[HN Gopher] UK government plans publicity blitz against encrypte...
___________________________________________________________________
UK government plans publicity blitz against encrypted
communications
Author : danyork
Score : 256 points
Date : 2022-01-16 13:41 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.rollingstone.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.rollingstone.com)
| tupac_speedrap wrote:
| This is bollocks, GCHQ get on fine with metadata and most CSAM is
| back-doored anyway, it is literally "think of the children"
| claptrap. It's just another power grab, we already have some of
| the worst privacy laws in the world in the UK.
| tjpnz wrote:
| Any insights as to why the big players are implementing E2E while
| ignoring P2P? Is this a control issue or purely related to
| technical challenges?
| 323 wrote:
| One big problem with P2P is that it reveals the IP address of
| the other party.
| salawat wrote:
| This is true of any network architecture that guarantees
| delivery of a message between terminii.
|
| The legal conflation you're actually homing in on is we
| conflate technical terminals with their human users. We've
| been doing it for years, and it shows no sign of slowing
| down.
| gruez wrote:
| p2p but route it over tor?
| Mystlix wrote:
| yes, let's route billions of people through Tor when we are
| already scraping by on bandwidth because exit nodes get
| shut down left and right. and no, the companies themselves
| shouldn't set up exit nodes to expand the network because
| then they would still know everyone's IP address and could
| give that info to the police. either the Tor network gets
| reinforced on a completely independent basis or nothing
| gruez wrote:
| >yes, let's route billions of people through Tor when we
| are already scraping by on bandwidth because exit nodes
| get shut down left and right
|
| You realize that hidden services don't require exit
| nodes?
| tjpnz wrote:
| That's true but aren't the feds already able to request that
| as metadata?
| labawi wrote:
| Probably, but a random stalker can't, and your local ISP /
| network snooper can't tell who you talking to either.
|
| OTOH, many email providers do include the sender's IP, so
| it doesn't seem like a deal-breaker.
| 323 wrote:
| I meant the other party that you are talking too. For
| example I initiate a conversation with you and now I know
| your IP address. This was a problem with Yahoo! Messenger
| which was P2P.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| In the US, people have meager upload bandwidth. I assume to
| deliver a comparable experience as serving from the cloud, P2P
| would require much more upload bandwidth for individuals.
| xoa wrote:
| > _Any insights as to why the big players are implementing E2E
| while ignoring P2P? Is this a control issue or purely related
| to technical challenges?_
|
| Both. Certainly a lot of major players see messaging as an
| important strategic area, not much needs to be said about that.
| But remember, for actual secure communications one needs both
| encryption and _authentication_ , and the latter is a much more
| challenging problem. Purely as a matter of tech there could be
| better ways to go about that, but in practice there isn't any
| great infra for that inter-system, which is both distributed or
| at least federated and easy/accessible for the overwhelming
| majority of the population. It's improving in fits and starts
| but still a mess. A lot of the natural places that might make
| sense to base authentication off of have insecure foundations
| with enormous legacy base that'd be hard to change (typical
| collective action problem), or are very slow moving for other
| reasons.
|
| Centralized solutions just make authentication much easier,
| even if at obvious cost and SPOF-risk. Within any given
| platform the centralized provider can of course guarantee all
| participants about certain properties of whomever they're
| dealing with. Governments could perhaps require some sort of
| industry standardized public-key based interoperability of
| auth, but even assuming they didn't muck it up goverments
| themselves (as this article shows) have unfortunate perverse
| incentives there. Not many have internalized yet that the
| economic cost of poor authentication and security is very high
| because it's so distributed. There may be a bit of coming
| around on that but it's slow. A grim silver lining to all the
| ransomware attacks for example is that at least they're highly
| visible and painful, and at last have started to motivate minds
| a bit. But the addiction of many agencies to old models is
| strong.
| abagheri43 wrote:
| ghostwriter wrote:
| The Government should instead be running a publicity blitz on how
| the police and law enforcement agencies ignore victims of
| grooming gangs and avoid investigations because of political
| correctness [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
|
| [1] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7901731/Police-
| chie...
|
| [2] https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-
| news/harrowing-t...
|
| [3] https://mallarduk.com/grooming-gang-survivor-proposes-new-
| de...
|
| [4] https://archive.is/TVP64
|
| [5] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-
| yorkshire-598283...
| eunice wrote:
| given how many of this cabinet are close to the likes of jeffrey
| epstein the 'think of the children' stuff is particularly
| laughable
| 323 wrote:
| A more effective approach would be to highlight how the far-right
| uses encrypted chat apps. That would get the majority of the
| media and blue-checks supporting you.
|
| > Why right-wing extremists' favorite new platform is so
| dangerous. Telegram's lax content moderation and encrypted chats
| make it a convenient tool for extremists.
|
| https://www.vox.com/recode/22238755/telegram-messaging-socia...
|
| > In collaboration with anti-fascist research group the White
| Rose Society, the Guardian has tracked McLean's activity through
| the rabbit warren of largely unregulated Telegram groups and
| found that he describes a vastly different version of his
| intentions.
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/mar/26/where...
|
| > Far-right groups move online conversations from social media to
| chat apps -- and out of view of law enforcement
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/oct/14/telegram-war...
|
| > White supremacists openly organize racist violence on Telegram,
| report finds
|
| https://edition.cnn.com/2020/06/26/tech/white-supremacists-t...
|
| > Are Private Messaging Apps the Next Misinformation Hot Spot?
| Telegram and Signal, the encrypted services that keep
| conversations confidential, are increasingly popular. Our tech
| columnists discuss whether this could get ugly.
