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from the nothing-to-hide-vs-none-of-your-business dept.
The New York Times published an interesting story about the fears of the current FBI director:
The director of the F.B.I., James B. Comey, said Thursday that federal laws should be changed to require telecommunications companies to give law enforcement agencies access to the encrypted communications of individuals suspected of crimes.
... Mr. Comey warned that crimes could go unsolved if law enforcement officers cannot gain access to information that technology companies like Apple and Google are protecting using increasingly sophisticated encryption technology.
“Unfortunately, the law hasn’t kept pace with technology, and this disconnect has created a significant public safety problem,” he said.
Mr. Comey said that he was hoping to spur Congress to update the 20-year-old Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, which does not require companies to give law enforcement direct access to individuals’ communications.
The F.B.I. has long had concerns about devices “going dark” — when technology becomes so sophisticated that the authorities cannot gain access to them. But now, Mr. Comey is warning that the new encryption technology has evolved to the point that it could adversely affect crime solving.
The kicker is this line:
“Those charged with protecting our people aren’t always able to access the evidence we need to prosecute crime and prevent terrorism, even with lawful authority."
Of course, it should be no surprise to the FBI why so many people are going "dark" and using things like Tails. For decades, the government has proven time and again that it can't be trusted to act lawfully and constitutionally. The FBI is responsible for more than its share of that. So naturally those who can are going to take steps to protect their privacy and Apple and Google, among others, are simply responding to that demand.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Arik on Friday October 17 2014, @01:33PM
There's another thing as well.
Encryption also helps to *prevent crime.* It's not *just* useful to criminals - it's useful to everyone, to LEOs perhaps more than most, and to criminals only in the sense that they, too, are a subset of everyone.
Holding back the General Welfare in order to accrue a special advantage to one sector of society is arguably in violation of the Constitution itself, and certainly NOT good governance.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by MrGuy on Friday October 17 2014, @02:42PM
Right. But if you don't understand how this works, you might THINK it's a "cake and eat it too" situation. Holder's public statements seem consistent with that.
What they want is magic cryptography that's easily breakable by law enforcement, but NOT breakable by anyone else. Apparently, they do not realize the theoretical impossibility of this desire.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 17 2014, @05:27PM
They are not in the business of preventing crime. They are in the business of letting crime happen, then catching the criminal quickly. If they started preventing crime, then suddenly crime would decrease, their budgets would be cut, and some of them would be laid-off. The last thing that law enforcement wants is a reduction in crime.
Sure, it would make a better world for nearly everyone, just not for them.
(Score: 2) by tathra on Friday October 17 2014, @06:46PM
preventing crime would also mean their job is to arrest people for crimes they did not commit. i don't want to live in a world where innocent people are regularly arrested and locked away.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 17 2014, @08:27PM
In that world innocence simply isnt binary, merely setting the threshold below much further below 1.00 than currently.
(Score: 2) by tathra on Friday October 17 2014, @11:18PM
prisons are already full of people who say that didn't do it. arresting people before they commit crimes would make every one of them honest. if we were to make attempting or planning to commit a crime illegal, we're entering the dangerous realm of policing thoughts; either the state would have to prove motivations and intentions beyond a reasonable doubt or it'd just be plain ol' totalitarianism. it'd be almost guaranteed to be the latter, but neither of them are acceptable.