Leaked government document shows Spain wants to ban end-to-end encryption

https://www.wired.com/story/europe-break-encryption-leaked-document-csa-law/

by arkadiyt • 3 years ago

556 217 3 years ago

czscout• 3 years ago

This seems similar to the ridiculous questions members of the US Congress asked Google and Facebook employees a few years ago. Law makers (particularly the older, less technologically inclined) tend to view things through the worst possible lens because they lack the knowledge required to understand the inherent value of technologies such as encryption.

mistrial9• 3 years ago

I think you misunderstand the display put on by most senior members. They have staff that can get details. However, playing dumb or obstinate is a negotiating tactic. The authority hierarchy at play is more important that the details of the tech, viewed a certain way. Let's be blunt, more than half of all representatives in both parties work on behalf of local, state, Federal and international security.

EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK2• 3 years ago

And many of them - on behalf of foreign nations.

judge2020• 3 years ago

It's not just lack of knowledge, but lack of willingness to learn and apply it.

Their priorities are set on the power plays that happen in government chambers, the government and corporate interests that ask them to change laws for some purpose, and performing actions that will keep them elected (in that order). Banning encryption is something that satisfy the second group, where government organizations would love to make their jobs easier by having a key to encrypted communications. The fact that the entire internet is built on encryption is only a barrier to these governmental powers telling lawmakers to "pull the trigger" on banning encryption, since the compromises will hit corporations the most (since corporations actually do need perfect encryption without the government spying on them).

throw_a_grenade• 3 years ago

https://archive.is/3rqpB

DrThunder• 3 years ago

Every single government on Earth does. This is why you limit their power.

gsdofthewoods• 3 years ago

Apparently Germany is an exception. From the story:

Representatives from Germany—a country that has staunchly opposed the proposal—said the draft law needs to explicitly state that no technologies will be used that disrupt, circumvent, or modify encryption. “This means that the draft text must be revised before Germany can accept it,” the country said.

ajsnigrutin2• 3 years ago

We (the citizens) need access to all the politicians communication, just in case if they do anything illegal... 24/7 microphones, digital communication tracker, etc. Let's start with that, and then move on to "normal people", if politicians still believe in no privacy.

dylkil• 3 years ago

In the uk politicians were allowed to opt out

https://www.digit.fyi/data-protection-political-parties/

kelseyfrog• 3 years ago

More responsibility demands more scrutiny.

nordsieck3• 3 years ago

As a first step, I'd settle for 1 party consent for recording everywhere.

And no more unrecorded votes.

josephcsible2• 3 years ago

Can someone steelman the argument against one-party consent? I literally can't think of any reason anyone would want it, other than wanting to be able to lie about what they said later. It doesn't even help people who are saying things that might be dangerous if they leak, since illegal != impossible.

pezezin• 3 years ago

Spain is already a 1-party consent country, it is legal to record any conversation as long as you are part of it. However, it is not legal to publish them, but they can be used in a trial.

clbrmbr• 3 years ago

Thanks. Looking up “1-party” sent me down an interesting rabbit hole learning about the limited “0-party” rights of interception. For radio interception in NJ, it is legal (and only legal?) to intercept:

f. Any person to intercept any radio communication which is transmitted:

(1) by any station for the use of the general public, or that relates to ships, aircraft, vehicles, or persons in distress;

(2) by any governmental, law enforcement, civil defense, private land mobile, or public safety communication system, including police and fire, readily accessible to the general public;

(3) by a station operating on an authorized frequency within the bands allocated to the amateur, citizens band, or general mobile radio services; or

(4) by any marine or aeronautical communications system;

———

Which would imply that broadband RF recording using SDRs, even if it excludes the cell phone bands, is not OK!

For example, the MURS band seems to be illegal to intercept.

spullara• 3 years ago

42 states (in the US) have one party recording so I think that it is by far the normal situation.

https://www.justia.com/50-state-surveys/recording-phone-call...

joebiden22• 3 years ago

Politicians are mostly corrupt, though degrees vary. Most relevant child abuse was covered by famous politicians¹²³⁴⁵. Nevertheless, the same politicians cut budgets for police to do actual investigation work, because that could harm themselves, then want to cut the last line of defense the public has to do actual investigation and journalism (which requires free speech and privacy) by declaring that this is required to fight pedophilia.

We need to do something against this. We really do.

¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Epstein

² https://www.researchgate.net/publication/336831983_Understan...

³ https://time.com/2974381/england-land-of-royals-tea-and-horr...

⁴ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Dutroux

⁵ https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/past-pedophile-...

joebiden22• 3 years ago

If you downvote, please at least state a reason. All of the links are reputable and verified. And all of them were covered by famous, reputable politicians.

noduerme• 3 years ago

My reason to downvote will be: Around half the girls I've met in my life were molested by adults as children, and it wasn't by famous people or politicians. It was by neighbors and family members in the suburbs where they grew up. It's fine to call out hypocrisy in the ruling class that covers up for their own while claiming to be trying to address the problem, but at the end of the day the vast majority of the millions of daily cases of child abuse are taking place right nextdoor or even in the same houses as the people who make a lot of noise about corrupt politicians. I'd even go as far as to say that an obsession with famous child abuse cases is a good indicator of someone who's either committed or thought about committing that sort of crime.

