7 ms·

Good news for UK people. I am all for laws designed to protect children, and stop terrorism. But these 'back door' laws are nearly always very poorly thought o

Good news for UK people. I am all for laws designed to protect children, and stop terrorism. But these 'back door' laws are nearly always very poorly thought out and offers new avenues for 'normal' people to come to harm.

amelius 1y ago
Meanwhile, who believes that the US has no backdoors in these devices?
- johnisgood 1y ago
  Hopefully no one, in services available globally (i.e. not US-specific), just to be sure.
- sedivy94 1y ago
  Why litigate it when you can buy it from the NSO / IDF?
- philistine 1y ago
  Cold logic dictates otherwise. The UK is part of Five Eyes: total data sharing between intelligence agencies. If that were the case, why would the UK need a law to get data it already has?
  - kneegerm 1y ago
    San Bernardino shootings smartypants
  - Someone 1y ago
    It wouldn’t need the law, but putting the proposal up and then, after the predictable backlash, retract it could be a ploy to make the criminals/us think they don’t have access to the data now.
    - 0cf8612b2e1e 1y ago
      WW2, the Allies used all sorts of fake outs to lead the Germans to believe that the Enigma machine remained secure. Many people died for the sake of the secret. Given the lengths the government has gone to monitor its citizens, I could believe the technology stack has already been compromised.
    - southernplaces7 1y ago
      Upvote from me. Your point is completely valid and simply stated, and yes, I agree that they very possibly could do exactly this sort of thing for the sake of play-acting a government blindness that doesn't really exist as such. Truly this site is crawling with anal-retentive man-children who downvote over any silly self indulgent bullshit they can think of.
  - fsflover 1y ago
    https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2024/10/4.html https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2024/10/4.html https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveillance/ https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveil...
- sneak 1y ago
  It’s not really a secret; it’s by design and it’s public. iCloud is not end to end encrypted by default. Apple and the state can read the on-by-default iCloud Backup which contains your iMessage sync keys and all your historical iMessages and attachments. iCloud Photos, Contacts, and Mail are all similarly not e2ee and trivially readable by Apple, DHS/FBI, and anyone else under FAA702 (aka PRISM, aka the #1 most used US intel source) without a warrant. https://www.reuters.com/article/world/exclusive-apple-dropped-plan-for-encrypting-backups-after-fbi-complained-sour-idUSKBN1ZK1CO/ https://www.reuters.com/article/world/exclusive-apple-droppe... Apple processes FAA702 orders on upwards of 80,000 Apple IDs per year per their own annual transparency report. Snowden himself said that they see so many nudes that they got desensitized to it. This clever setup allows them to claim iMessage is e2ee while still escrowing keys in effective plaintext to Apple in the iCloud Backup, rendering the e2ee totally ineffective. I think “backdoor” is probably an appropriate term for it, but they have made no secret whatsoever of it. It’s terrifying to think that the US federal government can read every iMessage in the entire world across a billion devices (except China, where the CCP can do the same) in effectively realtime. The power that that enables (if only in blackmail ability) is staggering.
  - staplers 1y ago
    allows them to claim iMessage is e2ee while still escrowing keys in effective plaintext to Apple in the iCloud Backup Does this also apply to their advanced data protection feature?
    - intrasight 1y ago
      My read is that it does not apply to ADP. Also, what regular criminal, let alone terrorist, would leave iCloud backup turned on after all the hacks and leaks over the years. I assume that most in the HN community, like myself, have iCloud backup turned off.
      - sneak 1y ago
        Criminals (that get caught, or get put under surveillance) are generally criminals because they are stupid. I would venture a guess that almost all criminals have iCloud Backup enabled, because that is the default setting.
chaostheory 1y ago
Back doors just make the device or platform less secure.
ACCount37 1y ago
I am very much against laws designed to protect children and stop terrorism. By now, "think of the children" is a tired cliche of anti-freedom laws. If "protecting children" requires sacrificing freedom for everyone, then children should not be protected. Every time I come across another anti-freedom law wrapped in an excuse of "think of the children", I question whether the worshippers of Moloch had the right idea after all.
- flumpcakes 1y ago
  > I am very much against laws designed to protect children and stop terrorism. This can't be true. You're against a law that says a convicted child rapist cannot work in schools? You're against a law that says people can't take bombs onto planes? I think you're being dishonest in your statements, or do not care about anyone else in society.
  - ACCount37 1y ago
    I do think that both TSA and modern airport security in general should be dismantled. And that any law that claims to "protect children" or "stop terrorists" should be scrutinized as if it was written by Satan himself, with assumed malicious intent. This is true for existing laws, and true twice over for anything that's being proposed. It's long overdue for the "safety" plague of "think of the children" to die.
