Poll Says Most Americans Favor Crypto Backdoors

Sideways The Dog writes: "According to this MSNBC article, "72 percent of Americans believe that anti-encryption laws would be 'somewhat' or 'very' helpful in preventing a repeat of last week's terrorist attacks on New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C." I realize that I'm preaching to the choir here, but it is scary how many people do not realize that the bad guys are not going to play fair here. Even granted that people may not realize the tools are already out there for the bad guys to use, I wonder what the polls will say when the backdoor gets compromised and 72% of people get their bank accounts wiped." Update: 09/19 19:26 PM GMT by T : Declan McCullagh adds a link to "the actual text of the question asked by the pollsters, which Princeton Survey Research Associates describes here." Note the numbers on this page as well.

Comments

Crypto backdoors in Afghanistan?

[eples]

Great poll, but what good does weak encryption within the borders of the U.S. do for finding terrorists sending e-mail in Afghanistan?

Besides, the government can't regulate my speech whether or not it's encrypted.

72%... You know some 80% of people are in favor of this "war" we're supposedly having. Idiots. All of them.

Thanks.

I think the better question to ask the public is:

[mickeyreznor]

How would you feel if the government could figure out your credit card #'s because of mandated backdoor encryption?

72%

[GiorgioG]

72% of americans don't have any idea what encryption means, let alone a backdoor.

Other Poll.

[hotsauce]

In other news, 72% of Americans believe handcuffing airline passengers before boarding would be "very" or "somewhat" helpful in reducing hijackings.