4 ms·

To attempt another perspective on this... These days we have organized crime, drug cartels, human trafficking, government corruption, terrorist activities but

To attempt another perspective on this... These days we have organized crime, drug cartels, human trafficking, government corruption, terrorist activities but from that all the way to simple crime as three dudes sharing pictures of a girl they gangraped while she was unconscious.. All this, happening on encrypted platforms. Mass surveillance is probably not the silver bullet to deal with it. And yes, most hardened criminals will certainly find a way around.. But, then what are effective measures, in terms of time and cost?

hiatus 2y ago
> Mass surveillance is probably not the silver bullet to deal with it. And yes, most hardened criminals will certainly find a way around.. So should the government be reading every piece of mail too? And record your private conversations? Why not put a microphone and camera in your home to ensure you are not gangraping anyone? > But, then what are effective measures, in terms of time and cost? Effective measures need not be time or cost efficient. Maintaining a free society is expensive.
- throw46365 2y ago
  > So should the government be reading every piece of mail too? Essentially all governments have some mechanism to make it legal and possible for them to read any post in transit. US postal inspectors need a warrant, which they can easily get. In the UK, once you post something in a post box, it becomes the temporary property of the crown (the state) until it is delivered, so they can read it when they want. They have to open it, of course, so you would know it happened. The simple problem with encryption is that it replaces communications that are exposed to this authority with communications that can evade it. Whether you are happy with it or not, it's absolutely true that inspecting post has thwarted serious crimes, so it's not surprising to see governments seeking to have the same powers. The fact that it's impossible to do safely doesn't necessarily make it an idiotic request. And the instantaneous nature of these communications means retention for some period of time is the only way inspection is even possible. I am not sure we should blame governments for wanting to retain powers in a social contract we've been broadly happy for them to have for 150 years. It's technologists' jobs to explain why easily-broken encryption is a bad idea. In the UK that's really easy. You just say "imagine if the Prime Minister could read their own party's whatsapp group whenever they liked". And then they get it.
  - Hizonner 2y ago
    > I am not sure we should blame governments for wanting to retain powers in a social contract we've been broadly happy for them to have for 150 years. The breadth and depth of surveillance that you can do on the average modern person with electronic monitoring is unprecedented in all human history. Reading somebody's letters does not begin to compare. There is not an "established social contract". They got a massive spying windfall, beginning with wiretapping, and then exploding when practically everything anybody did was recorded in a machine somewhere. The changes in the last 20 or 30 years have been overwhelming. There's no "150-year social contract" on their side, but there are several hundred thousand years of established balance of power on our side. The powers these people want to "retain" are things they didn't have for long enough that it could be intertwined with the biological evolution of the species.
  - hiatus 2y ago
    > The simple problem with encryption is that it replaces communications that are exposed to this authority with communications that can evade it. > I am not sure we should blame governments for wanting to retain powers in a social contract we've been broadly happy for them to have for 150 years. Encryption is math. I can encrypt messages and send them by post, and law enforcement would be equally powerless to read them. Ciphers are not a new invention. The social contract you are speaking of never existed. > It's technologists' jobs to explain why easily-broken encryption is a bad idea. No, it is on the people who want new powers to justify them.
    - throw46365 2y ago
      Yes I don't need explaining that encryption is maths and letters can be encrypted. That is pretty obvious. (Postal inspectors the world over would assume evidence of a crime.) > No, it is on the people who want new powers to justify them. The exact point I am getting at is that the governments who want these things are seeking to protect the power they have, not expand it. Encrypted communications are eating away at the power to inspect communications they already have, that we have been happy to grant them (that is the social contract I am talking about; it has existed for as long as postal services have). It's a very American thing to assume that government in general is always acting in bad faith, I guess.
ale42 2y ago
> But, then what are effective measures, in terms of time and cost? The first question I would ask is rather: is what they propose effective? Probably not. Real criminals (those you mention) wont have any problem breaking the law a bit more than what they already do and use non-backdoored encryption. Therefore, is such proposed mass surveillance and backdooring going to do anything against big crime? Probably not.

hiatus 2y ago

> Mass surveillance is probably not the silver bullet to deal with it. And yes, most hardened criminals will certainly find a way around.. So should the government be reading every piece of mail too? And record your private conversations? Why not put a microphone and camera in your home to ensure you are not gangraping anyone? > But, then what are effective measures, in terms of time and cost? Effective measures need not be time or cost efficient. Maintaining a free society is expensive.

throw46365 2y ago
> So should the government be reading every piece of mail too? Essentially all governments have some mechanism to make it legal and possible for them to read any post in transit. US postal inspectors need a warrant, which they can easily get. In the UK, once you post something in a post box, it becomes the temporary property of the crown (the state) until it is delivered, so they can read it when they want. They have to open it, of course, so you would know it happened. The simple problem with encryption is that it replaces communications that are exposed to this authority with communications that can evade it. Whether you are happy with it or not, it's absolutely true that inspecting post has thwarted serious crimes, so it's not surprising to see governments seeking to have the same powers. The fact that it's impossible to do safely doesn't necessarily make it an idiotic request. And the instantaneous nature of these communications means retention for some period of time is the only way inspection is even possible. I am not sure we should blame governments for wanting to retain powers in a social contract we've been broadly happy for them to have for 150 years. It's technologists' jobs to explain why easily-broken encryption is a bad idea. In the UK that's really easy. You just say "imagine if the Prime Minister could read their own party's whatsapp group whenever they liked". And then they get it.
- Hizonner 2y ago
  > I am not sure we should blame governments for wanting to retain powers in a social contract we've been broadly happy for them to have for 150 years. The breadth and depth of surveillance that you can do on the average modern person with electronic monitoring is unprecedented in all human history. Reading somebody's letters does not begin to compare. There is not an "established social contract". They got a massive spying windfall, beginning with wiretapping, and then exploding when practically everything anybody did was recorded in a machine somewhere. The changes in the last 20 or 30 years have been overwhelming. There's no "150-year social contract" on their side, but there are several hundred thousand years of established balance of power on our side. The powers these people want to "retain" are things they didn't have for long enough that it could be intertwined with the biological evolution of the species.
- hiatus 2y ago
  > The simple problem with encryption is that it replaces communications that are exposed to this authority with communications that can evade it. > I am not sure we should blame governments for wanting to retain powers in a social contract we've been broadly happy for them to have for 150 years. Encryption is math. I can encrypt messages and send them by post, and law enforcement would be equally powerless to read them. Ciphers are not a new invention. The social contract you are speaking of never existed. > It's technologists' jobs to explain why easily-broken encryption is a bad idea. No, it is on the people who want new powers to justify them.
  - throw46365 2y ago
    Yes I don't need explaining that encryption is maths and letters can be encrypted. That is pretty obvious. (Postal inspectors the world over would assume evidence of a crime.) > No, it is on the people who want new powers to justify them. The exact point I am getting at is that the governments who want these things are seeking to protect the power they have, not expand it. Encrypted communications are eating away at the power to inspect communications they already have, that we have been happy to grant them (that is the social contract I am talking about; it has existed for as long as postal services have). It's a very American thing to assume that government in general is always acting in bad faith, I guess.

ale42 2y ago

> But, then what are effective measures, in terms of time and cost? The first question I would ask is rather: is what they propose effective? Probably not. Real criminals (those you mention) wont have any problem breaking the law a bit more than what they already do and use non-backdoored encryption. Therefore, is such proposed mass surveillance and backdooring going to do anything against big crime? Probably not.