  - johnnyanmac 1y ago
    >You're against a law that says a convicted child rapist cannot work in schools? I'll be the devil's advocate: for how long and in what way? You can be on the child predator list because a minor caught you peeing on the side of a road. Do they deserve to be blocked out of an industry because of bad luck over something many people have done? >You're against a law that says people can't take bombs onto planes? Well that led to me not being able to bring a normal stick of deoderant in my bags. So maybe we should review the TSA oversight after 20 years. >I think you're being dishonest in your statements, or do not care about anyone else in society. and I think you're arguing in bad faith comparing the ability for government to track society's entire digital footprint to imprisoning a convicted criminal.
throw0101a 1y ago
> I am all for laws designed to protect children, and stop terrorism. The usual suspects: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocalypse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocalyp...
- fmajid 1y ago
  The real target: journalists, activists and whistleblowers
  - flumpcakes 1y ago
    This isn't true on the whole in this context. How does the UK's OSA target journalists, activists and whistleblowers? I think this conspiratorial view of these laws is doing more harm than good and ignores the entire issues that these laws are designed to address. The problem is we create overly broad laws because: - There is a problem with child predation / terrorism - There is a lack of understanding on how technology works - There is faith that the system works and won't ever be abused - There are too few people in community self policing these issues. Addressing any one of these in a different way will negate the need for laws like the UK were trying to implement. Creating broad gives the police more ability to enforce their spirit. I think that's generally a bad thing when the laws are to do with civil liberties. But maybe a good thing when dealing with, for example, domestic abuse.
    - johnnyanmac 1y ago
      >How does the UK's OSA target journalists, activists and whistleblowers? The general context is it targets "anyone who angers the government". Being able to ban your entire internet if this becomes widespread becomes a very powerful deterrent to opposition. \ >Creating broad gives the police more ability to enforce their spirit. I think that's generally a bad thing when the laws are to do with civil liberties. Given the histories of "enforcing spirits" for both the US and the UK police forces, I'm not sure how or why you'd have faith in their interpretations. The police can bring up your info themselves without needing the ability to cut off someone's entire digitial landscape.
ben_w 1y ago
Mm. Unfortunately, I'm highly confident that 90% of the intelligence community looks at us insisting that crypto standards be inviolable, and thinks we're all as infuriatingly naïve as a ChatGPT comment. I don't know the true risks of terrorist organisations. I doubt I ever will, because the intelligence community wants to keep its methods secret in order to avoid mildly competent terrorists from avoiding stupid (from MI5/6's POV) mistakes. The counter-point is that such secrecy makes the intelligence organisations themselves a convenient unlit path for a power-hungry subgroup to take over a nation. Regarding sexual abuse, the stats are much easier to find, and are much much worse than most people realise to the extent that most people either don't understand what those numbers mean or don't believe them: If you're an American, on your first day in high school, by your second class you have more than even odds of having met a pupil who had already been assaulted, most likely by someone close to the victim such as a relative. I don't see how any level of smartphone surveillance will do anything to stop that. Or indeed, any surveillance that isn't continuous monitoring of every kid to make sure such acts don't find them.
- Refreeze5224 1y ago
  > Unfortunately, I'm highly confident that 90% of the intelligence community looks at us insisting that crypto standards be inviolable, and thinks we're all as infuriatingly naïve as a ChatGPT comment Until they can prove this is the case, and not just fear mongering to justify their massive budgets, overreach and assaults on civil liberties, I am happy to continue being considered naïve by them.
- kbelder 1y ago
  >If you're an American, on your first day in high school, by your second class you have more than even odds of having met a pupil who had already been assaulted, most likely by someone close to the victim such as a relative. You're saying that the rate of sexual assault is.. a few percent? Too high! I agree. But it's bad form to give convoluted examples in order to give the impression that the actual number is worse than it is.
  - ben_w 1y ago
    > You're saying that the rate of sexual assault is.. a few percent? Specifically of pre-pubescents. This is already enough to exceed the prison capacity of any nation, including El Salvador. If I had instead broadened to the under-18 rate of victimisation, about 11% of women are victimised: https://rainn.org/statistics/children-and-teens https://rainn.org/statistics/children-and-teens The lifetime risk is higher still.

