The White House will not be supporting draft legislation that would allow courts to force tech companies like Apple to help law enforcement hack into encrypted devices, reports Reuters.
The Senate Intelligence Committee in February announced plans to impose criminal penalties on companies that fail to comply with court orders like the one challenged by Apple and finally withdrawn by the FBI. Remarks by President Obama last month appeared to suggest he would support the proposed legislation, but it now appears this isn’t the case …
The FBI has been pressing for the legislation, briefing two Senators working on the bill on the method used to crack the iPhone 5c in the San Bernardino case. If I were to speculate on the purpose of the briefing, I’d say it would be to persuade the Senators that the method used is a difficult one that would not work with later iPhones, thus providing additional ammunition for their case.
President Obama previously spoke of the difficult balancing act between privacy and security, but his comments then suggested that was siding against Apple.
The question we now have to ask is, if technologically it is possible to make an impenetrable device or system where the encryption is so strong that there is no key, there’s no door, at all, then how do we apprehend the child pornographer, how do we solve, or disrupt a terrorist plot, what mechanisms to we have available to do simple things like tax enforcement… if government can’t get in, then everyone’s walking around with a Swiss bank account in their pocket… there has to be some concession to the need to be able to get into that information somehow.
But the Reuters reports indicates that Obama does not believe the government should go so far as to criminalize refusal to assist law enforcement to hack into devices.
The White House is declining to offer public support for draft legislation that would empower judges to require technology companies such as Apple Inc to help law enforcement crack encrypted data, sources familiar with the discussions said.
TNW says its sources suggest the planned bill is in any case unlikely to make it through Congress before the election.
Sources familiar with the matter say that the proposed bill isn’t likely to go far in a gridlocked Congress during an election year.
This battle looks set to continue for quite some time yet.
Photo: Diego Cambiaso
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Finally . . . a slight ray of hope that our government isn’t as F**KED up as I thought!
Thank you, Barrack! May the House and Senate see the lies that the DOJ and the other 3 letter spook agencies have been feeding them and stand down on their plans!
I can only Hope!
However, in reading the quoted text a little closer, “The White House is declining to offer public support for draft legislation” that ray of hope just got a little dimmer!
lol, was just going to say. For a president that unconstitutionally uses drones to kill American Citizens, this just reeks of a marketing ploy.
Link?
Shareef777:
According to the US Constitution, the penalty for being a ”Traitor” to the United States of America is DEATH! The few individuals that were targeted by Drones proved they were ”Traitors”.
Back to the article, one thing these brainless politicians do not realize by forcing backdoors into American companies products, these brainless politicians are in essence losing sales for these companies. When you have competition in your industry from worldwide suppliers, which product will be bought? I have software/hardware made in America with backdoors for their government or I can buy software/hardware from a EU based company with NO backdoors. Which one will you buy? I know where my money will go and it would not be with a product that has backdoors! This hurt some Chinese based manufacturers. There have been reports that some Chinese based manufacturers have backdoors in their products because the Chinese government forced them to do it. If this is true or not, not sure, but there is evidence.
Remember, once these draconian measures are enacted it is hard to earn the trust from people, if down the road these same brainless politicians realize they killed off the IT industry that is keeping this country afloat. If the IT industry was not around in 2008, the US economy would have hit a depression, and may still be depressed as manufacturing left in the 80’s. The only industry keeping America strong today is the IT industry.
Don’t they already have legislation in the communication charters that says they cannot do this anyway…??? Which would mean they are breaking the law by doing this if they do… As the law already says they can’t. So they would have to change the other laws as well… Good luck with that…
You speculate well, Ben.
If anyone wants to vote for the best phone between Lumia and iPhone 6S Plus…
http://www.technobuffalo com/2016/04/06/apple-iphone-6s-plus-vs-lumia-950-xl-vote-best-smartphone-mobile-madness-2016/
No spam, please.
Thank you.
“If government can’t get in, then everyone’s walking around with a Swiss bank account in their pocket”. Isn’t that the whole point of constitutional protections?
Mmm .. a few weasel words here?
That bill seemed to be saying Apple & co. should be stopped from producing products and services which are deliberately designed to prevent disclosure to law enforcement (on court order). This report says Obama not in favour of people being forced to hack into things – that’s not the same thing.
But not that big an issue what Obama thinks – not long until a change of administration.
Hopefully a new administration will have the back bone to take on these greedy corporations.