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WhatsApp encryption and private communication April 9, 2016

Posted by Aonrud ⚘ in Internet security/privacy/information, Technology.
8 comments

You may have seen during the week that WhatsApp have recently introduced end-to-end encryption, meaning even they (or the company’s owners in Facebook) can’t intercept the content of your communications.  With a billion users, WhatsApp have rolled this out quietly to a huge number of people.

Of course the response from state security in its various forms isn’t entirely positive.  For example, in the UK, Theresa May’s Investigatory Powers Bill could essentially seek to ban private encrypted communication.  There are arguably legitimate cases law enforcement can point to, and there are plenty of unpalatable uses private communication can be put to, but ultimately this sort of choice is quite all-or-nothing. Unfortunately or otherwise, if there’s a back door of any kind, then your messages aren’t private, and guaranteeing only the ‘right’ parties can exploit that is difficult; and if they are properly encrypted, then they can’t be accessed, even in exceptional circumstances.  It’ll be interesting to see what sort of pressure WhatsApp experience in the aftermath of this.

That also points to the issue that this service remains proprietary, so there is still a single target which could ostensibly be forced to stop providing it.  Even though WhatsApp aren’t storing all your information (like, for example, Facebook are) you still require their software.  I heard someone suggest recently that privacy has somewhat replaced the free software (libre, not gratis) movement’s prominence in technology rights.  The two are intertwined of course, but WhatsApp points to the problem that removing the service requires only a single target, whereas decentralised, open source methods of communication (of which email, for all its flaws, is an example) are far harder to shut down.

Still, even though I’d prefer a decentralised free software alternative, credit where it’s due to WhatsApp for rolling out fully private communication to a huge swathe of people, many of whom may not have otherwise sought it out.

Ireland and RIPA’s ‘economic well-being’ clause June 26, 2013

Posted by WorldbyStorm in British Politics, Internet security/privacy/information, Irish Politics.
3 comments

From Gé Bruite a post with some very interesting thoughts about Ireland and RIPA.

As those of you who have been paying attention will know, RIPA (the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act) was passed in the UK in 2000.

It specifically permits the interception of communications (contents as well as ‘meta-data’), informers and following of ‘suspects’:

…in the interests of national security, for the purpose of preventing or detecting serious crime and for the purpose of safeguarding the economic well-being of the United Kingdom.

The list of agencies permitted to use these powers is long, one might say exhaustive.

Now take a look at the optic fibre cable map and zoom the map in to Ireland (the gray cables represent those yet to be laid).

Practically all of our communications go through these cables.  And all the cable from Ireland passes through UK territory.  As we now know, GCHQ can monitor any and all communications through these cables, to ensure the ‘economic well-being’ of the UK.

If I was running an Irish business with UK competitors I would be concerned. If I was someone who publicly expressed the opinion that the baleful influence of the City of London on British and European politics should be curtailed by legislation banning most of their activities, I would be concerned. If I was campaigning against the British arms trade, I would be very concerned.

The thing is, in the digital world, evidence is easy to fake. Unless you digitally sign every communication with a private key that has been kept safe, then the interceptors can manufacture communications evidence. And, hey presto, your anti-arms trade campaigners can so easily become ‘terrorists’, hauled before semi-secret courts, and silenced.

As sclerotic capitalism – going through its longest crisis since the 1930s – becomes more authoritarian, and if we don’t succeed in taking back some democratic ground, we can expect these powers of the state to be used more and more.