Obama Says He's 'A Strong Believer In Strong Encryption'

An anonymous reader writes: U.S. President Barack Obama spoke with Re/code recently on a variety of topics relating to technology. The talk included the president's thoughts on encryption, which has been a controversial subject in tech circles lately after government officials (including Obama himself) have publicly complained about default encryption in modern communication tools. In the interview, he says he's a "strong believer in strong encryption," adding, "I lean probably further on side of strong encryption than some in law enforcement." Obama puts it another way, more bluntly: "There's no scenario in which we don't want really strong encryption." However, the president says the public itself is driving concern for leaving law enforcement a way in: "The first time that an attack takes place in which it turns out that we had a lead and we couldn't follow up on it, the public's going to demand answers."

Comments

Here's the problem

[Anonymous Coward]

People are stupid. Like, really fucking dumb.

Couple that with a 24 hour news cycle nonstop coverage, first time some attack (even 9/11 was utterly minor in terms of life vs, say, annual car accidents) happens, you have these dumb sheep throw the Constitution out the window and yell 'Murica while going full tilt behind a nearly decade long attack on a country that had nothing to do with it.

If you think there is fixing this country, you are severely overestimating the ability of an educational system, any educational system to pound out the stupid. If it could have done so, we wouldn't be still debating evolution and vaccines.

Yeah?

[Snotnose]

So order the NSA to quit figuring out how to attack us and have them figure out how to protect us.

The Chomsky interpretation of mind control

[Swordfish]

I hope this doesn't sound too much like the tin-foil hat view of the world, but this whole business of the government's "need" to monitor everyone's phone calls, e-mails, web browsing, smartphone GPS coordinates, travel etc., makes me think of a very significant thing that Noam Chomsky once said, namely that in a free society, where people can do what they like, the government (or the ruling class) has a strong motivation to develop state-of-the-art tools to influence the way people think, whereas in a society where physical actions were controlled by the State, like in the old Soviet Union, the ruling class there didn't develop mind-twisting distortions of reality because with physical control, mind control is unnecessary. And Chomsky identified this as the cause of the total distortion of political language and thinking in the USA in particular, and in physically free countries in general.

Now I'm starting to think that the whole NSA spying thing, and government spying in general, is a direct result of the lack of physical control of the populace. In principal, people in the free countries can think what they want, but only if the government knows what people are thinking at all times. I guess monitoring everyone's thoughts like as if we were all prisoners on parole is a direct consequence of physical freedom. If people are granted the freedom to _do_ what they like, they must give up the right to _think_ what they like, or at least they give up the right to share their thoughts privately with others.

Re:The Chomsky interpretation of mind control

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope. Nazi Germany had Goebbels which is until today considered the archetype of the state propagandist, spent millions of Marks on that Leni Riefenstal movies (and made expensive movies even when they were losing the war and money was on short supply), threw Hitler's personality cult on the classrooms to the point that, at the end of the war, kids of the Youth Nazi were often the fiercest soldiers because they were the ones that still believed on that shit. Even more amazing, a good deal of German weapons production was oriented not the most useful but the most impressive. They had to be the best of the class to appear good on the news, no matter this would be a shoot in the foot because that they could only build in few numbers. This is true for Bismarck-class battleships, Tiger Tanks, rail cannons, you name it.

In Soviet Union Lenin and Marx images were at every central street of any city. They spent a money they already don't have on Olympics (Cuba did the same for Pan-American games some years ago) just to give an impression of plenty.

In my own country, Brazil, we also had a military dictatorship, and the amount and nastiness of state propaganda in the 70s ("Brazil love it or leave it", among others - loving it meaning loving the government, obviously) dwarfs the one we still have today on our much imperfect democracy.

Not saying they don't rely on force, which is the ultimate power (both in democratic and totalitarian societies). Obviously they do, as they are dictatorships. I'm saying that Chomsky idea that they don't do mind controls is unfounded. Mind control of population (e.g. propaganda) is a tool for both democratic and totalitarian societies.

