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>> if you don't trust your own goverment then why would they trust you. In the context of intercepting and storing your messages, trusting "your own government

>> if you don't trust your own goverment then why would they trust you. In the context of intercepting and storing your messages, trusting "your own government" means thousands of strangers, government employees and contractors alike, in this and future administrations, both now and as long as the data is stored (likely beyond your lifetime). It means trusting that they won't leak that data intentionally, for political or personal gain, or by incompetence, under attack by hackers all over the world. (And let's face it, almost no one is competent when it comes to that level of attacks.) If you send any information at all, business or personal, that you wouldn't want to be used against you, you can either trust all of these people, or you can use strong encryption and never worry about it again.

EthanHeilman 14y ago
>It means trusting that they won't leak that data intentionally, for political or personal gain, or by incompetence, under attack by hackers all over the world. This! No communication is as secure as it could be if gives access to someone that is not an intended recipient. It's not a matter of trust, it is a matter of design and common sense. I trust plenty of people, but I don't email them the passwords to all my accounts. Doing so would be an unnecessary risk with zero benefit even if they are 100% trustworthy (possible) and even if they are never compromised (extremely unlikely) because other people's systems are beyond my knowledge and my control. How can someone analyze risk under such circumstances? * Do you think a secretive intelligence agency is going to announce that they were compromised? * Even if they do, how much data are they going to provide on what exactly was stolen?