ComodoHacker• 3 years ago

Politicians are just ambitious people, sharing full spectrum of other traits. Most people would become equally corrupt if presented the opportunity. Being ambitious just amplifies the temptation.

wnevets• 3 years ago

If they got nothing to hide why wouldn't they do it?

ajsnigrutin2• 3 years ago

Yep, and they're working and being paid for and by us. If they're working for the benefit of the people (or at least their voters), why would they keep secrets from us/them?

flagrant_taco2• 3 years ago

Not to defend politicians, but I don't want to be does on just because I think I'm doing nothing wrong

pessimizer2• 3 years ago

Politicians are the most surveilled people, and sometimes vote for things like this for fear of or as the result of being targeted by their own or other countries' intelligence agencies.

If the CIA wants Spain to ban encryption, they're not going to be bothered by the resistance of some Spanish MPs, they're going to fix the problem.

We (the citizens) need to ban secret police and secret courts.

HeavyStorm2• 3 years ago

Politicians are the most surveilled people, and sometimes vote for things like this for fear of or as the result of being targeted by their own or other countries' intelligence agencies.

Not here. Probably not anywhere outside US and some very few countries.

belter2• 3 years ago

"Dutch PM Mark Rutte questioned after deleting text messages for years" - https://www.euronews.com/2022/05/19/dutch-pm-mark-rutte-ques...

varenc2• 3 years ago

While of course no government comes close to that level of radical transparency, Finland comes closer than most. I believe Finland requires all official government documents be made public by default, unless they are specifically exempted. Many other governments, like the US through FOIA, let citizens request documents with varying degrees of success, but proactive disclosure is much more rare. And of course, this is just about official documents and doesn't cover the contents of private meetings.

(I'm just an interested observer, so I'd love to hear from actual Finns on how they feel about their government's level of openness!)

nevon• 3 years ago

It's the same here in Sweden. It just feels natural that _obviously_ we should have access to what goes on in the public sector, unless there's a very specific reason not to. There was a huge backlash when the current government decided to hide who received electricity subsidies this last winter, as it was seen as a way to hide corruption.

luxuryballs2• 3 years ago

that’s what I’m saying, quadruple or 10x their pay to increase the cost of them selling out for corruption but also make them wear 24/7 body cameras, maybe we can get the true patriots who are willing to sacrifice some privacy to do the good work and as a bonus shorter terms will just work themselves out naturally

IG_Semmelweiss2• 3 years ago

Patriots ought to work for free.

This is about duty. Not about profit.

I think you have it flipped.

Have everyone in govt making in excess of 2x poverty line be subject to a tax of 99% for all income exceeding the avg of 5 years of income before joining govt

You can be rich and join govt. You can live ok post-govt. But you sure as hell should not get rich off govt

It's called public service for a reason. Its a service. Not a career.

Either you have a sense of duty and are willing to sacrifice, or else go work on the private sector.

We need statesmen. Not rent-seeking politicians

bigthymer• 3 years ago

Way back when, Ukraine implemented video recording of all politicians' offices in order to combat corruption. I read an article where a citizen was trying to get something done at a local government office, tried to offer a customary bribe, but was rejected as the officer pointed to the recording camera in the corner of the room.

EGreg2• 3 years ago

I have been advocating this for some time. If we want full transparency, let's start with the public servants. Oh, they won't be able to make backroom deals, fail at peace agreements because they walked out after 2 hours, and we'll know exactly how they failed? Yes, that's how it should be, because millions of plebs will have to fight and pay the price for their abject failure, negligence and incompetence later. Let it be on full display!

Look, maybe nuclear secrets, black ops and some kind of weird Blackwater (er excuse me Academi) stuff can be off the books, although that has historically resulted in a lot of misery, especially the CIA: https://www.npr.org/2017/01/23/511185078/america-in-laos-tra... and is probably a major reason behind war in Ukraine since 2014 ... but also in dozens of other countries, too. You'll find out when it's fully declassified 10 years later, but by then they'll just say "mistakes were made".

If we knew about how the covert operations that led to wars that killed MILLIONS of people, we'd hold them to account: https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/how-jimmy-carter-...

Come to think of it, we'd all be richer, too. Want to get rid of wasteful spending? Start with the Pentagon. Somehow debt-ceiling Republicans aren't eager to do that but it can't account for $35,000,000,000,000 https://www.yahoo.com/video/pentagon-35-trillion-accounting-...

Thankfully we have C-SPAN at least.

snehk• 3 years ago

It is so ridiculous that the exact same discussion has to be repeated again and again. The arguments haven't changed. "Bad thing is happening and we need this to ensure it doesn't anymore". The bad thing changes to what's currently the most popular threat although protecting children is obviously an all-time favorite.

