| We live in a world, not a democracy. There are many different countries, with many different systems. Any proposed solution has to deal with that reality, not with the little bubble of one democracy which may arguably in the questionable opinions of some subset of people have a good government. The reality includes police states where the police are truly evil. It also includes police states where the software is written by truly evil people, to do evil things, with evil experts overseeing it all and approving evil behavior in the software they are checking. Please tell me how you can be confident that there can be a solution that addresses this reality while protecting the privacy of users. Sometimes all the user wants to do is send a message to their boyfriend, without getting thrown off a building, burned, flogged, or killed, possibly having several generations of your family killed as well (see North Korea). The system has to work for this reality. I'm pretty sure that simply drawing a line and fully protecting the privacy of users' messages, full stop, is a better solution than whatever you and your senators will come up with. And yes, the security of a crypto system can be verified. If it's designed to be secure. Not if it's designed to be monitored. Even if the experts are perfect angels and absolutely competent, if there is a way to monitor, hackers will find a way to get access to it. >When it comes to properly securing the physical part (the servers), I'm sure something can be figured out there. You're dreaming. Remember, the authorities will have full power over that system, and even in countries where the authorities are not evil, the authorities as a rule are inevitably corruptible if not corrupt. This isn't just cynicism, it's reality. Look around. |
Theoretical security and actual security are two very different things. Once is mathematical which can be verified by equations. Other deals with software and imperfect developers. Software can't be verified for perfect security in a deterministic way, no matter how hard you try. Vulnerabilities pop up all the time. Your expectation that theoretical security translates to real world security is something I believe you need to think about again.
>Not if it's designed to be monitored. Even if the experts are perfect angels and absolutely competent, if there is a way to monitor, hackers will find a way to get access to it.
You seem to miss the part where I said a new protocol, not something which is modified, or backdoored. I'm surprised at you being so sure about the failure of a non-existent protocol. Do you have anything to back up your claim that any such protocol wouldn't work? Remember, it doesn't exist yet.
I honestly didn't find most of your post very coherent. There is no avenue for free speech in North Korea and other authoritarian regimes so it is a waste of time talking about working around the existing government for privacy and free speech rights. The only place where the masses can bring about change is in a democracy.
>not with the little bubble of one democracy
Last time I checked, most countries are democratic. Please show me the case where democratic countries vastly differ in how their government is organized.
> The reality includes police states where the police are truly evil.
Again, I talked about a democracy since we really can't do anything to help them with encryption and code. If there are no rights, strong encryption doesn't really matter. Look up rubber-hose cryptanalysis.
> The system has to work for this reality. I'm pretty sure that simply drawing a line and fully protecting the privacy of users' messages, full stop, is a better solution than whatever you and your senators will come up with.
It is of course is a better solution for individual privacy, I thought I talked about this at the end of my last comment. I don't have much control over my senators.
>>>When it comes to properly securing the physical part (the servers), I'm sure something can be figured out there.
>You're dreaming. Remember, the authorities will have full power over that system, and even in countries where the authorities are not evil, the authorities as a rule are inevitably corruptible if not corrupt. This isn't just cynicism, it's reality. Look around.
Full power? I don't believe you have understood what I said.
At this point it feels like you're arguing for the sake of an argument.