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Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956
The FBI's director says the agency is collecting data that he will present next year in hopes of sparking a national conversation about law enforcement's increasing inability to access encrypted electronic devices.
Speaking on Friday at the American Bar Association conference in San Francisco, James Comey says the agency was unable to access 650 of 5,000 electronic devices investigators attempted to search over the last 10 months.
Comey says encryption technology makes it impossible in a growing number of cases to search electronic devices. He says it's up to U.S. citizens to decide whether to modify the technology.
Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/fbi-chief-calls-national-talk-over-encryption-vs-safety-n624101
(Score: 2, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Sunday August 07 2016, @11:28PM
I can think of a more wise man to turn to to speak than myself...Ben Franklin..."Those Who Sacrifice Liberty For Security Deserve Neither".
While I agree with the sentiment, I really wish people would quit dragging out that (supposed) Ben Franklin quotation to make this argument. In the context of that quotation [npr.org], Ben Franklin was actually arguing in FAVOR of a state legislature's power to have greater power over private citizens. (Wealthy private citizens in this case, who were trying to buy off the governor to veto the legislature instead of letting themselves be taxed for defense. Franklin was arguing -- as a legislator -- that it was in the interest of our collective welfare for the government -- elected by the people -- to have greater power (i.e., "liberty") to tax. Wealthy people were instead trying to disrupt this process for their own "security," which in this case was a word that implied power as well as literally money.)
So, when Franklin wrote it, he meant roughly the opposite of what most people who use the quote mean: he wanted greater government power to tax private citizens for the war effort.