Top FBI Attorney Worried About WhatsApp Encryption (usnews.com)

An anonymous reader shares an article on USNews:WhatsApp on Tuesday announced that all types of messages on the latest version of its app are now automatically protected by end-to-end encryption, and the FBI's top attorney is worried some of the platform's more than 1 billion global users will take advantage of the move to hide their crime- or terrorism-related communications. FBI General Counsel James Baker said in Washington on Tuesday that the decision by the Facebook-owned messaging platform to encrypt its global offerings "presents us with a significant problem" because criminals and terrorists could "get ideas." "If the public does nothing, encryption like that will continue to roll out," he said. "It has public safety costs. Folks have to understand that, and figure out how they are going to deal with that. Do they want the public to bear those costs? Do they want the victims of terrorism to bear those costs?"Maybe the government shouldn't have imposed so many surveillance programs on its citizens -- and kept quiet about it for years -- that they now feel the need to use sophisticated security technologies.

Comments

Fuck him

[Anonymous Coward]

Good. Fuck him and the horse he rode in on.

Re:Fuck him

[rhazz]

FBI: If the public does nothing, encryption like that will continue to roll out.

Public: Ok.

Re:Fuck him

[MightyMartian]

Freedom always has a price. Compared to our ancestors, even with encryption, the cost of freedom is pretty fucking cheap these days.

Re:Fuck him

[Sigma 7]

But he is correct? There _are_ costs, potentially involving people being killed.

Eliminating encryption won't handle:

• A lone wolf.
• Communications that aren't across phone lines or the internet (e.g. Sneaker net).
• Communications from burner phones that appear innocous (e.g. asking friends to meet up at certain galleries/malls/etc), but are actually targetting data.
• Letters, especially if they aren't immediatly suspicious.
• Open broadcasts, calls to action.

There's no real cost to allowing encryption, as criminals can easily find alternate methods that don't require encryption.

Re:Fuck him

[tripleevenfall]

The country exists because some people thought preserving freedom was more valuable than preserving their own lives.

Re:Fuck him

[NatasRevol]

FBI: Encryption is bad for us.

Hackers: We know, here's all your data

FBI: Well, shit.

Re:Fuck him

[AdamThor]

FBI: If the public does nothing, encryption like that will continue to roll out.

Except that the public isn't "doing nothing." The public is rolling out (favoring in the marketplace) encryption in response to government surveillance overreach. G-man should get his cause and effect straight.

Re:Fuck him

[Anonymous Coward]

I am completely willing to bear these risks and costs. It is my cost for freedom, I know that, *history* knows that, and I will bear them.
If some fucknut strafes the local shopping mall while my daughter is there and she's killed, that is my cost for her and everyone else to be able to live a life without ID and to go have fun at malls and all sorts of things in life.
That's my cost and I'll pay it gladly.

And while I'm at it, we should have rebuilt the WTC towers exactly as they were before to send a big FUCK YOU to them.
But *no* we got a bunch of fucking tears and memorials and FUD and PATRIOT ACT.

Fuck all these governments trying to take our freedom.
Fuck em all.

Be Brave, not sheep.

Re:Fuck him

[Anonymous Coward]

Quote:

The price for having freedom and presumption of innocence is the fact that guilty men may roam free and evil men may do harm before they can be stopped.

But if stopping them means risking the loss of freedom and the punishment of the innocent, then tolerating such men is the cost that we must accept for all the treasures a free society offers.
A saboteur, terrorist, or criminal can only destroy objects and harm lives.

But they are incapable of touching the foundation on which that freedom is founded.
Only our fear and paranoia can do that.

This man is an idiot:

[gstoddart]

and the FBI's top attorney is worried some of the platform's more than 1 billion global users will take advantage of the move to hide their crime- or terrorism-related communications

The problem is user may attempt to take advantage of the move to hide their perfectly legal and private endeavors which in no way break the law.

As usual, FBI General Counsel James Baker and his kind are outright lying, and asserting you do not have a legal right to do things anonymously or without your government knowing, and that many of those people don't give a fuck what the FBI wants because our rights are not defined by assholes who feel we should have no right to privacy if it impedes the ability of government spy on us.

Why, FBI General Counsel James Baker and his entire family need to be sure their entire lives are made public so that we can be assured he is not misusing his office to conduct illegal business.

The short version of this is: too fucking bad, there are legally valid reasons to have encryption, the world isn't subject to this asshole's definition of "valid", and he doesn't get to decide without oversight or process that he is entitled to any of this data.

But like all these modern fascists, he wants the right to see everything we do, and then decide if it's legal.