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/03/technology/personaltech/t...
|
| > A report this week found that the messaging app had emerged as
| a central hub for several conspiracy movements espousing
| antisemitic tropes and memes, including QAnon, as well as others
| on the extreme right promoting violence.
|
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/01/15/parler-...
| decremental wrote:
| Clearly extremist rhetoric. It needs to be called out before we
| all drown in it. Luckily and thankfully the community is
| identifying it as such.
| wanda wrote:
| Don't forget to promote chopping off _everyone 's_ hands.
|
| I hear some ultra-right-wing people might be typing their
| nonsense with their hands. So we should make sure no one has
| hands, that'll get em.
|
| ~ Also, this list of US news vendors' articles against e2ee is
| kinda evidence that it's not just the UK going on a campaign.
| ufmace wrote:
| I think the parent was commenting not on the ability of
| disfavored groups to use encrypted chat to organize, but on
| how readily the current social elite can be scared into
| banning anything by telling them that such disfavored groups
| are using it.
| FabHK wrote:
| Telegram is not e2ee, by default, IIRC. You have to manually
| switch to an encrypted chat. Are those group chats typically
| e2ee?
| detaro wrote:
| Telegram doesn't support e2ee for group chats.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| Yep, no way to make them encrypted.
| kerneloftruth wrote:
| I'm not surprised that the UK is deploying it's often used Nanny
| State scare tactics to try and outlaw encryption. Don't take them
| lightly, though, fight back!
| jonplackett wrote:
| The other day I was telling my mum about how in China they can
| monitor and delete anything you post online. Even delete an
| entire type of post made by millions of people based on a keyword
| etc etc.
|
| Her response, rather than the horror I was trying to i instil,
| was "I think we ought to have that here!"
|
| So it does worry me that public support could go the wrong way on
| this if they spend a lot of time on messaging.
|
| I hope that the high level of mistrust of the government - built
| up especially through covid - will prevail.
| brokenmachine wrote:
| So the UK is getting rid of https now?
| tradesurplus wrote:
| This is to prevent MPs and civil servants from evading
| professional communications logs rules, right? Right?
| samwillis wrote:
| I find it amusing that WhatsApp and its e2ee is used as a common
| target for regulation by the government when their own ministers
| are using it to organise all sorts of shenanigans; illegal
| parties during lockdown, "anonymous" briefing of journalists,
| leaking compromising information about their peers. Not to
| mention that it always seems like the government is run via
| WhatsApp (probably need the e2ee for that!).
|
| Ultimately this is about perceived control, the paraphrased
| saying goes "if you outlaw encryption only outlaws will have
| encryption". Legislation won't reduce the use of encryption by
| criminals and terrorists, it will however allow the government
| and law enforcement to say "you have encrypted chat software,
| that's illegal, therefore you must be doing something illegal".
| However, that wont necessarily translate to prosecution, it's
| only the perception that matters.
|
| Pandora's box may have been opened but governments will always
| find a way to "control" their citizens, usually through fear.
| adflux wrote:
| Scumbag politicians here in the Netherlands are actually using
| Signal to avoid courts obtain their communications through the
| Dutch equivalent of the FOIA.
|
| Politics here is starting to look more like mob politics... Our
| prime minister is actually known to do as little on paper as
| possible - so when the shit hits the fan, he'll always say "oh
| I didn't know" or "I didn't remember"...
| dTal wrote:
| It doesn't really matter if government ministers organise their
| illegal lockdown parties over end-to-end encryption or not,
| when the police force were fully aware of it at the time (two
| officers stationed on either side of the door!) and decline to
| "investigate".
| belter wrote:
| Was the same police force who surrounded these dangerous
| criminals?
|
| "Covid: Women on exercise trip 'surrounded by police'"
| https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-derbyshire-55560814
| narrator wrote:
| Power deserves scrutiny. Politicians should have less privacy
| than the average person.
| larryflint wrote:
| LOL. Your right. If anything politicians should be denied
| E2EE
| messo wrote:
| Norwegian politicians are required by law to only use
| official channels of communication (government email, phone
| etc) when discussing anything related to their public
| service. Citizens can demand to get access to these
| communications, even anonymously. This has made it possible
| for regular citizens to uncover both small and big abuses
| of power through the years, most recently exemplified by a
| close connection between the Police and a private anti-
| drug-lobby organization that has had a big influence on
| drug policy for decades.
|
| I have, however, heard that apps like Signal has become
| more common among politicians, but using it for official
| business is still illegal.
| ed_balls wrote:
| > Norwegian politicians are required by law to only use
| official channels of communication
|
| Is it really enforacble? What are the sanctions for
| breaking the law?
|
| What if someone says it's a national secuirty matter?
| brokenmachine wrote:
| If it's a national security matter then they should
| _definitely_ be using the official channels.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| The government likes having THEIR communications e2e but we
| peasants should not also have that freedom. They feel they
| should be able to monitor and control every aspect of our lives
| because that is the type of people that politics attract. They
| look at China's power to monitor communications, block the
| entire nation's internet, and wall off entire cities not with
| shock but with envy.
| ben_w wrote:
| > Legislation won't reduce the use of encryption by criminals
| and terrorists
|
| Hmm, I used to think this, but now? Now I think most people are
| bad at tech and security. No reason to expect the average
| criminal would be better.