I think the next angle will be that it's needed to prevent hate speech. Any other ideas?

gigel82• 3 years ago

They never needed to go to a "next angle"; the "protect children" has almost always worked (with the occasional "prevent terrorism" thrown in for diversity) :)

xboxnolifes• 3 years ago

You don't need to change the angle, you just need to keep trying until the people's views align enough to get it through. "Never let a crisis go to waste", and such.

clnq2• 3 years ago

Counter-terrorism, criminal investigations, national security, cybersecurity, anti-corruption, regulatory compliance, breaking up organized crime, stopping drug distribution and trafficking, stopping black market trades (weapons, human trafficking, and the aforementioned drugs), stopping production of illegal materials, preventing insider trading, detecting fraud, stopping money laundering, preventing corporate espionage, nationalistic thought-police stuff that some countries legitimately want, stopping identity theft, political back channel interference prevention, social stability (someone might incite unrest), economic stability (someone might share ideas bad for the economy), public health safety (someone might share anti-vax ideas), gang activity prevention, stopping cults and sectarian violence, scam/fraud call and message prevention, disrupting ransom schemes, preventing propaganda, stopping environmental crime, disrupting illegal immigration, military and government organization advantage against allies on whom they can spy if they pressure them into abandoning E2E... oops I mean... peacekeeping, preventing the undermining of democracy (or the fatherland/motherland for those of the authoritarian inclination). There are definitely a few bingo cards worth of possible excuses.

soraminazuki• 3 years ago

There needs to be an international human rights treaty that enshrines the right to end-to-end encryption. Law enforcement all over the world already has more than enough power to do their jobs. If they cared about protecting people, they should be embracing the wide availability of strong encryption with open arms.

It's time politicians spent time increasing accountability and preventing abuse before they even think about granting more power to law enforcement.

fsflover2• 3 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocalyp...

olliej• 3 years ago

I'd have more sympathy to the "we need to be able to read every one's message, and open up everyone's communication to criminals to stop crime" story if there was any evidence it would actually do anything.

There is no evidence that the reason terrorist attacks (the common go to) would be stopped by removing encryption from people, because we know that existing attacks have occurred even when law enforcement is already aware (take the Manchester bombing: multiple friends and family had reported him to the police on multiple occasions).

We do have a huge amount of evidence that any such attack on privacy will immediately be abused. In the UK those laws that were passed to "stop terrorism", etc are used to catch people not picking up dog poop, not paying TV licensing, etc. In the US we had wide spread warrantless surveillance of literally everyone, courtesy of AT&T.

My opinion is that any law that proponents proclaim will only be used to stop X should contain terms along the line of "any use of this legislation for any purpose other than X invalidates this law, any evidence acquired must be destroyed, and any convictions derived from such evidence are no longer valid". I would give good odds that any attempt to add such text would result in push back by the people saying the law is only needed to stop X.

deepspace• 3 years ago

We had a recent example in Canada of how any attempt at restricting such a law would go.

- The government proposes a law to regulate content on the internet, ostensibly targeted at Netflix and similar services.

- Critics point out that the law would apply to small-time content creators too, and could destroy their ability to compete.

- The government pinky-swears that they would never apply the law to individuals.

- A member of the opposition proposes an amendment to explicitly exclude individuals from the law.

- The government rejects the proposal and passes the bill as originally drafted.

drexlspivey• 3 years ago

Crazy that we need big corporations to protect us from the government. It was supposed to be the other way around.

thatguy0900• 3 years ago

The corporations just want to stake their claim of keeping our data to themselves away from other corporations. Crazy were in a situation where corporations and governments are at war over who gets the looting rights.

sneak2• 3 years ago

Corporations serve at the pleasure of the government. Big corporations serve as single chokepoints for extortion or blackmail (via threats to business, legal via regulation or otherwise) to put in backdoors.

All power structures are your enemy.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-fbi-icloud-exclusiv...

For the purposes of privacy and human rights, corporations and the state are integrated in almost all large industrialized nations. Businesses are too busy being businesses to fight city hall.

FredPret4• 3 years ago

Not everything is a “power structure”. Some people actually like to get shit done and organizations are a means to that end.

dylan6043• 3 years ago

Gov't is just a special case of corporation. Every city within a state has a charter just like a corporation.

pessimizer2• 3 years ago

More the opposite. Corporations are granted charters (and limited-liability) by governments because they are extensions of governments. They're either meant to

1) take risks to accomplish goals that would be beneficial to government, but that government does not want to risk itself, [e.g. if there were no grocery stores, government would have to feed you, but government doesn't have the information to choose locations and stock stores effectively, which competition provides]

2) allow the government to do things that government isn't allowed to do directly [e.g. censor content, cut off undesirables from financial services, pay lower than their current government union contracts or legislation], or to

3) aid the transfer of wealth from government to insiders through either government overpayment for services it could more cheaply provide itself, or by having looser labor/materials sourcing/pollution regulation or monitoring than government does, providing self-dealers a margin built from externalities.

fsflover2• 3 years ago

They don't really protect from the government. NGOs like https://eff.org, https://edri.org do.

acuozzo2• 3 years ago

I just don't understand how they think they can do so.

It's not even the "why?". I get the "why?" even though I obviously don't agree.

It's the "how?".

ska• 3 years ago

The how probably isn't so hard if you are a state actor. You won't be 100% effective, but if you make it a felony to possess systems that can do it, to use systems that can do it, to possess any data that can be tied to such a system, etc., etc. it's quite likely that usage would drop to nearly nothing.

gnulinux2• 3 years ago

How do you ban cocaine? How do you ban special parts in guns that make them automatic? How do you enforce any law that's not practical to enforce?

