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>Yet the European Commission still appears to believe there's a way to have bypassable strong end-to-end encryption while respecting privacy rights and maintain
by tjpnz 3y ago
>Yet the European Commission still appears to believe there's a way to have bypassable strong end-to-end encryption while respecting privacy rights and maintaining operational security, flying in the face of mathematics.
There ought to be a requirement that lawmakers be able to demonstrate skills in precalculus. You could probably explain most of it to a smart ten year old and have them see the problem.
- mantas 3y agoI bet they know the problem. But they don’t want to see it.
- usrnm 3y agoDismissing politicians as stupid is a simple way to feel good about yourself, but does nothing to solve the actual problems. Politicians are just as human as everybody else, and they love money and power more than they love some abstract "greater good". They understand the problem just fine, it's not a very complicated problem. We need a better system, not smarter politicians
- RenThraysk 3y agoThat is precisely the problem. The average human is ignorant of almost everything. So why then do we select a tiny number of people to make laws concerning everything?
- yladiz 3y agoIs there an alternative?
- RenThraysk 3y agoThe court system with a jury. A set of people are presented with evidence and become knowledgeable of the matter in hand.
- sofixa 3y agoThat doesn't make them smarter or more knowledgable outside of a very narrow scope, where they knowledge is entirely dependent on what biased experts called by either side tell them.
- RenThraysk 3y agoYes. But it distributes the work load across larger number of people, so they have time to learn. The current system has politicans not even reading the bills they are voting on, let alone any attempt to understand them.
- ben_w 3y agoI’ve tried reading a few Bills and Acts. They’re more legible than patents, but harder than code in a programming language I’ve not learned. I’d like legislation by sortition, but only if the laws can actually be made simple enough for normal people to follow them. If that can’t be done, it’s very easy to pull wool over people’s eyes in either direction, getting them to pass bad laws they don’t understand and to refuse to pass good laws they don’t understand.
- CamperBob2 3y agoMaybe don't allow central governments to accumulate so much power.
- 3y ago
- sgjohnson 3y ago> Dismissing politicians as stupid is a simple way to feel good about yourself, but does nothing to solve the actual problems. There is no actual problem. Politicians see problems where they don’t exist.
- dimask 3y agoI think the comment meant that the problem is the political system, not the politicians' personalities, or education, or ignorance per se. Imo, when you build a system that is more prone to pressure and influence by lobbying corporations than from the majority of people, or by those who have expertise and the best societal interests in mind, this is where you get.
- ajsnigrutin 3y agoMost of the major problems would be solved by taking their security and drivers away and make them park a few blocks away from the government buildings. If you did nothing wrong to "the people", you have nothing to fear. The problem is, that when talking about advance technology plus appealing to emotions ("think of the children!"), average joe is pretty stupid too, and half of population is even stupider than that.
- s_dev 3y agoWouldn't the 'better system' produce smarter politicians? Are you not just arguing the semantics between the ends and the means to get there.
- josefx 3y agoI think the point the comment is trying to make is that these politicians are not stupid, they are corrupt. They are not doing it because there is a problem to be solved, they are doing it because there are bags of money to be had. A smarter politician in this context would just mean a smarter burglar.
- jacksnipe 3y agoI really don’t think this is true. A significant number of non-engineers I talk to about encryption genuinely think it’s some sort of scam.
- scrps 3y agoAre they conflating encryption with cryptocurrency? I've forced myself to stop saying crypto and started to use encryption or cryptography with most people for that reason.
- jacksnipe 3y agoThe most interesting one I ran into is a doctor I had, who thought “WhatsApp isn’t really encrypted, right?”
- scrps 3y agoI'll say this; at least your doctor is asking if something is encrypted, it's a small win but it is a win. Also just tell your doctor not to worry it is protected by NFTs. /s
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- scrps 3y agoI don't believe it is stupidity at all, they are corrupt full-stop Even if a politician isn't knowledgable they have staff (look up the staff sizes of some powerful US senators) who can get experts on the phone. The problem is that what the populace wants is not a parallel incentive with what the politicians and their paymasters want. Banning e2ee, the disneyfication of the internet, it's all old power games with a digital twist, can't let ordinary people have force amplifiers like technology because they might actually carve some power away from them.
- systemvoltage 3y agoI agree but the irony is strong here. Criticize dismissal of politicians and then proceed to do exactly just that.
- gustavus 3y agoIf you want to understand how the EU works, like really understand how it works, my best advice is to binge watch 2 or 3 season of Yes Minister or Yes Prime Minister. You'll realize most of it isn't stupidity, it's intentional.
- mantas 3y agoJuncker interviews are better IMO.
- davidwritesbugs 3y agoI spoke once to a cabinet minister from the Thatcher era, he said "you think Yes Minister is a comedy, we know it is a documentary."
- ben_w 3y agoIt’s no a question of such mathematics, although I would call for this as a prerequisite for other reasons. If any state requires encryption is only done in a way that allows the state to pierce encryption, that means there is a state that can pierce the encryption. If your agencies can pierce it, agencies of other governments can do it to you, personally, Mr. President. They can find your successor’s skeletons in the closet, Mrs. Prime Minister, and blackmail him or her. And state intelligence appears to have already been used for enrichment of private corporation: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON#Concerns https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON#Concerns Leading to a recommendation that all residents of EU member states use encryption for all communications: https://web.archive.org/web/20131226152235if_/http://www.europarl.europa.eu:80/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+REPORT+A5-2001-0264+0+DOC+PDF+V0//EN&language=EN https://web.archive.org/web/20131226152235if_/http://www.eur...
- ShrigmaMale 3y agothis wouldn't actually fix anything because that's not how politics works. politicians set constraints that maximize their PR points then the job of everyone with a brain is left to scramble for a solution. they also don't actually care about preserving encryption and they generally don't care about collateral damage unless said damage has enough clout to make trouble.
- mistrial9 3y agomost politicians at the higher levels are lawyers; they are responding to power and hierarchy, enforcement and cash flows.. and importantly, each other. Most of those things do not involve you, the reader, as decision maker. They don't ask, they respond .. and there are stronger signals than yours. That's why it feels infuriating or hopeless to a single reader.
- willtemperley 3y agoEx EC employee here. Once you're an official, which really only requires patience with terrible web interfaces and fluency in two of French, German and English, it's almost impossible to get fired. It's also possible to take twelve years of unpaid leave and return to the same job!