amelius 1y ago

Meanwhile, who believes that the US has no backdoors in these devices?

johnisgood 1y ago
Hopefully no one, in services available globally (i.e. not US-specific), just to be sure.
sedivy94 1y ago
Why litigate it when you can buy it from the NSO / IDF?
philistine 1y ago
Cold logic dictates otherwise. The UK is part of Five Eyes: total data sharing between intelligence agencies. If that were the case, why would the UK need a law to get data it already has?
- kneegerm 1y ago
  San Bernardino shootings smartypants
- Someone 1y ago
  It wouldn’t need the law, but putting the proposal up and then, after the predictable backlash, retract it could be a ploy to make the criminals/us think they don’t have access to the data now.
  - 0cf8612b2e1e 1y ago
    WW2, the Allies used all sorts of fake outs to lead the Germans to believe that the Enigma machine remained secure. Many people died for the sake of the secret. Given the lengths the government has gone to monitor its citizens, I could believe the technology stack has already been compromised.
  - southernplaces7 1y ago
    Upvote from me. Your point is completely valid and simply stated, and yes, I agree that they very possibly could do exactly this sort of thing for the sake of play-acting a government blindness that doesn't really exist as such. Truly this site is crawling with anal-retentive man-children who downvote over any silly self indulgent bullshit they can think of.
- fsflover 1y ago
  https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2024/10/4.html https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2024/10/4.html https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveillance/ https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveil...
sneak 1y ago
It’s not really a secret; it’s by design and it’s public. iCloud is not end to end encrypted by default. Apple and the state can read the on-by-default iCloud Backup which contains your iMessage sync keys and all your historical iMessages and attachments. iCloud Photos, Contacts, and Mail are all similarly not e2ee and trivially readable by Apple, DHS/FBI, and anyone else under FAA702 (aka PRISM, aka the #1 most used US intel source) without a warrant. https://www.reuters.com/article/world/exclusive-apple-dropped-plan-for-encrypting-backups-after-fbi-complained-sour-idUSKBN1ZK1CO/ https://www.reuters.com/article/world/exclusive-apple-droppe... Apple processes FAA702 orders on upwards of 80,000 Apple IDs per year per their own annual transparency report. Snowden himself said that they see so many nudes that they got desensitized to it. This clever setup allows them to claim iMessage is e2ee while still escrowing keys in effective plaintext to Apple in the iCloud Backup, rendering the e2ee totally ineffective. I think “backdoor” is probably an appropriate term for it, but they have made no secret whatsoever of it. It’s terrifying to think that the US federal government can read every iMessage in the entire world across a billion devices (except China, where the CCP can do the same) in effectively realtime. The power that that enables (if only in blackmail ability) is staggering.
- staplers 1y ago
  allows them to claim iMessage is e2ee while still escrowing keys in effective plaintext to Apple in the iCloud Backup Does this also apply to their advanced data protection feature?
  - intrasight 1y ago
    My read is that it does not apply to ADP. Also, what regular criminal, let alone terrorist, would leave iCloud backup turned on after all the hacks and leaks over the years. I assume that most in the HN community, like myself, have iCloud backup turned off.
    - sneak 1y ago
      Criminals (that get caught, or get put under surveillance) are generally criminals because they are stupid. I would venture a guess that almost all criminals have iCloud Backup enabled, because that is the default setting.

chaostheory 1y ago

Back doors just make the device or platform less secure.

ACCount37 1y ago

I am very much against laws designed to protect children and stop terrorism. By now, "think of the children" is a tired cliche of anti-freedom laws. If "protecting children" requires sacrificing freedom for everyone, then children should not be protected. Every time I come across another anti-freedom law wrapped in an excuse of "think of the children", I question whether the worshippers of Moloch had the right idea after all.

