. This is not a simple issue. There is a valid concern but at the same time the potential ways to address it (e.g. backdoors, etc) are not very satisfactory.
- vasco 5y ago
  There's no such thing as kind of private. Either you cannot decrypt private citizen communications or you can. And if you can for any reason you also can for no reason at all.

netcan 5y ago

If it's a "fight over and over" situation, the ratcheting dynamics are important. IE, "we" need to walk away from a win with something more than "status quo defended." Otherwise, the situation is "hold ground until we fail."

hellojesus 5y ago

I don't think encryption backdoors will ever be enforceable, even if it becomes a legal requirement. What's to stop someone from just doing it anyway if we use protocols that allow for plausible deniability?

bitcharmer 5y ago

Came to say this. It's only temporary victory, sadly. The efforts to ban encryption won't stop here.

randomNumber7 5y ago
> The efforts to ban encryption won't stop here. How is this supposed to work? Can't the bad guys just send each other encryped emails anyway? Or hack together some peer-to-peer messenger?
jhgb 5y ago
Time for all companies to stop providing online services in Belgium, then.
- ben_w 5y ago
  Right after winning a battle is the worst possible time to give up.
- scrollaway 5y ago
  The above applies to every single country in the planet. Time for all companies to stop providing online services anywhere period? We need actual workable ideas, not empty statements. It is frustrating that this fight doesn't end. If you have real suggestions, I'd like to hear them.
  - jhgb 5y ago
    Well I'm not aware of any such efforts in my country. I thought the comment above about "the current administration" was about Belgium.
    - scrollaway 5y ago
      Which country is that? You probably haven't dug deep. If you live anywhere in north america, the EEA, china, russia, india or australia, then I'm aware of such efforts and I don't exactly follow this closely. I just live in Belgium...

ben_w 5y ago

Encryption is necessary for the entire modern economy, but also worthless when keystrokes can be remote-sensed, faces and other biometrics generated by the same AI that scan for them, and displays can be Van Eck phreaked. Our near-term future has both unbreakable encryption and omniscient surveillance in the hands of low-budget and non-technical people, and in a fight between the two, surveillance wins. I don’t know where the world goes from here, but I’m confident the status quo won’t be for much longer.

eitland 5y ago
Everytime something good happens someone have to come up with something to make our efforts seem hopeless. I'll say our efforts are not without hope for now.
jack_pp 5y ago
Except remote sensing keystrokes isn't as scalable as mass intercepting unencrypted network traffic
- 1337shadow 5y ago
  But you don't need that, you'd only get too much information you don't need. You need to intercept suspect network traffic only, otherwise you're most likely to fail to find anything useful at all.
- danuker 5y ago
  Indeed, you would need a rootkit in each target, logging and transmitting the keys. Something like a proprietary instant messaging client or keyboard application.
  - 19870213 5y ago
    Remote sensing in this case is listening to the individual sound a key makes when pressed by the victim, and wear on the keys means that frequently used keys (such as 'e' or the space bar) would make a slightly different sound than the other keys, as does the hand/finger position used to press a key.

snarf21 5y ago

Agreed, I think we need to change the narrative to get the politicians to "get it". Instead of all the talk about protecting us from __________ (random evil), we need to highlight the consequence of these plans. We need journalists to ask politicians to hand over their unlocked phones with the "promise" that they won't share anything they learn. That is what these backdoors would enable. We need to make them understand the downside because all "save the kids" will always have public support.