Fuck that. I think the entire rest of the world should start using real, hardened encryption the US has no access, and send a big "fuck off" and say it's none of your damned business.

Stop pretending that undermining our rights is necessary to protect our rights. Because that's a fucking lie.

The power of the public

[thegarbz]

If the public does nothing, encryption like that will continue to roll out

Finally for once the power of the uncaring and slack public will actually result in something good.

I am scared of 6 degrees of separation

[EmperorOfCanada]

I know people who are Pakistani. I know people who have family in Libya. With all the Syrians moving to my area, I suspect that I will soon know a Syrian. What scares the crap out of me is that just through the classic six degrees of separation they will be "in contact" with an associate of a known terrorist. This then puts me in contact with someone in contact with an associate of a known terrorist. Then some poorly written ML algorithm will see that I have this situation but through to two separate terrorist organizations. Then boom, I have somehow become one of the strongest links connecting the three. Basically a Canadian terrorist nexus. Add to that that I have visited LiveLeak where terrorist videos regularly get posted, and suddenly I am being pulled aside at airports, or cops have a big red blinking light show up on their computer when they pull me over for running a stop sign, and come out all guns drawn.

It is not only the invasion of privacy that worries me but the complete and certified morons who then interpret this data.

I just think of the hard partying British couple who's tweet, "I'm going to destroy America and dig up Marilyn Monroe" got them arrested for planning to commit crimes. Context you stupid morons.

Plus in 99% of this sort of stuff the only advantage is to find out that terrorist A who blew himself to bits was actually in contact with terrorist B who blew himself to bits. It doesn't prevent squat, it just makes the paper pushers happy to have a better trail to confirm whatever obvious facts they started with.

Here is the horrible thing about all this. Everyone knows exactly which country on this planet funds the bulk of modern ISIS terrorism. Officials won't say it, and they certainly won't do anything about it. So instead they just want to rape our rights to prove that they are doing something.

Basis for the "third party doctrine"?

[Bugler412]

I am distinctly not a lawyer, but is there merit to this thought? The entire legal basis of the "third party doctrine", with which enforcement types can grab your data from a company you do business with basically on demand (or with very easy to get approval), depends on your having "no reasonable expectation of privacy. Well, if I end to end encrypt all communications and stored data in such a way that the storing company does not hold the key, only I do, then I DO now have a reasonable expectation of privacy and the entire third party doctrine collapses legally. I'm VERY certain that it would take an army of attorneys and lots of $$$ and patience to push this idea through the courts, and likely a legal issue with which to establish "standing" to pursue the issue, but thoughts? Is there merit to this line of thinking?

But what about all the ROOMS!

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't understand why ROOMS are tolerated so widely. People go in a ROOM, they close the fucking door to the ROOM and they speak softly and I can't hear a damn thing they say. People have been using all these ROOMS to have private conversations for years. I bet nearly every damn crime this year has been planned in a ROOM of some kind. This ROOM tech must be stopped!!!! Criminals might get ideas! Imagine that! They can talk in private in a room and we can't do anything about it!!! The madness must stop!!!!

The cost of liberty, eternal vigilance.

[Chas]

Still true today.

Will this create problems when trying to root out bad actors? Sure!

The thing is, there's no such thing as perfect safety. No matter how hard law enforcement agencies try.

So, the American public can grow a pair, and realize that the government CANNOT protect them in all situations.
They can then choose whether or not they will act with more circumspection and awareness of the dangers inherent in their surroundings.
And they'll accept the fact that sometimes bad things happen regardless of how much effort was put into prevention.

Or we can simply have ever-greater encroachment on people's liberties.
And bad shit will CONTINUE to happen, regardless of how much effort is put into prevention.

So we have a choice:

* Liberty and danger?

OR

* Tyranny and danger?

PICK ONE!

The costs of terrorism

[DickBreath]

Folks have to understand that, and figure out how they are going to deal with that. Do they want the public to bear those costs? Do they want the victims of terrorism to bear those costs?"

I just did some googling. Apparently the number of people who die by terrorism from now back to 2001 is absolutely dwarfed by the number of people who day every year from automobile accidents, mostly caused by allowing cars to be driven by error prone, inferior, humans.

Maybe a better use of our tax dollars would be a new 'Manhattan Project' or "Moon Shot' project. Replace the 'War On Terror' with a real 'War On Human Driven Cars'. Self driving cars for everyone. That would save vastly more lives than would ever be saved by allowing the FBI snoops to break into every phone, any where, any time, and without any kind of supervision. That is what this is really about.