|
| Of course, trivial for _us_ to make it, or hide it in something
| that looks unrelated. And I expect serious organised crime to
| be able to afford a developer with no morals.
|
| But normal crime? It probably will make a difference.
| Lambdanaut wrote:
| Even the customers on the darkweb have to encrypt all of
| their orders with PGP or they won't be accepted. Encryption
| is definitely used by smaller-time black market operations.
| samwillis wrote:
| You are quite right, normal and "pretty" criminals will just
| use whatever and not care about encryption. Not only because
| they won't necessarily be educated about it, but it will have
| no impact on their ability to operate.
|
| The police and intelligences agencies aren't intercepting the
| communications of normal and petty criminals. It's organised
| crime and terrorism that matters, they will obviously
| continue to use it anyway.
| jevoten wrote:
| > The police and intelligences agencies aren't intercepting
| the communications of normal and petty criminals.
|
| Snowden showed otherwise - they're spying on _everyone 's_
| conversations, criminal or not.
| samwillis wrote:
| If they did have that capability do you think they would
| use it to take down and prosecute a small time drug
| dealer exposing what they are doing? Even exposing this
| capability to the Police by give them "secret"
| intelligence would inevitably result in the knowledge of
| their capabilities leaking.
|
| If they do have this capability it is only every going to
| be used for large scale organised crime, terrorism and
| state security.
| dTal wrote:
| Well, I don't know about phone conversations, but every
| Tom, Dick and Harry gets access to web surfing history.
| Given that highly casual attitude - formalised into law!
| - I wouldn't put it past them to informally do whatever
| they like with the rest of it.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investigatory_Powers_Act_20
| 16#...
| tata71 wrote:
| ben_w wrote:
| They do have this capacity. Given that the existence of
| this capacity is now public, it is my belief the UK is
| mainly limited by a combination of selective enforcement,
| lack of courts and lack of police (weirdly, given their
| preferred "tough on crime" rhetoric, U.K. courts and
| police are severely underfunded right now).
| 7952 wrote:
| It's possible that they like surveillance because it is
| cheaper than traditional methods.
| ben_w wrote:
| They might like the cost savings for evidence gathering,
| but there's something ridiculous like a half million
| backlog of court cases in the U.K. right now so the rest
| of the justice system isn't in a position to use that
| evidence.
| tata71 wrote:
| For the "skeptics", etc -- plenty of article sources and
| other jump-off points here, for those that want them. htt
| ps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosure
| ...
| rapind wrote:
| > If they do have this capability it is only every going
| to be used for large scale organised crime, terrorism and
| state security.
|
| Don't forget political opposition / dissidents, and
| analysis to see what they can get away with in terms of
| public opinion.
| pjc50 wrote:
| There have been a few interesting cases of "custom" encrypted
| solutions being sold to crime groups then compromised by law
| enforcement.
|
| The thing is, most "normal" crime doesn't rely on comms at
| all - street and domestic violence, burglary, car theft, etc.
| Fencing stolen items probably could make use of it. It's only
| really organized crime. And the UK has an increasing problem
| with organized crime .. from the top, like the unlawful "fast
| lane" procurement scheme. And the recent business with MI5
| identifying an (extremely overt) Chinese agent.
|
| And a surprising amount of terrorist recruitment gets done in
| the open. As long as you're not planning _specific_ acts it
| looks like "free speech".
| stephen_g wrote:
| Those stunts sound super creepy and messed up. Weird,
| manipulative campaign.
|
| This shouldn't really be legal surely in democracies to have
| campaigns that "appear to be the result of grassroots campaigns
| and children's charities, while downplaying any Government
| involvement", when it's a political manipulation campaign paid
| for, coordinated and organised by the Government themselves. I
| really hope the counter-campaign mentioned is good (although hard
| to compete with the already hundreds of thousands of pounds
| already allocated to this already).
| RansomStark wrote:
| This is normal for the UK.
|
| It was the current government, well it's previous coalition
| instantiation that created the nudge unit[0]. A group of
| behavioural psychologists that use mind tricks to convince
| people to do as they are told, whether that is to drink less,
| or stop smoking or to follow COVID rules. A group that has
| since been spun off as a business to sell coercion as a
| service, to any two bit dictator, or free democracy that needs
| it.
|
| This is the same government that deployed it's army information
| warriors against its own people during COVID [1]. The unit is
| known as 77 brigade and explains its mission as "modern warfare
| using non-lethal engagement and legitimate non-military levers
| as a means to adapt behaviours of the opposing forces and
| adversaries" [2].
|
| The UK has never had more than a thin veneer of freedom, it's
| always been an aristocracy lording it over the rest of us. They
| should just do away with the pretence.
|
| [0]
| https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/explainers/nudge-u...
|
| [1] https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/77-brigade-is-countering-
| cov...
|
| [2] https://www.army.mod.uk/who-we-are/formations-divisions-
| brig...
| hkt wrote:
| Or do away with the aristocracy. Now seems like a good time.
|
| We have the same unaddressed issues as America does on race,
| but also with class. Social mobility was just a way of
| introducing crippling brain drain into working class
| communities - something which led to them being effectively
| criminalised as an underclass through ASBOs and the like.
|
| (For the alternative to social mobility, the old line: "rise
| with your class, not above it")
| dTal wrote:
| >This is the same government that deployed it's army
| information warriors against its own people during COVID [1].