You just make it a felony with a penalty of decades of imprisonment. Then, all the businesses stop doing it and you selectively enforce the law in order to make an example out of people. The idea is never to enforce it fully.

If encryption is a felony, your average business will stop using it, which is pretty much the desired effect. They don't care so much about your personal website or data store using encryption. They'll just make it a fringe technique.

SV_BubbleTime2• 3 years ago

If only more people understood that the police aren’t there to stop crime rather to document it, we would be further along with the enlightenment.

It’s all punitive because preventative is fantasy.

crocowhile• 3 years ago

So are they banning VPN and SSL too? Those are not fringe techniques.

jchw• 3 years ago

Controlling supply chains is a lot easier when you're dealing with physical things and not abstract concepts.

reportgunner• 3 years ago

Ok but banning encryption seems akin to banning combustion.

themoonisachees• 3 years ago

Most likely it would enable them to go "well we can't decrypt your messages you exchanged with you conspirators which we think would prove you're a criminal, but since you used E2EE you are now a criminal by default."

It also enables them to stop petty criminals, but we both know they don't really care about that.

acuozzo2• 3 years ago

but since you used E2EE you are now a criminal by default

Wouldn't simple mappings introduce sufficient plausible deniability in this case?

An example: Every two bits in the encrypted message are mapped to 0=A, 1=T, 2=G, 3=C and suddenly everyone is transmitting DNA sequences for research and evaluation.

Attach the encrypted message to a legitimate sequence and-- boom! --you have a "telomere".

miohtama• 3 years ago

You force Google and Apple drop apps in the app store that support encrypted messages.

You sue and jail any website operator offering access to encrypted peer-to-peer chats.

EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK2• 3 years ago

Good Android supports app sideloading. Apple users, too dumb to care :‑þ

johnfernow• 3 years ago

Finland "warned that the proposal could conflict with the Finnish constitution" and Germany "has staunchly opposed the proposal", so I don't think there's going to be an EU law banning end-to-end encryption. So if Spain were to act alone, I can't imagine banning WhatsApp (which uses end-to-end encryption) would go over well with their constituents. It's on 98% of their smartphones and (at least in 2015) they used it more than any other EU country [1]. WhatsApp (like Signal) said it would leave the UK rather than weaken encryption if end-to-end encryption was banned there. [2] I'm sure the same would be true for Spain.

1. https://english.elpais.com/elpais/2015/02/16/inenglish/14240...

2. https://www.theverge.com/2023/3/10/23633601/uk-online-safety...

Maybe WhatsApp is lying, but it would put them in a predicament for the following situation: a user from outside of Spain chatting with someone inside of Spain. Assuming they comply with Spanish law, they could,

1. Say nothing and show no warning message. Would generate negative press and distrust in the platform.

2. Show a warning message when a user tries to message someone in Spain. Some would commend the transparency, but the press and public may still be upset that they acquiesced to the Spanish governments' demands.

3. Create an entirely different version of the app for Spanish users. This wouldn't generate much negative press outside of Spain, but Spanish users absolutely would be upset that they can't contact people outside Spain with the app.

This is not an edge case scenario: 15% of people in Spain are foreign-born (likely contacting family and friends from their home country) and 2.7 million Spaniards live abroad (likely contacting family and friends inside of Spain.)

Option 3 is likely out of the picture, but of options 1 and 2, while neither would result in the death of WhatsApp, some users may indeed leave the platform due to it. In order to be worse than losing the entire country of Spain, 2.35% of WhatsApp users would have to leave the app. That seems unlikely, but even still WhatsApp might not feel it's worth the risk, and in any case they'd probably prefer to not have to spend development hours building systems to comply with the law. Easier to just cut them off.

roywiggins• 3 years ago

If they can get the apps removed from Google/Apple app stores in their country, and put blocks at the ISP level to prevent anyone actually communicating with Signal or WhatsApp servers, they'll get most of the way there.

varenc2• 3 years ago

I think the how is pretty simple: If you're a company that runs a chat/communication app and you can't comply with a government request for the contents of private communication on your platform then you're in violating of the law.

If you have any presence in Spain then you'd be subject to fines or whatever cross-jurisdictional sanctions they can get away with. Or if you're untouchable legally they could require ISPs to block you and you can play whack-a-mole. The majors players where 95% of communications happens would either have to play ball or withdraw from the country. In practice this probably means that small apps get away without complying until the government has a request for you that you fail to meet.

