Ah, that is what confused me. I thought you meant you were willing to give it up in hopes it would save the life of someone who mattered, but if you are making a consciencious decision to do it, that does change things drastically (and giving permission based on a request to you).
Unfortunately, the request to Apple isn’t a their decision to make, the people who could are not capable of granting such permission (nor do I think they should), but this still does not make a backdoor a good option. Knowing that anytime a court could mandate access to your device regardless of what your thoughts on the matter is scary. What if they did it over a speeding ticket? Or a misunderstanding? (wrong convinctions never happen right?)
I also struggle to figure out how an encrypted device can have a new operating system loaded onto it to add a backdoor. Last I knew, iPhones required unlocking to perform system updates… So how would Apple be able to even provide what is being asked?
I can see why it’s tempting to get access to a criminal’s phone to harvest useful information. But where does it stop? Hm, wouldn’t it be useful to have records of everything they did and said in their home? Problem is, we don’t know who’s doing bad stuff, so let’s just put listening devices into everyone’s homes, just to be sure. Yeah! Problem solved.
It’s too slippery a slope. It makes me shudder as I remember reading 1984 in high school.
Saw a great T-Shirt, “1984 was not an instruction manual”.
Anyway, back to the topic, I think many of us would lack the guts, status and money to stand up to authorities, even if we wanted to. Apple are one of a handful of companies in unique position to make a point.
In Room 101, O’Brien straps Winston to a chair, then clamps Winston’s head so that he cannot move. He tells Winston that Room 101 contains “theworst thing in the world.” He reminds Winston of his worst nightmare—thedream of being in a dark place with something terrible on the otherside of the wall—
If you flip this around and ask it a different way does it change your thoughts?
Why don’t you want the government/security services to be able to see what is on your phone? Are you seriously storing something that you do not want them to see to that extent?
And if you aren’t why do you want to protect those that are doing things that they want to keep so hidden from the government?
The world has changed so rapidly. When most of us were kids the only real way to organise something was via phone, post or actually going to see someone. This meant if you were a terrorist, pedophile, drug trafficker, people smuggler or whatever you would have to ( i am assuming as i am none of the above) ring on a potentially unsecured line. Security services could and did tap phones and get information when needed. They could intercept mail or follow suspects. Now they can’t. Everything would be a lot slower to organise and far less global. Does that make us more or less safe?
I can’t remember demanding that i have a secure line so i could call my mate to go out to play, so i am unsure why everyone worries so much about having their phones encrypted so much so that not even Governments can find out that i took a picture of my dinner last night and that i ‘lol’ some joke someone text me. If the government really care that ‘I’ll be late home tonight. don’t worry about dinner I’ll have the left overs from yesterday xxx’ then it’s nice that they care about me that much.
No, I’m not, but that’s beside the point. Just because I don’t have anything to hide doesn’t mean I want people to have free and open access to what I do have.
There are two parts to why:
If someone can have open access to look into things, they also have open access to PUT things there. There have been too many cases where items have been planted just to ensure that a conviction is found (search for innocence project sometime), that any open invitation to go through my things just makes my skin crawl. While the majority of law enforcement officials are good, honest people, there are enough that feel they have the right to do whatever they want, “in the name of justice”
The other issue I have with this is that if a legal means is enforced, then it’s guaranteed to be used for illegitimate means. We have enough issues with hackers stealing identities, why do we willingly want to provide them an open door to come in and cause more havoc?
These are false dichotomies. No matter how many tools you provide law enforcement, the criminal element will continue to find new and potentially more insidious ways to elude capture.
People used to send communications just through letters and people figured out they could find out what they were planning by intercepting the communications. So they started sending out multiple people. Once they were all captured, they moved onto putting things into code. Once people started to figure out simple codes, they became more complex. Then they went to wired transmissions, and the process started all over again. Then wireless, then telephone, then email, ftp or web. There will always be those that can find new ways to evade the law.
And if you talked about playing cops and robbers and pretended to plan robbing a bank? Or kidnapping a popular celebrity? Or jokingly talked about killing a presidential candidate because you can’t stand the possibility of that candidate being elected? How does the law enforcement agencies know you are joking around? Do they take your word for it, or do you now become a target? What if you have a (legal) collection of firearms which would be appropriate for any of those joking actions? Where do you draw the line?
I’m sorry, but there are too many instances of bad things happening because of originally well intended purposes that I refuse to accept an open door policy for those with the power to inflict harm on others for the “right reasons”. Here are just three from the last 60 years, and just from the US, which I can think of - I can come up with more, and from other countries pretty easily.
McCarthyism
Japanese Internment Camps
The imprisonment and/or “interrogation” tactics used against suspected Al Qaeda (which produced far more “bad” intel than good.
yes i should be investigated if i am continually talking about that kind of stuff and communicating on a regular basis with known criminals or visiting sites that are linked to that kind of stuff.
There is a big difference between talking about what i’d do with the money if i robbed a bank, to having full blueprints of the local bank and the times and location the security van arrives. If I overheard someone in a pub talking about this numerous times i’d probably inform the police just to be safe.
‘They’ could already turn up at your house or place of work and plant a kilo of coke if they really wanted to get you, as the Government already know where you live, work, which doctor you have, etc etc. but i doubt they will bother and it doesn’t matter if your phone is encrypted or not if they want you that badly they will come get you.
And how many people have had their lives ruined by drug pushers or people traffickers?
To my mind the only people this truly protects is criminals.
I don’t see how either of those has any effect on this discussion
In the first case, in a VERY large majority of the cases (say 90% or more), it’s the person who makes a conscious choice to take the drugs the first time, regardless of the thousands of hours of education and/or advertisements warning of the dangers of the addiction.
Arguably, a much better approach would be finding ways to legalize them (or at least safer alternatives to them). Regulation would control product quality, allow for effective alternative treatments, and provide a revenue source which currently doesn’t exist.
I don’t understand the second case argument at all - from what I have read on the subject (which admittedly is not as complete as it should be), most trafficking activity occurs locally, and if it goes across borders, then communication occurs encoded over the net, which back doors to phones wouldn’t resolve.
Yes, we will. You have far too much trust in the honesty of people in power. That’s why checks and balances are in place - and why the US is struggling at the moment, as one branch isn’t doing their jobs, which is currently crippling another, and allowing the third to exercise more authority than should be allowed…
Because the easier you make it for people to communicate without being caught, the easier it is for criminal activity on a large, multinational scale. If there is no way in to encrypted phones and the criminals know it then why not use them to store information they don’t want people to ever find and communicate safety.
I just don’t worry as i can’t see what additional information they could actually gain. The Government already can see my entire medical history, where i’ve been to school, how much tax i’ve paid, who i work for, what car i drive, where i live etc etc
If i have something i don’t want anyone to see then i don’t put it on an electronic device connected to the internet/cloud/someones server. But i don’t because i don’t have anything that i have to hide to that extent.
To clarify though i am not advocating full continual snooping by the Government but if they go through the correct legal channels and get a warrant then i think they should be allowed/be able to get that information, in the same way they can’t come into my house without a warrant, but if they have one issued by the law courts then they can.
And if there is no way to encrypt them securely, then identity thieves can come in and steal a person’s information and/or identity and ruin their lives…which happens ALL THE TIME.
I have no problem with legally obtained warrants and searches, but the original issue wasn’t that they wanted this for this one case. The US government wanted a skeleton key built that allowed them easy and free access to ANY and ALL iPhones - something they openly admitted to having plenty of other cases where they wanted to use this same approach on.