|
| Your [1] link asserts, right at the very top, "It is
| important to note that this isn't being directed at British
| citizens or at UK organisations, the effort is being directed
| at sources outside of the country."
| RansomStark wrote:
| Yes it does. The UK defence journey is not exactly an
| unbiased source and always follows the party line. However
| at least 1 MSP would disagree with that narrative [0] and
| suffered significant inline abuse for that post. Which
| oddly enough suggests he might have been on to something,
| given the brigades operations.
|
| You will find this article is also biased, unfortunately in
| your current timeline finding unbiased sources is becoming
| harder everyday
|
| [0] https://www.thenational.scot/news/17858200.vile-abuse-
| snp-mp...
| tialaramex wrote:
| I mean, the present UK government also broke a whole bunch of
| other laws, so, why would they care if it's illegal?
|
| The current British Prime Minister was literally fired from a
| previous job as a journalist because he can't stop telling
| lies. It's worth making a distinction from Trump here. Trump
| wasn't a liar, Trump was a _bullshitter_. A Liar knows what the
| truth is, and is trying to convince you of a falsehood,
| bullshitters have no idea what is true or false, they don 't
| care. In some ways this makes Boris worse - he's deliberately
| trying to mislead you, which is harder to evade, is his claim
| that he enjoys making model buses a _lie_? Probably, but why is
| he lying about that? There were various theories. With Trump
| what he 's saying has no connection to anything, so, it offers
| no clues as to the facts but at least you know that.
|
| But like Trump, Boris is very popular with people who don't
| know much of anything. For them, the results of their support
| for Boris (everything got worse) are disheartening, but they're
| unable to join the dots. Who knows why this has happened, it
| surely can't be Boris' fault, wouldn't he tell us?
| ben_w wrote:
| Given that distinction between liar and bullshitter, I think
| Johnson is not even capable of comprehending that "truth" is
| a concept, let alone that other people can and do judge him
| for saying untrue things.
|
| Main example that gives me this belief is this:
| https://youtu.be/wzUDRyciqVM
|
| Where Boris Johnson says "well actually there's no press
| here" to a man who responds by turning to and pointing out
| the press cameras filming both of them having this
| conversation and saying "What do you mean there is no press
| here? What are they then?"
| pjc50 wrote:
| I remember discovering that the Scotland Office has a (crap)
| Buzzfeed posting account for the Indyref:
| https://www.buzzfeed.com/youdecide2014
| ben_w wrote:
| Sadly, this isn't the first case of the U.K. government going
| for something this super creepy. I've personally seen London's
| "Secure Beneath the Watchful Eyes" posters, which are felt like
| a parody by its own opponents to discredit it:
| https://mindhacks.com/2007/01/09/secure-beneath-the-watchful...
| unethical_ban wrote:
| "In a Godless society, Government creates the panopticon."
|
| Or something. It sounds profound.
| mbroncano wrote:
| Does anybody know how (or even if) these kind of campaigns are
| run in the US?
| alkonaut wrote:
| The US let authorities invent and market an encrypted
| communication tool, tricking criminals into using it (and
| surely some non criminals). In many ways I much prefer that, to
| the UK thing...
| steelstraw wrote:
| Which ones are compromised? Or conversely, which ones are not
| compromised? Signal?
| alkonaut wrote:
| The one FBI orchestrated was "Anom".
|
| https://www.engadget.com/fbi-encrypted-chat-app-anom-
| crimina...
|
| I'm not sure why criminals use these botique services
| rather than sticking with the major ones.
| petre wrote:
| No, in the US the government just classified encryption as
| weapons unsuitable for export. A more clean approach, rather
| than think of the children shenigans, all while certain members
| of the royal family have ties with a convicted child trafficker
| and his wife.
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| > in the US the government just classified encryption as
| weapons unsuitable for export.
|
| ... You realize that that hasn't been the case for ~20 years,
| right?
| humazed wrote:
| >... You realize that that hasn't been the case for ~20
| years, right?
|
| that's not true, try submitting an app to apple store, and
| you will get hit with a lot of Encryption Export
| Regulations prompts.
|
| please see https://developer.apple.com/documentation/securi
| ty/complying...
|
| >When you submit your app to TestFlight or the App Store,
| you upload your app to a server in the United States. If
| you distribute your app outside the U.S. or Canada, your
| app is subject to U.S. export laws, regardless of where
| your legal entity is based. If your app uses, accesses,
| contains, implements, or incorporates encryption, this is
| considered an export of encryption software, which means
| your app is subject to U.S. export compliance requirements,
| as well as the import compliance requirements of the
| countries where you distribute your app.
| petre wrote:
| Yes. I'm not blaming, it was a rather bureaucratic move
| though and it did not stop US citizens from using
| encryption, nor export. Tampering with the ECC crypto
| factors was much more ellegant.
| pixelpoet wrote:
| The sheer audacity of claiming this is about protecting children,
| while politically connected people like Prince Andrew walk free,
| is just mindblowing. Wow, just wow.
| Freak_NL wrote:
| Not sure if he'll walk free (that would be for a judge to
| judge), but this week was a bit of turning point:
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jan/13/veterans-ask...
| ashtonkem wrote:
| Even if he eventually gets in trouble, it's hard to argue
| that the British state didn't pull out the stops to protect
| their pedophile prince while wringing their hands about child
| abuse and online encryption. Oh, and Keir Starmer oversaw the
| prosecutor's office who decided not to charge Jimmy Savile,
| who turned out to be a prolific (hundreds of accusers) child
| rapist.
|
| So as far as child abuse is concerned, the call appears to be
| coming from inside the house.
| mhh__ wrote:
| We need a new government (then a new political class, but small
| things first...)