It's a horrible and terrifying idea, but I think it's reasonable to enforce and get the vast majority of people to have unencrypted communications. (but not the vast majority of dedicated criminals)

lstodd2• 3 years ago

It is not pretty simple. A govt can't win a whack-a-mole game. Consider attempts to block Telegram in Russia. They caused so much collateral damage while not even approaching the goal, that the whole effort had to be canceled and swept under the rug.

belter2• 3 years ago

Much like certain segments of American society prioritize gun regulation as the paramount factor influencing their electoral choices, I aspire that citizens might accord an equivalent level of importance to the prohibition of end-to-end encryption in shaping their voting decisions.

dylan6043• 3 years ago

personally, i doubt this to be true. the voting masses are by and large not that smart on issues like this. granting access to personal data in order to receive promotional information has been accepted and liked by a large percentage of the masses. if not liked, then tolerated. if not tolerated, then willfully ignored.

if the argument is to get discounts on retail products/services, then of course the "think of the children" or "but terrorists" will work on them as well.

putting that much decision making in the hands of the voting public is always a scary idea, and never a sure thing.

balderdash2• 3 years ago

Yeah - I’m constantly floored by the number of people that trust Clear at the airport, to save a couple of minutes in line…

balderdash2• 3 years ago

Off the wall idea - given that encryption was classified as a munition in the U.S. from an export control standpoint, does that mean it’s protected under the second amendment?

hospitalhusband• 3 years ago

That's not an off the wall idea at all. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=encryption+2nd+amendment+protectio...

avgcorrection• 3 years ago

Both are fantastical and naive. Billions are used on shaping voting decisions in plain sight/text.

gmerc• 3 years ago

LLMs make it possible to scan every message, every phone call, every communication and classify it for intent. Ba Without E2E we are screwed.

xkcd-sucks• 3 years ago

tbf communications are now classified by ridiculously broad criteria like degree-of-separation (my Doordash driver who called me donated money to "terrorists" so now my communications are fair game), keywords (I venmoed my friend for tickets to ISIS-the-band's last show) and geography (I live within 100 miles of the US border) so LLMs don't seem necessarily worse

TheRealDunkirk2• 3 years ago

Every country wants to ban end-to-end encryption. It's this one, common desire that gives me comfort that it actually works.

SV_BubbleTime2• 3 years ago

Fair point. We always hear about the NSA has this or that. The calls to ban encryption are lower in the US, so I wonder if NSA has something they just won’t share with Europe?

chrisco255• 3 years ago

It's a non-starter in the U.S. Legal battles were waged in the 90s over encryption and it was ruled that software is speech: https://archive.epic.org/crypto/export_controls/bernstein_de...

hamilyon2• 3 years ago

Yes. And continue thinking in the same vein, not once, not even single time there was a talk about banning https.

TheRealDunkirk2• 3 years ago

Oh... oh, shit.

stonecactus• 3 years ago

imperative that we have access to the data

What makes electronic messages be different to other forms of private communication that they need to be provided to the government automatically? And in the case of Spain in particular, there are reports of Pegasus being used to spy on Catalan politicians [1][2].

[1] https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/05/spain-pegasus...

[2] https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/04/spain-pegasus...

mercacona• 3 years ago

Spain's politicians don't understand what this ban means. In their eyes, it's like allowing a policeman to open suspicious mail at the post office; and no, it's like getting your mail in transparent envelopes, or receiving all your online shopping in crystal boxes. However, nobody will convince them since someone has sold them the other idea: the same people who sell ultra-expensive software to government that causes nothing but problems.

EGreg2• 3 years ago

The global view to put it into context:

https://community.qbix.com/t/the-coming-war-on-end-to-end-en...

cookiengineer• 3 years ago

The issue with governments is that they don't see the risk it creates for themselves.

Even if everybody _inside_ your country plays by the rules... Everyone _outside_ of it does not.

And let's face it, foreign intelligence services will have a feast over this.

tpmx• 3 years ago

Reminder that France actually did this in the 90s, because why wouldn't such an exceptional country with glorious leaders do that? Clearly they knew was was best.

https://www.theregister.com/1999/01/15/france_to_end_severe_...

Until 1996 anyone wishing to encrypt any document had to first receive an official sanction or risk fines from F6000 to F500,000 ($1000 to $89,300) and a 2-6 month jail term.

This news item from 1999 is about France finally making it legal to use toy ciphers to encrypt documents in France. Let that sink in. Trivial toy ciphers were actually illegal to use in france for 3+ years.

This (I think '97) was when I realized that France is not your typical western democracy style country. Nothing about France is typical.

(And, yes, the it was that Dominique Strauss-Kahn.)

jupp0r2• 3 years ago

I don't understand how this is proposed all over again when it has zero chance to be effective.

Criminals will not use apps that compromise security. They will still use apps that are end-to-end encrypted. These people are breaking the law already, why would they make an exception for one that would compromise their opsec?

iLoveOncall• 3 years ago

Spoiler alert: They don't care about the criminals.

Dma54rhs2• 3 years ago

It's a far-left government that believes the state has answers to everything. They also want to ban porn, prostitution, etc.

lowbloodsugar• 3 years ago

Oh sweet summer child. It's a government. This one may be "far-left". The UK wants to do the same and is "far-right". The far-right in the USA want to ban porn, prostitution and burn books. Governments are made of psychopaths. It doesn't matter what kind of politics the psychopaths are pretending to have in order to get into power. The reason that politicians even have parties is so that there is always someone else to blame, not them: you blame "the far-left" and not the psychopaths in power. The problem is always "woke people", "fascists", "lefties", "racists", you name it. No the problem is psychopaths.

eointierney• 3 years ago

The problem is not that they want to ban encryption but that they can't. It's like banning poetry

FredPret4• 3 years ago

Or randomness itself. What if I want to publish a sequence of meaningless blips?

mrfinn• 3 years ago

As a Spaniard, genuinely curious about why they are so worried. I mean, the real reason. My first bet is Catalonia, but wouldn't be surprised they are actually worried about their own security.

i-use-nixos-btw2• 3 years ago

Anyone with any insight as to why this topic is suddenly in the limelight in so many places at the same time?

