| Title | FBI Director Calls Encryption a "Major Public Safety Issue" | |
| Date | Wednesday January 10 2018, @08:49AM | |
| Author | Fnord666 | |
| Topic | ||
| from the trust-us-we're-the-government dept. | ||
The Washington Post has a story which says:
FBI Director Christopher A. Wray on Tuesday renewed a call for tech companies to help law enforcement officials gain access to encrypted smartphones, describing it as a "major public safety issue."
Wray said the bureau was unable to gain access to the content of 7,775 devices in fiscal 2017 — more than half of all the smartphones it tried to crack in that time period — despite having a warrant from a judge.
"Being unable to access nearly 7,800 devices in a single year is a major public safety issue," he said, taking up a theme that was a signature issue of his predecessor, James B. Comey.
Wray was then quoted as saying:
"We're not interested in the millions of devices of everyday citizens," he said in New York at Fordham University's International Conference on Cyber Security. "We're interested in those devices that have been used to plan or execute terrorist or criminal activities."
He then went on to promote the long-disparaged idea of key escrow:
As an example of a possible compromise, Wray cited a case from New York several years ago. Four major banks, he said, were using a chat messaging platform called Symphony, which was marketed as offering "guaranteed data deletion." State financial regulators became concerned that the chat platform would hamper investigations of Wall Street.
"In response," Wray said, "the four banks reached an agreement with the regulators to ensure responsible use" of Symphony. They agreed to keep a copy of their communications sent through the app for seven years and to store duplicate copies of their encryption keys with independent custodians not controlled by the banks, he said.
To me this is more of the utter nonsense the government has spouted. When will they understand that key escrow only works when one trusts the government and the keeper of the keys?
Previously:
FBI Failed to Access 7,000 Encrypted Mobile Devices
Great, Now There's "Responsible Encryption"
FBI Bemoans Phone Encryption After Texas Shooting, but Refuses Apple's Help
DOJ: Strong Encryption That We Don't Have Access to is "Unreasonable"
FBI Director Christopher Wray Keeps War on Encryption Alive
Original Submission Alternate Submission
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printed from SoylentNews, FBI Director Calls Encryption a "Major Public Safety Issue" on 2024-04-18 08:41:14