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| Governments hate the idea of not being able to open your mail.
| Politicians want to be able to control every aspect of your life
| down to picking up some groceries at the grocery or paying your
| babysitter. I really hope people don't fall for this garbage.
| Sure there is a price to be paid for privacy but there is a much
| larger price to pay for not having it.
| datavirtue wrote:
| Hmmm....it's for the children. This sounds like an attempt to
| keep law abiding people from privacy while guaranteeing that any
| criminal worth their salt is fully protected by their own
| encryption. Again, law abiding citizens are left unprotected as
| the government seeks it's own interest in keeping popular
| platforms wide open to their unconditional snooping.
|
| Spending tax dollars to eliminate privacy for those paying the
| taxes. Keep poking the bear.
| barnabee wrote:
| Does anyone know who I can donate to to fund a counter-campaign?
| basisword wrote:
| This is just exasperating. Pro privacy? You're responsible for
| child abuse. Every time you think the current British government
| can't sink any lower...
| hn_version_0023 wrote:
| Seems to me its the people _in the government_ who are widely
| responsible for child abuse.
|
| Just ask Prince Andrew.
| rosndo wrote:
| What does Prince Andrew have to do with the government?
| adventured wrote:
| The United Kingdom is a monarchy ruled by Queen Elizabeth
| (the mother of Andrew), even though the British people go
| far out of their way to pretend that's not the case. It's
| why Boris Johnson had to meet with the queen about forming
| a new government. Why is she involved at all? It's because
| she rules the United Kingdom in fact. Andrew's family rules
| Britain (for what, 1200 years? [1]), that's quite relevant
| to the context. The political structure of the United
| Kingdom goes very far out of its way to look after and
| protect the royal family (their rulers).
|
| Shall we pretend that the family that has _ruled_ Britain
| for 1200 years has no political power? Har har.
|
| Every country in Europe that still regressively clings to a
| monarchy (and there are a lot of them) goes out of its way
| to pretend - because it's so comically backwards - that
| their monarchy is only a figurehead / ceremonial and has no
| real role. In fact they're all back up dictatorships
| waiting in the wings if there's ever enough political chaos
| to prompt the people to turn to that, and that happens
| every time historically.
|
| [1] https://allthatsinteresting.com/lineage-british-royal-
| family
| theonemind wrote:
| France abolished their monarchy. I think the other
| monarchies took note of this and decided to simply live a
| life of power, prestige, and influence and not get their
| heads on a pike by ruling like tyrants.
|
| I think if they tried to exercise major operational
| control in government, it would trigger revolutions,
| formal republics, etc.
|
| Reality is usually a bit more nuanced than the formal
| rules on paper. We have all kinds of laws on the books
| that don't really apply. Likewise with many of the
| supposed powers of these monarchies. Without exercise,
| exercising them makes them legal in the same way killing
| a home intruder is legal. Legality doesn't mean
| exercising it won't be bloody, won't have cost, won't
| have risk, etc...legality one way or another doesn't
| matter _that_ much.
| KaiserPro wrote:
| > Shall we pretend that the family that has ruled Britain
| for 1200 years has no political power? Har har.
|
| That's like saying the Church of England still has
| significant political power. it still has the ability to
| take tithes, although they are mostly optional.
|
| The present royal family only really dates back to
| victoria, I mean sure they are tangentially related to
| the german/dutch/scots/danish that ruled before, but its
| not that strong.
|
| The monarchy is constitutional technical debt.
| Technically the queen can refuse to sign laws, and
| dissolve parliament, but as the constitution is basically
| "because we said so" it'll be the last thing the queen
| does.
|
| The queen has "influence", but not political power.
| calcifer wrote:
| > That's like saying the Church of England still has
| significant political power.
|
| Yes, they have no political power except the 26
| unelected, unaccountable bishops they have in the House
| of Lords, where every law must pass through.
| justin66 wrote:
| > The queen has "influence", but not political power.
|
| There's a very peculiar differentiation to make.
| hkt wrote:
| Also not true. The Queen is a lobbyist with legally
| enshrined privileges, see this report:
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/feb/07/revealed-
| que...
|
| "A series of government memos unearthed in the National
| Archives reveal that Elizabeth Windsor's private lawyer
| put pressure on ministers to alter proposed legislation
| to prevent her shareholdings from being disclosed to the
| public."
|
| Not to mention the lobbying Charles undertook, which took
| years to uncover, again because of his privileges as part
| of the royal family:
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/jun/29/prince-
| charl...
|
| ""I would explain that our policy was not to expand
| grammar schools, and he didn't like that," said Blunkett,
| who held the post from 1997 to 2001. "He was very keen
| that we should go back to a different era where
| youngsters had what he would have seen as the opportunity
| to escape from their background, whereas I wanted to
| change their background."
|
| Call it influence or power, fundamentally it is rich
| people getting to exert pressure on the legislative and
| executive that none of us get to exert.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| > Andrew's family rules Britain (for what, 1200 years?
