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UK Could Secretly Block Security Worldwide, Says Apple

posted by hubie on Thursday February 01 2024, @07:36AM   Printer-friendly

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Apple has attacked what it calls the UK's "unprecedented overreach" in proposing that it have the power of veto over all Big Tech security features across the globe.

The UK's House of Lords is due to debate an update to the country's Investigatory Powers Act (IPA) 2016 on January 30, 2024. In a much earlier form in 2015, the IPA was slammed by Apple for how it then proposed breaking encryption.

According to BBC News, Apple is now attacking the latest update proposals. Apple is against the UK having a veto over security updates, and also over how if the country were to exercise that veto, no Big Tech firm could even say that it has.

[...] Separately, in September 2023, the UK backed down from a nonsensical law after firms including Apple and WhatsApp said they would cease operating in the UK if the government passed a law requiring the breaking of end-to-end encryption.

The issue of Apple and others not being legally allowed to reveal that a government had vetoed a security update is similar to how the US forbade the company from revealing push notification surveillance.

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  • (Score: 3, Funny) by Opportunist on Thursday February 01 2024, @02:30PM (6 children)

    by Opportunist (5545) on Thursday February 01 2024, @02:30PM (#1342631)

    Last I checked I'm not breaking a local law by spilling those beans.

    Technically, I wouldn't even break a UK law. I'm not the company that is responsible for fixing it after all.

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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by Freeman on Thursday February 01 2024, @02:51PM (5 children)

    by Freeman (732) on Thursday February 01 2024, @02:51PM (#1342640) Journal

    I have two names for you: Edward Snowden and Julian Assange (Okay, I tacked on Kim Dotcom too.)

    Okay, the Edward Snowden thing is a fair bit different, but he had similar problems to Julian Assange.

    Just because you've never visited a place (Julian Assange/Kim Dotcom) doesn't mean you can't be extradited.

    https://www.reuters.com/world/julian-assanges-final-appeal-against-us-extradition-be-held-february-2023-12-19/ [reuters.com] (The screwed one, even if he eventually isn't extradited.)

    LONDON, Dec 19 (Reuters) - WikiLeaks' founder Julian Assange's possible final legal challenge to stop his extradition from Britain to the United States where he is wanted on criminal charges will be held at London's High Court in February, his supporters said on Tuesday.
    Assange, 52, is wanted by U.S. authorities on 18 counts, including one under a spying act, relating to WikiLeaks' release of vast troves of confidential U.S. military records and diplomatic cables which Washington said had put lives in danger.
    [...]
    "The two-day hearing may be the final chance for Julian Assange to prevent his extradition to the United States," WikiLeaks said in a statement.
    [...]
    He spent seven years holed up in Ecuador's embassy in London before he was dragged out and jailed in 2019 for breaching bail conditions. He has been held in prison ever since while his extradition case is decided.
    His lawyers have also applied to the European Court of Human Rights which could potentially order the extradition to be blocked.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden [wikipedia.org] (The one that got away)

    On July 1, 2013, president Evo Morales of Bolivia, who had been attending a conference in Russia, suggested during an interview with RT (formerly Russia Today) that he would consider a request by Snowden for asylum.[239] The following day, Morales's plane, en route to La Paz, was rerouted to Austria and landed there, after France, Spain, and Italy denied access to their airspace. While the plane was parked in Vienna, the Spanish ambassador to Austria arrived with two embassy personnel and asked to search the plane but they were denied permission by Morales himself.[240] U.S. officials had raised suspicions that Snowden may have been on board.[241] Morales blamed the U.S. for putting pressure on European countries and said that the grounding of his plane was a violation of international law.[242]
    [...]
    Snowden applied for political asylum to 21 countries.[245][246] A statement attributed to him contended that the U.S. administration, and specifically then–Vice President Joe Biden, had pressured the governments to refuse his asylum petitions. Biden had telephoned President Rafael Correa days prior to Snowden's remarks, asking the Ecuadorian leader not to grant Snowden asylum.[247] Ecuador had initially offered Snowden a temporary travel document but later withdrew it,[248] and Correa later called the offer a mistake.[249]

    On July 1, 2013, Snowden accused the U.S. government of "using citizenship as a weapon" and using what he described as "old, bad tools of political aggression." Citing Obama's promise to not allow "wheeling and dealing" over the case, Snowden commented, "This kind of deception from a world leader is not justice, and neither is the extralegal penalty of exile."[250] Several days later, WikiLeaks announced that Snowden had applied for asylum in six additional countries, but declined to name them, alleging attempted U.S. interference.[251]
    [...]
    Putin said on July 1, 2013, that if Snowden wanted to be granted asylum in Russia, he would be required to "stop his work aimed at harming our American partners."[259] A spokesman for Putin subsequently said that Snowden had withdrawn his asylum application upon learning of the conditions.[260]
    [...]
    Amid media reports in early July 2013 attributed to U.S. administration sources that Obama's one-on-one meeting with Putin, ahead of a G20 meeting in St Petersburg scheduled for September, was in doubt due to Snowden's protracted sojourn in Russia,[268] top U.S. officials repeatedly made it clear to Moscow that Snowden should immediately be returned to the United States to face charges for the unauthorized leaking of classified information.[269][270][271] His Russian lawyer said Snowden needed asylum because he faced persecution by the U.S. government and feared "that he could be subjected to torture and capital punishment."[272]
    [...]
    In October 2020, Snowden was granted permanent residency in Russia. His lawyer said that granting an unlimited residence permit became possible after changes in the migration legislation of the Russian Federation in 2019.[274][275][276]

