Legislating Insecure Encryption

firewort writes: "Sen. Judd Gregg (R-New Hampshire), who called for global backdoors in encryption products in a floor speech last week, is readying legislation. This is another push for backdoors - but it seems that Gregg wants them to be used cautiously, only with permission from a US Supreme court appointed commission, subject to normal search and seizure rules." Representative Goodlatte, who has supported strong encryption before, is one of the few people speaking out against this.

Comments

You can't have it both ways.

[b0z]

Congress is not using the terrorist attack as a "blank check" to do whatever they want. It is obvious that within the many speeches the president and others have given, that we can't allow the terrorist acts to change America. This includes restricting our freedoms, or letting us live in fear. I have faith that our governmental representatives are going to do what is right to ensure our safety, and do it within the confines of the system of checks and balances that have always existed within the government.

We all know that encryption is hardly used except by criminals and the paranoid. I am not trying to flame people, but it's the honest truth. Personally, I don't use it nor does anyone I know. However, I think it's ok if someone needs to send an email with some information that needs to be protected. The problem is that criminals are abusing these encryption systems to commit crimes. It's not like it will hurt Joe Linuxbob to send an unencrypted email to his friend Don Window. The ones it will hurt are the ones that are comitting crimes against the people of this country, and those who are escaping law enforcement. We hire these people to protect us, we pay them taxes, yet you don't want to allow them to do their jobs? Why? Why do you hate your fellow Americans so much that you would permit criminals to contact each other in private and murder thousands, as evidenced on the 11th.

It is your duty as an American to protect your country and love your fellow Americans. In order to protect all of us, we might have to allow the government, under strict, controlled circumstances, to view our email once in a while. Which would you rather have happen? Would you prefer to be ran into a building at 600+ mph and burn in a fiery inferno along with thousands of others, or perhaps be inconvenienced of the government seeing you send porn to your geek friends at school?

True freedom requires security of those freedoms. To be secure, you might have to give up some of your liberties.