flumpcakes 1y ago
> I am very much against laws designed to protect children and stop terrorism. This can't be true. You're against a law that says a convicted child rapist cannot work in schools? You're against a law that says people can't take bombs onto planes? I think you're being dishonest in your statements, or do not care about anyone else in society.
- ACCount37 1y ago
  I do think that both TSA and modern airport security in general should be dismantled. And that any law that claims to "protect children" or "stop terrorists" should be scrutinized as if it was written by Satan himself, with assumed malicious intent. This is true for existing laws, and true twice over for anything that's being proposed. It's long overdue for the "safety" plague of "think of the children" to die.
- johnnyanmac 1y ago
  >You're against a law that says a convicted child rapist cannot work in schools? I'll be the devil's advocate: for how long and in what way? You can be on the child predator list because a minor caught you peeing on the side of a road. Do they deserve to be blocked out of an industry because of bad luck over something many people have done? >You're against a law that says people can't take bombs onto planes? Well that led to me not being able to bring a normal stick of deoderant in my bags. So maybe we should review the TSA oversight after 20 years. >I think you're being dishonest in your statements, or do not care about anyone else in society. and I think you're arguing in bad faith comparing the ability for government to track society's entire digital footprint to imprisoning a convicted criminal.

throw0101a 1y ago

> I am all for laws designed to protect children, and stop terrorism. The usual suspects: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocalypse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocalyp...

fmajid 1y ago
The real target: journalists, activists and whistleblowers
- flumpcakes 1y ago
  This isn't true on the whole in this context. How does the UK's OSA target journalists, activists and whistleblowers? I think this conspiratorial view of these laws is doing more harm than good and ignores the entire issues that these laws are designed to address. The problem is we create overly broad laws because: - There is a problem with child predation / terrorism - There is a lack of understanding on how technology works - There is faith that the system works and won't ever be abused - There are too few people in community self policing these issues. Addressing any one of these in a different way will negate the need for laws like the UK were trying to implement. Creating broad gives the police more ability to enforce their spirit. I think that's generally a bad thing when the laws are to do with civil liberties. But maybe a good thing when dealing with, for example, domestic abuse.
  - johnnyanmac 1y ago
    >How does the UK's OSA target journalists, activists and whistleblowers? The general context is it targets "anyone who angers the government". Being able to ban your entire internet if this becomes widespread becomes a very powerful deterrent to opposition. \ >Creating broad gives the police more ability to enforce their spirit. I think that's generally a bad thing when the laws are to do with civil liberties. Given the histories of "enforcing spirits" for both the US and the UK police forces, I'm not sure how or why you'd have faith in their interpretations. The police can bring up your info themselves without needing the ability to cut off someone's entire digitial landscape.

ben_w 1y ago

Mm. Unfortunately, I'm highly confident that 90% of the intelligence community looks at us insisting that crypto standards be inviolable, and thinks we're all as infuriatingly naïve as a ChatGPT comment. I don't know the true risks of terrorist organisations. I doubt I ever will, because the intelligence community wants to keep its methods secret in order to avoid mildly competent terrorists from avoiding stupid (from MI5/6's POV) mistakes. The counter-point is that such secrecy makes the intelligence organisations themselves a convenient unlit path for a power-hungry subgroup to take over a nation. Regarding sexual abuse, the stats are much easier to find, and are much much worse than most people realise to the extent that most people either don't understand what those numbers mean or don't believe them: If you're an American, on your first day in high school, by your second class you have more than even odds of having met a pupil who had already been assaulted, most likely by someone close to the victim such as a relative. I don't see how any level of smartphone surveillance will do anything to stop that. Or indeed, any surveillance that isn't continuous monitoring of every kid to make sure such acts don't find them.

Refreeze5224 1y ago
> Unfortunately, I'm highly confident that 90% of the intelligence community looks at us insisting that crypto standards be inviolable, and thinks we're all as infuriatingly naïve as a ChatGPT comment Until they can prove this is the case, and not just fear mongering to justify their massive budgets, overreach and assaults on civil liberties, I am happy to continue being considered naïve by them.
kbelder 1y ago
>If you're an American, on your first day in high school, by your second class you have more than even odds of having met a pupil who had already been assaulted, most likely by someone close to the victim such as a relative. You're saying that the rate of sexual assault is.. a few percent? Too high! I agree. But it's bad form to give convoluted examples in order to give the impression that the actual number is worse than it is.
- ben_w 1y ago
  > You're saying that the rate of sexual assault is.. a few percent? Specifically of pre-pubescents. This is already enough to exceed the prison capacity of any nation, including El Salvador. If I had instead broadened to the under-18 rate of victimisation, about 11% of women are victimised: https://rainn.org/statistics/children-and-teens https://rainn.org/statistics/children-and-teens The lifetime risk is higher still.