    On September 26, 2022, Putin granted Snowden Russian citizenship, making it impossible to extradite him to any country.[277]

    https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/17/23764438/kim-dotcom-megaupload-executives-sentenced-to-over-two-years-new-zealand-doj [theverge.com] (Status To Be Determined)

    I didn’t expect to write about Megaupload in 2023, but here we are — former Megaupload officers Mathias Ortmann and Bram van der Kolk have been sentenced to more than two years in prison over their roles in the company, Associated Press reported on Thursday.
    [...]
    Dotcom tweeted about the convictions on Thursday, saying the light sentences two men got off easy because they are pinning the blame on him, adding that they “will make terrible witnesses for the US Govt.”
    [...]
    It’s been about a year since the men entered a plea deal to avoid extradition to the US from New Zealand and eight years since we asked if it was time to just settle the Megaupload case. Around that time, it was ruled by a New Zealand court that Dotcom can be extradited to the US, and he’s been fighting that ruling ever since.

    --
    Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"

    • (Score: 0, Flamebait) by Opportunist on Thursday February 01 2024, @03:03PM (4 children)

      by Opportunist (5545) on Thursday February 01 2024, @03:03PM (#1342646)

      Well, if you play that game, you can't really expect to be very well liked by various state actors.

      Snowden is a pretty tragic case. He just did what any person with a conscience would have done and ended up as a pawn in a political game. I really feel for him because I know I would probably have done the same. Assange, well, he's a bit of a narcissist and showman, with him I just don't know whether he did it because he thought it's the right thing, for the lulz or because he wanted to show off.

      And Kimmie... that lardball will hopefully end up as a shitstain on a prison wall. If you run down his history, you can't help but think that Karma is a bitch and at least sometimes it hits the right bastard.

      • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Freeman on Thursday February 01 2024, @03:24PM (3 children)

        by Freeman (732) on Thursday February 01 2024, @03:24PM (#1342648) Journal

        Neither Julian Assange or Kim Dotcom violated the laws of the country they were living in, thus the extradition hearings. Otherwise, they would have been serving time for the laws they did break. While neither of them are saints, the long arm of the law is being stretched a bit much in both cases.

        --
        Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"

        • (Score: 1, Troll) by Opportunist on Thursday February 01 2024, @03:28PM (2 children)

          by Opportunist (5545) on Thursday February 01 2024, @03:28PM (#1342649)

          Assange was accused in Sweden of rape. Whether it was a set-up or not, who am I to decide that? One part of me would say of course the US would set him up like that, the other part of me would say that he's enough of an egomaniac to think that every woman wants him... I frankly can't be assed to care. In the end, the whole deal is a huge political poker where of course the US won't back down because they feel slighted. And, let's be honest, they got what they wanted, nobody gives a fuck about Wikileaks anymore.

          When it comes to Kimmie-boy... Frankly? At this point, I don't even care if he broke a particular law or whether he's framed, this guy is such a pest and generally unlikable bastard that if someone put a bullet through his head, all I would do is step over the corpse and ignore it.

          At best I would say "finally".

          • (Score: 3, Touché) by Freeman on Thursday February 01 2024, @04:54PM

            by Freeman (732) on Thursday February 01 2024, @04:54PM (#1342656) Journal

            Assange never had a chance at a fair trial and likely would have been extradited the USA. He may still be extradited. Regarding the rape accusations and other things. Assuming everything is exactly as the alleged victim said, he was definitely not in the right. That said at best it was a case of he said/she said and there was quite a bit of consensual sex going on between them.

            Kim Dotcom's character has nothing to do with the legality of what was done.

            Laws exist as much to protect the individual from government overreach as it does to protect the Nation. The Nation should be the people, the government shouldn't be protected from it's own people. A government should fear it's people, because the people should hold the power.

            --
            Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"

          • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 01 2024, @09:02PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 01 2024, @09:02PM (#1342692)

            Assange was never accused of rape by the woman in question. When she found out he was also bonking her friend she went to a police station and asked if he could be forced to take a STI test.
            A CIA asset leveraged that into an accusation to try and get Assange into custody. He was questioned and it was so obviously bullshit that the real cops and prosecutor released him before the asset could arrange to get him shunted off to the US.