[vineyardmike]

> wouldn't an expert be consulted??

All the prosecutes need is an expert that says "Base64 is an encryption. Sending data encrypted means they don't want you to read it.. they tried to break encryption and succeeded when they werent supposed to"

And then just fear-monger the risk of broken encryption and government and how you have to try to break it and its dangerous or something.

Lots of people claim to be experts, and know enough to pass. Plenty of people want to curry gov favor, or get their 10 seconds of attention.

[_y5hn]

Base64 is a well-known plain-text encoding format. Using it as an encryption format violates privacy laws.

[vineyardmike]

You sure the courts will know that if an "expert" paid by the state says otherwise?