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Obama: Gov't Shouldn't Be Hampered By Encrypted Communications
According to an article at The Wall Street Journal, President Obama has sided with British Prime Minister David Cameron in saying that police and government agencies should not be blocked by encryption from viewing the content of cellphone or online communications, making the pro-spying arguments everyone has come to expect:
“If we find evidence of a terrorist plot and despite having a phone number, despite having a social media address or email address, we can’t penetrate that, that’s a problem,” Obama said. He said he believes Silicon Valley companies also want to solve the problem. “They’re patriots.” ... The president on Friday argued there must be a technical way to keep information private, but ensure that police and spies can listen in when a court approves. The Clinton administration fought and lost a similar battle during the 1990s when it pushed for a “clipper chip” that would allow only the government to decrypt scrambled messages.
Just ignore that bit about being secure in your papers and possessions! The Government should be able to take what it wants, for your protection!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Regardless of government laws and tactics, hiding your communications is incredibly easy for anyone who isn't an idiot.
What this means is that most terrorists must be incredibly stupid... or the government wants to spy on normal people more easily.
...there must be a technical way to keep information private, but ensure that police and spies can listen in when a court approves.
Simply impossible with the inherent corruption in the system. He's making the same speech as the Supreme Chancellor in front of the senate, and he will get his thunderous applause.
There is nothing left to do but try to keep up and protect our selves as best we can.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I dont like the scumbags that shoot up chocolate shops and newspaper offices or crash airplanes into buildings or blow up nightclubs but I would rather see 1000 terrorists go free than to see a single innocent person have their privacy, security, civil liberties or constitutional rights violated.
I am not afraid of terrorists. I am not afraid of religious extremists. I am not afraid of murderers, rapists, drug dealers, drug addicts, carjackers, burglars, home invaders, "active shooters," or copyright violators. No, the biggest threat to my freedom comes from my own government, and that makes me sad.
Thanks to the War on Drugs, it's easier to buy meth than it is to buy cold medicine!
If the court approves, they can just go and obtain the computers. That is already solved.
If the hard disk is encrypted (very rare I suspect), the expectation of legal costs or indefinite holding at Gitmo without any trial are already there as motivation to comply.
No, better spying is not what we need. It destroys our freedom of speech and quality of life. We need due process. We need protection of all those not proven guilty yet, because it could be any one of us.
NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
Or does he intentionally want to bankrupt Silicon Valley?
No-one in their right mind wants anything to do with US software products any more, because we've no idea how many backdoors they've built in, and can't trust them an inch.
Doesn't the precedence of the clipper chip fiasco in the 90s already dictate this can't be done? Or am I misunderstanding?
They try again and again to implement the same bad ideas, knowing that defeats don't matter, understanding that they only need to score a single victory and their maladaptive proposals will be forever enshrined in law, never to be repealed. These are people who play chess and as such they learned to take a long view of things, realizing that most Americans have incredibly short memories and are only considering the here and now.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
I for one am tired of the government from being slowed by locks whenever they need to find a terrorist suspect, I think the government needs a master key that can open any lock, and everyone combination lock needs to have a master unlock code to unlock it.
Since the master keys would only be available to a few thousand (ok, maybe a few hundred thousand) law enforcement personnel, I fail to see how the "bad guys" would ever get access to them. The government has our best interests at heart, and they carefully screen employees to ensure that none of them are the "bad guys".
Fake as all the others.
The man acted like a redneck idiot. He used deliberately common-folk language, avoided long words. Soundbite quotes wherever possible. But his educational record is very good, and he even graduated Harvard business. He knew that a popular, everyman president would play well, and an intellectual would be regarded as 'elitist' - so he put on the act he knew would give the best advantage in his career.
Fake as all the others.
The man acted like a redneck idiot. He used deliberately common-folk language, avoided long words. Soundbite quotes wherever possible. But his educational record is very good, and he even graduated Harvard business. He knew that a popular, everyman president would play well, and an intellectual would be regarded as 'elitist' - so he put on the act he knew would give the best advantage in his career.
Yes, Heaven forbid the man occupying the highest office of the land and charged with making important decisions be known as an intellectual. I mean, this IS America...
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
So first they can obtain computers. People were upset, but nothing changed and they are able to do it.
Next they were able to put people into Gitmo without due process. People were upset, but nothing changed and they are able to do it.
Now they want to spy even more. People are upset. So what will change now?
And you know if it doesn't work to put it into law this time, it will the next time. People will be upset and nothing will happen.
If your kid steals a cookie and all you do is being upset, it will steal again. Just telling the kid it should not do that is not enough.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
A backdoor/vulnerability/weakness that the government can exploit is one that a bad actor can exploit. Digital data of many sorts *requires* integrity and confidentiality. To allow an opening for surveillance is to allow an opening for hackers. It is simply not tenable to the economic functioning of the planet to allow communications and storage that are other than secure.