Re: Feds tell Web firms to turn over user account passwords

Sandro Hawke:
> I've said things a lot like this over the years, and I'm 100% in favor
> of decentralizing, but I'm no longer confident it'll reduce government
> access to personal data.   Yes, going from a handful of service
> providers to millions would make the job of obtaining keys harder, but I
> don't think it would make it much harder, not technically.   It would
> make it harder to keep secret, it's true. But now that this stuff isn't
> even plausibly deniable any more, the lawmakers basically have to decide
> whether to give the NSA the keys to everything or not.   If they decide
> to, then they can just demand that every Internet connected system have
> an NSA-approved back door.    Okay, that might be going a bit far, but
> I'm sure folks will be pushing for that, and we'll probably settle on a
> compromise that multiuser and/or commercial systems get a backdoor.  
> And then when you let your kids use your phone, does it qualify as a
> multiuser system?

A decentralised system can be spread over several jurisdictions. That
obviously does not help much when the governments in those jurisdictions
collaborate closely.

I agree that protecting users against surveillance first of all is a
political issue, not a technical one. I will not settle on a compromise
with the NSA and their collaborators.

Cheers,
Andreas

Received on Friday, 26 July 2013 13:59:59 UTC