I find it remarkable that, even though the UK government is desperate to demonstrate any form of tangible benefit to Brexit, and talks about independence and sovereignty etc, it is moving in exactly the same direction as EU nations on this, ignoring all advice to the contrary.

To be honest I’m kind of feeling left out. My messages are boring. Perhaps if this nonsense goes ahead I’ll start communicating dinner plans with my wife through our own custom key pairs, just to mess with them.

a13o4• 3 years ago

The dirty secret of the web is that the past 2 decades of VLOPs have led to a stunning increase in CSAM and sex trafficking. Governments know this from initial good-faith participation by VLOPs to escalate abuse to authorities. They were quickly overwhelmed. We know all this because of investigative journalism done by NYT in 2019.

VLOPs are interested in E2E encryption now because it lets them ignore their sexual abuse problem by making it untraceable and therefor unreportable. No normal user needs or benefits from E2E encryption on Facebook.

We don't need a blanket ban of E2E encryption but we do need regulation around who can use it and when. Preventing VLOPs from smoke-screening their platform abuse is a good middle ground.

Many idealistic technocrats on the web already believe E2E encryption is an absolute moral good, so it's hard to even get the conversation started. As evidenced by the extremely simplistic black & white takes in this thread. VLOPs are counting on this when they market E2E features as in their users' best interest.

pie_flavor2• 3 years ago

No normal user needs or benefits from E2E encryption on Facebook.

Not the encryption baked into facebook chat, but most certainly the encryption baked into the HTTPS they're accessing facebook through.

superkuh• 3 years ago

I suppose that massive increase of cases is why the special "sex trafficking" courts the US government set up in 2018 shut down for lack of cases. This is just anothe scare like the red scare, terrorism, etc. Very little actual impact or events but huge response in terms of getting re-elected and showing eyes ads so it's blown way out of proportion in the public discourse.

Basing your laws off the needs of corporate persons instead of human persons is bad policy. Authoritarianism might look good in the short term but $godwin. Will you suggest going after the post office for people mailing illegal items too? It's misplaced. The person who commits the crime commits the crime.

lost_tourist4• 3 years ago

We don't need to ban E2E, especially not "to think of the children". I am thinking of my children when I say I don't want any ban on encryption at all. I want them to enjoy their lives and the internet as I have, without the government constantly sticking its nose in. That's what “thinking of the children” really means if you're being sincere about it.

HDMI_Cable2• 3 years ago

How would this even work? Sorry in advance, since I'm not well-versed in encryption, but wouldn't HTTPS also fall under end-to-end communication? What about for military purposes? How would enforcement of this work? Like would they just require that What's App and the like not use end-to-end, or fully just block all encrypted packets on the ISP side? If not, couldn't someone just program an app to do the same, or download APKs of Signal or a similar app? This strikes me as being completely bone-headed.

orthoxerox• 3 years ago

wouldn't HTTPS also fall under end-to-end communication?

Not if you have to use a government-issued root certificate.

hashstring• 3 years ago

Technically still end-to-end but in that case you can’t trust one end.

HDMI_Cable2• 3 years ago

Wow, so would non-gov-signed certs be completely banned? Like if a website used Let's Encrypt, then would the government just ban people from accessing it? How would that even play out with VPNs? This seems so completely unenforceable, unless Spain decided to enact a China-style Great Firewall, and even then this would be an entirely different level.

_trampeltier• 3 years ago

So spain would have to make a certificate for EVERY website? How would it work, when you would visit a canadian or brasilian website?

andrewstuart• 3 years ago

Who is it specifically that pushes for this? It has to boil down to specific people/companies/organisations.

Who, and why do they want it?

autoexec3• 3 years ago

Seems like everyone who wants to spy on and control you has a strong interest in outlawing encryption or anything else that stands in their way.

pie_flavor2• 3 years ago

The politicians saying they need to curb CSAM, mean exactly what they say they mean. The problem is exactly as big as they say it is. That doesn't make their desired angle of attack a good idea, but if you make predictions based on the assumption they mean something completely different and want to spy on people, or that they're being influenced by people who do, you're going to predict wrong. There's a reason many of them are fixated on trying to fingerprint CSAM content out of encrypted messages without decrypting them, something that would not enable the government spying everyone seems convinced it's really for.

lost_tourist4• 3 years ago

Almost all governments want this because they want more power and more control over people's lives.

FredPret4• 3 years ago

In a world where encryption is banned:

- will it be illegal to transmit a blast of static?

- will it be a crime to transmit words that aren’t good, clear Spanish? If no, what if it’s a crazy complicated language?

