Apple and Facebook representatives met with lawmakers today where senators pushed for the companies to compromise their users’ security by including encryption backdoors. In particular, Sen. Lindsey Graham said:
My advice to you is to get on with it. Because this time next year, if we haven’t found a way that you can live with, we will impose our will on you.
“Encryption backdoors for thee, but not for me.”
Check It Out: Senator Lindsey Graham to ‘Impose His Will’ on Encryption Backdoors
Andrew:
I could be wrong, but in a representative democracy, shouldn’t that be ‘We will impose the people’s will…’?
Are not these congressmen and senators elected to represent the will of their respective districts and states? If so, then should not the good senator from South Carolina produce the data that shows that a majority of the people wish to have such an encryption back door, or does he posit that the government know best?
It might also help to have a public record of expert testimony that there is no such thing as a back door for end to end encryption, but, if a platform allowing on the fly decryption were created, what such a ‘back door’ would entail for commerce, banking, the economy, national security, as well as for such obscure niceties like personal privacy, safety and security. However, such data and testimony likely harken back to a quaint period when truth was objective, facts mattered and the designation ‘expert’ was not a slur.
Finally, not to suggest that elected officials would ever stoop to shirking responsibility for their decisions, let alone hypocrisy, duplicity or outright lying, but one does wonder, should governments succeed in forcing an encryption ‘back door’, and the inevitable abuse and public harm follow, would the gentleman acknowledge his error, or instead insist that our pain, stolen information and bank accounts were not real?
None of this encryption back door discussion should be worrisome; after all, undoing any ‘back door’ damage should be about as simple as…reanimating Julius Caesar.
The Mac mini isn’t a bad option; decent CPU, up to 64GB, and several Thunderbolt 3 ports supporting an eGPU as well as fast storage.
The 2013 trash can Mac pro was a unique machine. Really no reason why you can’t add a thunderbolt/PCI expansion cage to it to give it a bunch of slots; I’m a bit disappointed that PCI expansion cages didn’t catch on and come down in price. Perhaps if Apple had primed the pump a bit…
Maybe it will become a collector’s item like the G4 cube.
A backdoor would enable the Deep State to get into the telephones of Mr. Trump’s errand boys, not to mention his as well.
@ Lee Dronick
The guy is porn fan?
I don’t suppose that he has ever heard of the Constitution.
They will play ip the “security” and the “terrorist” cards and people will believe them. Remember 2020 is an election year. A lot of stupid ideas will get floated.
And of course a backdoor would make it easier for hackers to get into Senator Graham’s private phone; that should reveal some interesting stuff.
Or the mathematical impossibility of adding a backdoor that is only usable by good guys.