A draft of a proposed bill mandating companies give, under a court order, the government access to encrypted data is being derided by technology experts as "ludicrous," as it "ignores technical reality" and threatens everyone's security.
The manufacturers just need to fight idiocy with idiocy.
Here is an example of the technical assistance the company should provide:
Step 1: Read the 2048 bit encryption key from the device.
Step 2: Factor the key into two prime numbers.
Step 3: Use the factors to transform the encrypted data into an intelligible format.
Fortunately, no one yet knows how to do Step 2 efficiently. However, this procedure, even though it is impractical, would allow the government to read the device (given a few million years) and would satisfy the wording of the law.
As we all know, congress doesn’t like science and math is science. Maybe a few 9th grade refresher courses would do the trick and they’d understand encryption, whatya think? I personally use Linux Mint and Tor and have removed wifi from my life, do I feel safe yet? NO. Because I use these things I’ll be classified as a criminal next. If any of this gets further down the road I’ll just unplug, it just ain’t worth it. How many more will do this? How many more will be driven under-ground?
Feinstein said in a statement Friday, “(we) hope to have final language ready soon”
“ludicrous, dangerous, technically illiterate” pretty much covers all Feinstein’s activities.
onedman, I’m already with you in the switch to alternate platforms. But I have a question regarding your stated need to “unplug” from wifi. If you or I properly encrypt our communications before putting them on the wire, then it doesn’t really matter whether the communication device(s) have back-doors, does it? What is the “further down the road” scenario that effectively prevents us from using our own encryption?
First they came for George’s phone, but not for mine.
Then they came for Cindy’s phone, but not for mine.
Then they came for mine, and I cursed that bitch Feinsten.
The wifi can be rerouted through various software programs before transmission and the encryption isn’t there unless every single byte is encrypted. The key to your question is “properly”. It’s been awhile since I had my fight with apple but my wifi was routed through 3 programs before the transmission, so I do not trust the encryption portion. That and wifi is radiation, it does cause damage to the DNA of the mitochondria within cells, there are many studies about the damage done, well worth the look see. I am totally hardwired but if this becomes Law I’m unplugging for sure. Do you have a lock on your front door? Who else has a key but you? With a “backdoor” why have a key? With a backdoor, who’s to say whether something is encrypted or not?