Damned if he does...Damned if he doesn't

[Ronin Developer]

It sounds like he's caught between a rock and hard place. He might, personally, believe in strong encryption and privacy. But, the series of events since 9/11 have made a stance which prevents the collection of information to prevent another attack a difficult one to sell to the public.

Strong encryption can protect secrets and privacy. The secrets and privacy of the common man is worth protecting. The same technology can also enable our enemies to operate in stealth. Should we have another 9/11 experience and the suspected perpetrator used strong encryption to protect their plans, the public will scream that not enough was done to prevent the attack. How should the president respond?

I am an advocate of strong encryption having started a business in the 90's to provide secure email and file transfer. I also remember the advent of the Clipper chip and the reasons behind it subsequent defeat. We liked to believe our privacy was not being infringed and then Snowden revealed how our intelligence community was violating our rights. At the same time, we haven't had another terrorist attack on our soil lending credence to their methods (valid or not). Snowden, however, also released information on other data and intelligence collection methods. That disclosure allowed our enemies to operate with more impunity through the use of strong encryption and by adjusting their methods to avoid detection.

Sadly, that protection strong encryption provided in order to protect our privacy and rights now becomes a marker of potential threats with other intel methods compromised. Weakened encryption or strong encryption with a backdoor would, theoretically, permit the gov't to pierce the veil when other intel might have put the focus on an innocent citizen and users of strong encryption would be marked as threats.

We, as a nation, have allowed the events of 9/11 to shatter our society and live in a world where our believe of privacy through ignorance was shattered by Snowden's revelations.

The revelations that Snowden provided on the intelligence collection programs aimed at our own citizens, supposedly for our protection, were necessary. However, the disclosures of other techniques and operations on the international front has given our enemy insight and tactics to be able to circumvent critical intelligence collection methods. In that regard, he has done tremendous harm. And, with the shutdown of those programs, the fight is now over when and how strong encryption will be permitted.

Re:Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

he's had enough chances to prove that he's a champion of The People.

Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan are widely regarded as two of the worst presidents in the history of the United States. The held office prior to the US civil war and were all about civility and compromise and the rule of law. They weren't personally in favor of slavery but they were also unwilling to take a principled stand against it. Then Abraham Lincoln came along and suspended habeus corpus, presided over a civil war that resulted in the deaths of over half a million Americans, and ultimately got assassinated. But he also took a stand, and prevailed, against the evil of slavery in the USA. He is remembered as one of the greatest presidents in the history of the USA.

When Obama was elected I hoped that he would see his presidency as an opportunity to take a stand against at least some of the great injustice that still exists in this world - that it wasn't just a chance for him to enjoy his personal prestige as the first black president. Obama is fond of a quote from Martin Luther King Jr: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” But Obama somehow ignores the fact that this justice has been the result of good people being willing to take heroic stands against injustice. Instead, Obama is all about embracing middle ground fallacies and basking in a false respectability of being "reasonable" and "civil" - which amounts to rationalizing and preserving all the terrible injustice that still exists in this world.

When Obama was elected he could have chosen the path of Abraham Lincoln but instead he has chosen the path of Pierce and Buchanan. I certainly don't expect everyone on the planet to don the mantel of greatness and make their lives about something bigger than themselves. But it's disappointing when someone who has gone to the great effort of being afforded the honor being elected president of the United States turns out to be so unwilling to be champion of the fundamental principles on which the USA was founded.

Re:Huh?

[AmiMoJo]

It's cowardice, but it's unjustified. David Cameron in the UK said pretty much the same thing, that he doesn't want to be blamed if there is an attack and people say he could have done more to stop it. But look at recently history, i.e. 9/11 and 7/7. Both times the intel was there to prevent it, both times those responsible failed to do so. Didn't really hurt Bush, even when it was apparent he was more interested in golf than security. Didn't hurt Blair, even when the police then murdered in an innocent man a few days later under pressure to do better.

The man in charge never gets the blame, the terrorists do. People understand that on those very rare occasions when someone wants to blow themselves up and actually has the means and capability to do it there isn't much anyone can do to prevent it. Even other politicians shy away from blaming the head of government.