+ TSA keys
+ OPM (all of it)
+ NSA's hacking tools
Were these incredible skilled sidechannel attacks? Movie esque infiltrations?
+ TSA accidentally published the keys
+ OPM was a master password from a contractor who was bribed for about the cost of an ipad
+ NSA hacking tools was.. an email trojan? A CD walked?
Do you really trust these people with anything?
Putting a backdoor into encryption is less secure than a random Microsoft employee backdooring me. At least I know it's Microsoft who will be doing the backdoor...
This isn't politics, this is history. This is not the first time, nor the last time we've seen these moves. We know 5 eyes have had major incidents of internal abuse because we have their own documentation on it - and we have their own documentation that they decided to do nothing about it.
It requires external oversight for any organization to truly follow compliance, otherwise the incentives to cheat the system are overbearing. If they won't take us at our word, why would we take them at theirs?
My point isn't about how much you trust Microsoft, but that Microsoft has keys, which are more easily stolen and in many regards more valuable than the scheme I gave.
> TSA keys
Not remotely comparable. These were never designed to be secure in the sense we're talking here.
> OPM (all of it)
> NSA's hacking tools
Hence the scheme I gave, which isn't vulnerable in the same way.
We had security agencies that had the info but didn't act in case of Vienna. Encryption wasn't the issue here, this is an incontinent case of saving face at best, a deliberate attack against civil rights at worst.
> These were never designed to be secure in the sense we're talking here
Encryption today is a protection against access for a limited amount of time. It is an intrinsic rule about every encryption algorithm. It is fundamental property and widely known.
Making a political comment but then trying to shut down discussion of it by stating that you will not participate in political discussions is a double standard, though perhaps you were unaware that you were doing it.
I think what prompted me to react was mostly your `[government bad]` blurb. It felt like you got to state your political position and caricaturise the political position of the responder while avoiding further discussion. That felt wrong.
This is a completely different context to having one copy (or a small number) of said low-bandwidth silicon held exclusively by an agency vested in keeping it exclusive, plus another copy held by the company themselves, such that both copies would need to be broken for security to be weakened.
> If it's already backdoored then there is no need for such an act, the problem is already solved.
Seriously? Microsoft having the ability to install a keylogger on any random person's machine is not the solution to finding networks of criminal activity.
> [government bad]
I'll debate the technicals but I'm not going to argue politics here.