| [1]),
|
| Try a bit over 100. The House of Windsor ascended to the
| throne of the United Kingdom in the misty past of ...
| 1901. Even if we disregard royal houses and look at just
| successions then you run into some awkward situations
| pretty early, including a nice run of kings born in
| Hanover and speaking primarily German.
|
| A lot of royalist propaganda is an attempt to tie
| relatively short lived dynasties into some mythical long
| lived chain of succession, mostly to reinforce the idea
| that they rule by right rather than by force or accident
| of history. In reality royal houses are regularly
| discarded when they become too inept, too inbred, or (in
| England's case) too Catholic for the people to tolerate.
| mattlondon wrote:
| The royal family has no involvement with the UK government.
|
| The queen is officially head of state, but in reality does
| what she is told by the current party in power (queen's
| speech is written for her for example).
| barcoder wrote:
| That's not true. The queen does have final say over laws.
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/feb/08/queen
| -...
| salawat wrote:
| The fact the Queen is exceedingly good at doing exactly
| what a Head of State should endeavor to do (not use power)
| does not mean they never will. Something to keep in mind.
| Especially with an informal Constitution.
|
| Not that a formal one makes much difference when the people
| who interpret it start doing mental gymnastics.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| She uses power, we just don't get to see it. She gets
| final review over any law that affects her estates
| _before it's submitted to parliment_ , which includes
| anything related to tax and employment law.
|
| The whole "the queen is just this beloved and powerless
| figurehead" is propaganda.
| JetSetWilly wrote:
| Indeed, I recall the stink when this came out:
| https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jul/28/queen-
| secret...
|
| She used "Queen's consent" to make sure she is the only
| person in Scotland who is exempted from a law designed to
| cut carbon emissions.
| zxcvbn4038 wrote:
| That's the same gimmick the US government uses, associating
| encryption with the boogeyman of the day, usually terrorism,
| child abuse, or Nazis. However it might also include migrants,
| drug dealers, unwed teenage mothers, welfare recipients, a
| laundry list of non-caucasians, and the Irish (I like to add
| that one in just to highlight the absurdity but the US really
| toned down the anti-Irish stuff in the 40s).
| tobbob wrote:
| End to end encryption will surely make a government's task of
| protecting the public much harder. It allows paedos, terrorists
| and the like to communicate freely, and any efforts to track what
| they're up to must be an absolute nightmare.
|
| The problem is, getting rid of encryption is replacing a bad
| situation with a disastrous situation. If you ban locks so the
| government can obtain access to the house of a terrorist, it
| means anyone now has access to anyone's house.
|
| If this article is to be believed, it really feels like someone
| just hasn't thought this through. Surely there's tech people
| whose job is to explain this to politicians.
| Kim_Bruning wrote:
| E2E encryption is a form of security. It also protects the
| victims of these people; and it protects the police. So the
| question is not black and white, but more about shifting the
| balance between different people. And in this case I'm not sure
| it'd shift it in the right direction.
|
| Drug dealers might be able to intercept police communications
| and be long gone. Pedophiles might be able to more easily track
| down their (next) victims. And terrorist groups tend to invest
| more and more in hacking units, and weakened defenses for
| police, off duty soldiers, and civilian targets can't possibly
| be a good idea.
|
| Finally the big one is state level actors using weaknesses in
| encryption to attack, impersonate, and undermine politicians;
| spearphish infrastructure and communications personnel, and
| just cause all-round havoc.
|
| In short, to paraphrase Franklin: Those who give up essential
| security to purchase a little security, err... end up with no
| security at all?
| [deleted]
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| If you want your communications to go to the government, I
| suggest you make a zip file and send it off to them. Personally
| I don't think any phone, tech device, or anything else should
| have spying software on it. It should require a specific
| warrant for a person, place, and time limit. The government has
| Far Too Much power already, we don't need to give it any more.
| Sure it allows criminals to do crime but it also allows the
| rest of us to carry on our lives without being spied on at
| every turn.
| tobbob wrote:
| Are people only reading the first sentence I wrote? I made
| the argument in favour of encryption.
| wanda wrote:
| > protecting the public
|
| Are you serious? This isn't high on their agenda at all.
|
| > surely there's tech people whose job is to explain this to
| politicians
|
| You have a very, very optimistic view of the world. If the
| government needs to get a consultant, they'll just find one who
| agrees with them.
| tobbob wrote:
| That's nonsense. It's all very well being ultra cynical,
| makes you feel high and mighty but what you're saying is
| absurd.
| wanda wrote:
| What I said is a long way from "ultra cynical"
|
| And I didn't say it for any feelings of my own, or for
| anyone's feelings for that matter.
| CryptoPunk wrote:
| Yes, malicious actors can also be found within the government.
| This is the reason behind placing limits on the power of the
| state.
| CommanderData wrote:
| Because TLS is already broken with the trusted model. CAs
| subpoenaed and also hacked a few years ago. PKI is dead.
|
| If you're a threat level is the state then there's very little to
| hide from them.
| motohagiography wrote:
| The campaign as described sounds like what would be classified as
| hate speech against any other identifiable group, and yet so long
| as governments and their appendant "agencies" approve of creating
| new identifiable groups to target with otherwise proscribed
| speech, it's somehow acceptable?
|
| This is Hutu vs. Tutsi meets Gobbels level propaganda, and I'm
| sure it must be very fun to be so righteous, we know how it ends.