- will it be a crime to transmit Spanish with bad grammar? What if I transmit a billion random Spanish words?

quazar6• 3 years ago

You're speaking as if this will help you. If you go to the prosecution/trial phase, you will be found guilty since you probably hadn't the best opsec and forensic analysis of your computer found the encryption/steganography software you used, or you left something in the system logs (e.g. timestamps of accessing files), or you left something in the thumbnail cache, or you did not rename the file before deleting it, or the timestamp analysis of e.g. you browser data and logs will show clear behavioral patterns pointing to you hiding data. If you use VMs, their ram is stored in a plaintext file unless you configure it otherwise, on your ssd it never goes away due to wear protection. Even if you had an encrypted drive you will be forced to give them the key, then they will rederive the master key and analyze parts of the disk free space to find something on you, again on ssd this is a certainty and on for example Bitlocker you can never change the master key, ensuring you going to jail.

Even if all of this did not incriminate you, you're in trouble for something in the first place, since you're on trial, right? So probably other people you communicated with lead them to you. And in this case, the judge applies common sense, there is this traffic cell of 6 people and on 5 computers we have clear evidence but on 6th nothing, therefore you're still probably 95+% guilty? Judges aren't stupid.

People making comments like yours annoy me since you seem to be calming people down that we could endure total strong encryption ban, while we absolutely could not.

Prickle4• 3 years ago

What are you smoking?

The parent comment has nothing to do with anything you just spouted.

It's about random transmissions being labeled as "encrypted" when that is not the intention.

Encryption is not limited to the more modern systems. They have existed for a long time.

These are politicians. We cannot trust them to have any knowledge or nuance.

ragnot• 3 years ago

The type of person you are replying to has most likely never lived in any sort of authoritarian regime. People like them play these games...almost like the equivalent of a child saying "I'm not touching you".

What happens in authoritarian regimes is that the law is used to justify the actions of the ruling body, not the other way around. So if you just so happen to blast random static and act suspicious, you'll be taken, beaten and either admit to a crime or a law will be made or amended to justify it. And then you'll admit to it.

The price of freedom is constant vigilance. You are correct in saying we could not endure a total strong encryption ban.

FredPret4• 3 years ago

I am, of course, familiar with the wrench decryption method (https://xkcd.com/538/).

I am saying no ban on encryption can be logically consistent since you can’t absolutely prove that something is encrypted. Even if it is a file called encrypted_drive.imencrypted.

I’m not a lawyer but this kind of ban should be wide open to legal attack. Especially if the country also has freedom of speech. And if it doesn’t have that, it should.

And if all else fails and this insane law passes, the illiterates who pushed it through will cause a national economic and security disaster. Online crime will skyrocket. The KGB/FSB will have a feeding frenzy. Voters will quickly learn to love encryption again.

93po3• 3 years ago

This is already tested somewhat in the UK, where you're required by law to provide a password to an encrypted file or volume when asked. If you're in possession of the encrypted volume, the courts assume you know the password, and throw you in jail if you don't. Obviously this can be easily abused by slipping an encrypted USB drive into someone's backpack.

The point is that they will look at intention and surrounding context - is there a crime leading to you in some way and could it have been facilitated in part by encrypted messaging? Did you also transit a billion random Spanish words during this time frame? If so, it seems to follow by their current laws and logic that they can assume this was encrypted information and therefore broke the law. And if you refuse to decrypt it for them, that's another broken law.

tiku• 3 years ago

Perhaps we need to make a special decrypt program, one that accepts any password and just produces some log files. They can't prove it is not the data (except by claiming they planted it)..

18271639• 3 years ago

I recommend filling up the empty space on hard drives and flash drives with random data from /dev/urandom. What is the government going to do, try and get you to decrypt that? On my computer I already have several terabytes of completely random data. Decrypt that, thought police.

stiltzkin• 3 years ago

- will it be a crime to transmit Spanish with bad grammar? What if I transmit a billion random Spanish words?

I'm open they ban anything related to Latinx. Or at least call it a different language.

StanislavPetrov• 3 years ago

Anytime you see articles like this just substitute the word "math" for "encryption" to understand how absurd and authoritarian it is.

mtlmtlmtlmtl• 3 years ago

My view on banning encryption in any way is always the same: it will disadvantage the innocent masses, and the criminals they purport to be targeting will simply continue to use it. The black hats will rejoice because now their victims are less secure by law. Good luck stopping them.

FpUser2• 3 years ago

They can shove this CSAM BS up their asses. We all know that this "save the children" is nothing but fig leaf used to cover total surveillance and control. Opening their communication to wide public instead as the other poster have proposed makes way more sense.

18271639• 3 years ago

Fascism always uses an excuse, it stokes widespread fear and panic, so that it can subject the population to authoritarian rule.

18271639• 3 years ago

https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/blogs/news/4421-the-authori...

"The psyche of a fascist is “authoritarian” in the sense that it attaches itself to figures of strength and disdains those it deems weak. It tends toward conventionalism, rigidity, and stereotypical thinking; it insists on a stark contrast between in-group and out-group, and it jealously patrols the boundaries between them. It is prone to obsession over rumors of immorality and conspiracy, and it represses with self-loathing the sexual licentiousness it projects onto others. In all of these ways, fascism appears as the political manifestation of a pre-political disposition. The authoritarian personality does not always turn explicitly fascist; its politics may remain dormant, only to emerge under certain social-historical conditions."

DiabloD32• 3 years ago

All I'm seeing is Spain wishes to disconnect from the rest of the world.

Without encryption, you do not have banks, you do not have email, you do not have 90+% of websites, you don't have any business software sales, and now as of Win11 and its Bitlocker-by-default strategy, you don't have consumer desktops.

If Spain wants to get on the fast track to a revolution by literally destroying their economy in the most efficient manner, I say let them. This is a self-solving problem.

_ink_• 3 years ago

They are fine with transport encryption. They want do ban E2E encryption. As long as the companies (and the authorities) can access your data at rest, they are fine.

DiabloD32• 3 years ago

Encryption does not work unless everything is encrypted, even at rest.

There are no secret keys that only the "correct" people can use, there are no impenetrable vaults where hard drives live and only the "correct" people have access to. It is either encrypted, 24/7/365, in all the forms it lives in, or it is not encrypted.

Banning E2E is the first step on banning encryption entirely. There is no other sane way to conceptualize this.

fomine32• 3 years ago

What is "E2E" is a bit ambiguous. Server-Client is a sort of end-to-end in network context. Maybe nowadays people say E2E for between personal device encryption?

smashem• 3 years ago

I don't use E2E encryption to evade my government. I use E2E encryption to protect myself from criminals and malicious actors. Oh, government == malicious actors ??

chaseha2• 3 years ago

Would homomorphic encryption or any other privacy enhancing technologies allow for a middle ground here?

Would allow you to scan the encrypted messages for incriminating or illegal content when there is reason to believe a specific account is doing something illegal (could require court approval, then a further process for full decrypted messages as part of court proceedings)

quazar6• 3 years ago

In one-key scheme you, the encryptor, would also have to encrypt the naughty word list, allowing you to cheat, so it will not be allowed.

chaseha2• 3 years ago

Ahh interesting. So you could not have one key encrypting the messages than a separate org-wide key encrypting the naughty word list. That makes sense. Thanks.

Havoc• 3 years ago

Pack it up boys. Back to http

clintfred• 3 years ago

Every government wants to ban E2E encryption, but most know that it isn't feasible to do so.

barbariangrunge• 3 years ago

Maybe what we need is for a first world nation to finally do it, so the rest of the world can see what a catastrophe it turns out to be?

18271639• 3 years ago

The article says the majority of EU countries want to scan peoples' messages for illegal content. If this ends up being implemented, then it has crossed the line and we are now living in an authoritarian state. A watershed moment indeed.

mokkol• 3 years ago

I see those things as a big slap in the face for freedom. Can you imagine? We forbid locks in your homes. You have nothing to hide (but a lot to lose).

I hate the argument 'You have nothing to hide'. It is so untrue for every single person in the world. It is such a weak argument.

You have nothing to hide and we forbid to use any form of encryption.

Alright, lets AI call your grandmother with all the information hackers got on you. Lets see if you really had nothing to hide.

quectophoton• 3 years ago

How does one even look out for these things?

There are elections this year, yes.

But other than that, how does one even notice these proposals, and how can one help to prevent them from passing? Or even, how to help change the people representing the country in these things?

pas• 3 years ago

politics has patterns, it has some procedural and bureaucratic parts, those are very visible (legibility! see also "Seeing like a state")

but in general there's the separation of powers (branches of government), the opposition parties, the checks and balances, and the media.

to answer your question directly, the bigger the government the more separate agencies it has, the more people you need to watch them, the more people are needed to simply raise their voices, give their faces as the opposition, and then more people to keep track of what-the-hell are they doing.

that's how you got special interest groups. single issue parties. (and if such a party manages to raise the salience of their issue to the "national level" then this basically forces other parties and actors to reveal their preference regarding that issue.)

Cyber_Explorer• 3 years ago

I'm curious. Why are European Governments from the UK to Spain suddenly trying to ban end-to-end encryption.

I mean I would be extremely surprised if agencies such as the GCHQ were unable to crack or completely circumvent end-to-end encrypted messages (and any well-funded signals intelligence agency that claims it's unable to do so, should be required to give an accounting of what it spends it's budget on), so why the sudden desire to ban it?

Wouldn't it be better to give the bad guys a false sense of security to lull them into using seemingly secure end-to-end encrypted messaging apps, and then quietly gather evidence against them?

lost_tourist4• 3 years ago

They are taking an authoritarian bent, this is what happens when you think government can solve all your problems.

pvaldes2• 3 years ago

Afraid people votes conservative and the election is the next Sunday. The more confused and afraid get the voters, the more will search protection in the angry and vicious candidate that promises stability.

For the PP all is a flaming hell, for the Socialists all is unicorn glittering wonderful. All are wrong and they know it. The truth is in the middle.

I would just assume that everything said in this week is fake or incorrect. This is simply typical FUD to catch some late votes in minor groups of citizens.

pvaldes2• 3 years ago

And if is a public document, why do they call it "leaked"?

uda• 3 years ago

Am I the only one to wonder what will happen to DRM streaming in the EU if this passes?

chemmail• 3 years ago

Why don't we just ban alcohol too.

lost_tourist4• 3 years ago

I would be surprised if all governments didn't want to ban e2e encryption except for their own usage.

Leaked government document shows Spain wants to ban end-to-end encryption

Related Stories