| While mainstream society and discourses are not allowed to reason
| about the applicability or justness of violence, these official
| parties appear free to incite and direct it, and notably, to
| selectively enforce the provisions against it so that it's
| directed at the right people.
|
| These are dishonest parties working in bad faith using special
| protection, what are the alternatives? I'm afraid the only thing
| they will understand is cost.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| It honestly seems like the MPs involved still suffer the delusion
| that the U.K. is important enough to strong arm multinational
| companies into doing their will in order to gain access to the
| U.K. as a market. Genuinely not sure why they still think that,
| after their half assed (pun intended) attempt to ban pornography
| from their internet.
| FabHK wrote:
| If only some large tech company could come up with a way to deal
| with CSAM while still allowing for e2e... /s
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| Apple's plan was awful. How about there be no scanning at all?
| If you don't want your stuff scanned then don't put it on
| icloud or encrypt it before you put it there. I personally
| don't want scan-all-the-things policing software put on any of
| my devices. That should require a warrant at the least.
| FabHK wrote:
| But you see what happens when there is no scanning at all:
| politicians hook onto this awful crime to argue against e2ee.
|
| Of course, e2ee everywhere (e2eee? e2e3?) would be all fine
| and dandy if you didn't have these malicious actors. But we
| do.
|
| Suppose there are three options:
|
| 1. Encryption and no CSAM scanning 2. Encryption and on-
| device CSAM scanning 3. No encryption
|
| Currently we have 1 (more or less). Legislators are
| increasingly averse to keeping it that way, and are arguing
| for 3. Apple proposed 2.
|
| What is the alternative? Is there another option?
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| That's why you fire your representative and get a new one.
| Two wrongs don't make a right. Don't bend on this or they
| will break you later. The US government is already heading
| towards fascism with Trump's likely win in 2024, we don't
| need to speed it along.
| randomhodler84 wrote:
| This sarcasm is unbecoming. Client side filtering absolutely is
| not a panacea for "safe" end to end encryption. It is a cop in
| your pocket. Dystopia. The UK can continue making up its own
| reality if it wishes, strong encryption is the only way
| forward.
| jevoten wrote:
| > The new campaign, however, is entirely focused on the argument
| that improved encryption would hamper efforts to tackle child
| exploitation online.
|
| I bet cars and homes without microphones and cameras spying on
| their residents also hampers their efforts to keep children safe
| - are those next on the chopping block? They're already spying on
| near every street corner, after all.
|
| Funny how they never say "Technology has given us all this extra
| surveillance capability, you can reduce our legal powers somewhat
| to compensate" - it's always "People have some tiny scrap of
| privacy left - we _must_ eliminate it, or terrorists and
| pedophiles win! "
| dan-robertson wrote:
| I think complaining about 'think of the children' arguments is
| bad because:
|
| 1. These arguments appeal to people and making fun of them
| makes you sound like an ass. If your goal is to just complain
| to your in-group then I suppose that's fine, but it won't
| convince many people outside.
|
| 2. The arguments are true to some extent. CSAM online is a big
| thing, it's hard to combat and seems shockingly common. (Though
| I've not worked for a big internet company that is likely to
| interact with this problem so this is all second hand). We are
| fortunate to mostly not be exposed to this part of society.
|
| That doesn't mean that you can't support e2ee, but it does mean
| that it's unfair to dismiss these arguments as a secret ploy to
| spy on your communications and unrelated to any actual problem.
| jevoten wrote:
| > The arguments are true to some extent. CSAM online is a big
| thing
|
| As is sexual abuse inside private homes. Any child-protection
| argument that applies to spying online, applies ten times
| over to spying at home. How many children are raped each
| year, because you're unwilling to let a few cameras into your
| house? We pinky swear we'll only use the video feeds to
| investigate "serious" crimes.
| mattlondon wrote:
| > They're already spying on near every street corner, after
| all.
|
| Citation needed.
| frickinLasers wrote:
| https://www.precisesecurity.com/articles/top-10-countries-
| by...
|
| Holy crap, the US has more cameras per capita than China,
| according to this. The UK is a somewhat distant third.
|
| Though I think a distinction should be drawn between
| government-operated and commercial surveillance.
| godelski wrote:
| Per Capita is probably the wrong metric to use here. This
| isn't just limited to cameras but you don't need a single
| camera to track a single person. The more population dense
| an area is the higher efficiency a single camera can have.
|
| Just think about it in this manner. If you have a house and
| you set up cameras that monitor every square inch of the
| house, does it matter if there is one person in the house
| (high camera per occupant) or many people in the house (low
| camera per occupant)? Obviously not. The US is also one of
| the least population dense developed nations.
|
| Not that we shouldn't be worried about surveillance, but
| let's use good metrics.
| frickinLasers wrote:
| Fair enough. I didn't find a ready source on average
| camera densities by country, but comparing cities at the
| link below can give a sense of the difference. London has
| 399 cameras per square kilometer. Beijing has 278. NYC
| has 26, so not quite as Orwellian, in terms of cameras at
| least.
|
| Approximate Populations, per wikipedia, for reference:
| London: 9 million Beijing: 21 million
| NYC: 9 million
|
| https://www.visualcapitalist.com/mapped-the-top-
| surveillance...
| barcoder wrote:
| Just take a walk down any British town street. If you can't
| physically do it there's always Google Street View
| jevoten wrote:
| _One surveillance camera for every 11 people in Britain, says
| CCTV survey_ -
| https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/10172298/One-
| surveill...
|
| I'll leave it to you to estimate how many people live per
| street corner, on average.
| [deleted]
| foldr wrote:
| For the UK government to be "spying on every street
| corner", these cameras would have to be hooked up to some
| kind of central system. They're not (and indeed most are
| privately owned).
| jevoten wrote:
| Don't forget to count automated license plate readers,
| too: https://www.thenewspaper.com/news/48/4865.asp
|
| And in the context of a crime investigation, all those
| private cameras will have their recordings looked at by
| the police - though I concede "spying" is too harsh a
| word for that.
| foldr wrote:
| >And in the context of a crime investigation, all those
| private cameras will have their recordings looked at by
| the police
|
| This might happen in a parallel universe where the police
| were well resourced and competent. In reality, they
| rarely bother to access CCTV footage. It's not a
| particularly quick and easy process.
|
| https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/met-police-fail-to-
| sol...
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| Said surveillance is available at a moment's notice and
| without a warrant. Just because they can't do the show
| "24" level of surveillance doesn't mean it's not bad,
| real bad, out there for someone who just want's to live
| their life relatively unscrutinized. Can't really believe
| anyone on HN is standing up for 24 hour surveillance with
| cameras.
| foldr wrote:
| Private individuals and organisations are not obliged to
| give their surveillance footage to the police without a
| warrant. There's no centralized system, so the data is
| not in any way available 'at a moment's notice'.
|
| >Can't really believe anyone on HN is standing up for 24
| hour surveillance with cameras.
|
| As explained in the guidelines, there's a broad range of
| opinion on HN. However, I wouldn't say I'm 'standing up
| for' it. I'm fairly ambivalent about CCTV. I don't think
| it makes a large amount of difference, either positively
| or negatively. I do, however, think it's important to be
| accurate about how (un)sophisticated and (in)effective
| the surveillance apparatus actually is.
| jevoten wrote:
| I only have information on the US, but warrants don't
| offer much protection:
|
| https://www.popehat.com/2014/07/15/warrants-bulwark-of-
| liber...
| foldr wrote:
| I have to say this discussion is getting a little
| frustrating.
|
| First of all, information regarding the US is obviously
| irrelevant in the context of UK surveillance. Why even
| bring it up?
|
| Second, every time you reply, you keep broadening out the
| terms of the discussion further and further, rather than
| addressing any of the specific factual claims in my
| posts. I have not taken any strong stance for or against
| surveillance in general. I'm only concerned to address
| inaccurate claims about the extent of CCTV surveillance
| in the UK.
|
| The police can easily get warrants to look at lots of
| things that might be relevant to solving a crime. Maybe
| that is a problem. If so, that's an issue that's only
| tangentially related to CCTV surveillance in the UK.
|
| All I am doing is correcting the claim that the police in
| the UK can force private individuals to hand over CCTV
| footage without a warrant. If you have a problem with
| warrants per se, then that's probably a discussion to be
| had elsewhere.
| jevoten wrote:
| > First of all, information regarding the US is obviously
| irrelevant in the context of UK surveillance. Why even
| bring it up?
|
| Barring evidence otherwise, I believe it's reasonable to
| conclude the situation in the UK is similar, or at
| minimum, that we don't _know_ that warrants in the UK are
| an adequate protection. Unfortunately I don 't know of
| information about this that is specific to the UK.
|
| > you keep broadening out the terms of the discussion
| further and further, rather than addressing any of the
| specific factual claims in my posts.
|
| I apologize. I did and do concede that referring to the
| proliferation of mostly ( _mostly_ ) private CCTV in the
| UK as "government spying" is incorrect. I did not address
| the other claims you made because I agree with or believe
| them or think they're likely true and didn't bother
| investigating (such as a warrant requirement to take
| private CCTV footage, and that the police rarely bother
| to request CCTV footage). I see how that can create a
| frustrating feeling of getting nowhere.
|
| But while I don't dispute the latter two facts (in fact I
| think we agree on all factual issues so far), I disagree
| with the implication that this diminishes the
| surveillance state, or that the problem is limited to how
| warrants are issued.
|
| While the police/government may only rarely request CCTV
| footage, the _possibility_ is there, which is enough to
| establish chilling effects, especially for groups that
| may fear selective enforcement, where more resources are
| expended to suppress them than what is afforded to
| regular crime.
|
| This is how the US government defended their illegal bulk
| surveillance PRISM program - that while they collected
| data on everyone, they had strict (so they say) limits on
| who humans working there _looked at_ , and that only what
| humans look at counts as a "search".
|
| And while I do have a problem with how liberally warrants
| are granted, that would not be such an issue if there was
| less data for the warrants to request in the first place.
| Recent history has shown that once the infrastructure for
| surveillance is built, purely legal means are rarely
| effective in restricting its use.
| [deleted]
| belter wrote:
| oliv__ wrote:
| The way the article breaks down exactly how the campaign is set
| to "persuade" the public feels so dystopian and cynical.
|
| Launching a PS500K media campaign (with public funds) under the
| cover up pretense that "UK's biggest children's charity and
| stakeholders have come together to urge social media companies to
| put children's safety first" and then swaying people through
| "'sofa programmes' such as Loose Women and This Morning for
| broadcast".
|
| If this isn't manufactured consent, I don't know what is. But
| seeing what happens behind the curtains really makes you wonder:
| what other "mainstream opinions" were created this way?
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