lewmur Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 Apple's Tim Cook said in an interview with Charlie Rose that American's have a right to encrypt their Smartphones to protect the privacy of their banking, medical and intimate conversations or even business secrets. This sound reasonable on the surface but it isn't. There is a well established legal precedent that says law enforcement is able get a court order to monitor "phone" conversations or open your mail. Why should "smart phones" be any different? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 Encryption has nothing at all to do with email or phone conversations. They can already get to your email by giving a court order to Google or whatever email service you use and they can tap the phone conversations at the ISP level. Encryption just keeps your data safe from prying eyes, not your email or conversations. Until they try to ban it, I will always keep my devices encrypted. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 21, 2015 Author Share Posted December 21, 2015 Encryption has nothing at all to do with email or phone conversations. They can already get to your email by giving a court order to Google or whatever email service you use and they can tap the phone conversations at the ISP level. Encryption just keeps your data safe from prying eyes, not your email or conversations. Until they try to ban it, I will always keep my devices encrypted. Encryption has EVERYTHING to with email and phone conversations on the latest smartphones and even gaming consoles. And even the NSA's computers can't decrypt them in a timely manner. It does no good for law enforcement to intercept phone calls or emails they can't hear or read. This debate has absolutely nothing to do with you encrypting the data on your devices and everything to do with encrypting TRANSMISSIONS with keys stored ONLY on the transmitting and receiving devices. If law enforcement wants the data on your computer, they can force you to give them the key or you'll go to jail. They can't do that with encrypted communications. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 Xkcd said it best (applies to phones as well): Irregardless you can always use pgp via an extension or app. You said "on the latest smartphones"..well I have the latest android smartphone (released last month) and unless you use a third party app like CipherMail or Redphone, you cannot encrypt emails or phone calls by default on Android. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 21, 2015 Author Share Posted December 21, 2015 (edited) Xkcd said it best (applies to phones as well): Irregardless you can always use pgp via an extension or app. You said "on the latest smartphones"..well I have the latest android smartphone (released last month) and unless you use a third party app like CipherMail or Redphone, you cannot encrypt emails or phone calls by default on Android. Not all smartphones are the same. Your phone may not encrypt by default but Mr. Cook's iPhones do and some Android phones do. So do some game boxes. And PGP is not state-of-the-art encryption by any means. "Mr. President, this guy blew up a mall yesterday. Is it Okay if we beat his encryption key out of him now that it is too late?" In fact, with iPhones, I don't think the owner even knows the key. If I'm not mistaken, it is built into the device. And it is well known that Apple intentionally designed the encryption so that Apple couldn't be taken to court and forced to reveal the keys because they don't know them. This is featured selling point and has been copied by others in order to compete. Edited December 21, 2015 by lewmur Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 All Android devices give you the option to encrypt and I have mine encrypted. Some do this by default but its the same method they all use so it's just a matter of enabling it or not. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 21, 2015 Author Share Posted December 21, 2015 (edited) All Android devices give you the option to encrypt and I have mine encrypted. Some do this by default but its the same method they all use so it's just a matter of enabling it or not. They give you the option to encrypt DATA not PHONECALLS!!!! You are not getting the distinction between storage and communications. It is the encrypted COMMUNICATIONS that have law enforcement worried. The ability to plan and coordinate attacks or other illegal activity. edit: Perhaps you'll recall the stink that was raised when MS bought Skype and then relented the pressure from the Fed govt and gave it the ability to decrypt Skype calls. Well, Apple, and others, got around that by coming up with a system that even they couldn't decrypt. Now the courts can't force them to do so. The only option left to the Federal Govt is to make such encryption illegal. Edited December 21, 2015 by lewmur Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 Oh I am, hence why I mentioned Red Phone. Apple does not encrypt phone calls, just facetime calls. https://www.apple.co...ach-to-privacy/ Android does not encrypt phone calls either. Your thinking of the encrypted data by default on new Android and Apple devices, not phone calls. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 21, 2015 Author Share Posted December 21, 2015 (edited) Oh I am, hence why I mentioned Red Phone. Apple does not encrypt phone calls, just facetime calls. https://www.apple.co...ach-to-privacy/ Android does not encrypt phone calls either. Your thinking of the encrypted data by default on new Android and Apple devices, not phone calls. Gee, I wonder which ones the terrorist will use. Whether it is all phone calls or just some is irrelevant. The fact is they are giving organizations like ISIS the ability to communicate freely. Edited December 21, 2015 by lewmur Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 And also for free Americans.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 21, 2015 Author Share Posted December 21, 2015 And also for free Americans.... Which brings us right to the original argument. Free Americans have never been free from court ordered "snooping". And this link seems to say ALL calls from an Apple device can be encrypted. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 And once again... that is an app, not built into apple. From that article: Now a free, zero-learning-curve app exists for both text and voice that can keep those communications fully encrypted, so that no one but the person holding the phone on the other end can decipher your words. I have been using OpenWhisper apps for almost a year now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 21, 2015 Author Share Posted December 21, 2015 (edited) And once again... that is an app, not built into apple. From that article: Now a free, zero-learning-curve app exists for both text and voice that can keep those communications fully encrypted, so that no one but the person holding the phone on the other end can decipher your words. I have been using OpenWhisper apps for almost a year now. You keep making distinctions without a difference. Who cares if you have to install it or it comes pre-installed? The only pertinent fact is that it exist and that crooks and terrorist can use it to hide their activities. Edited December 21, 2015 by lewmur Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 In my opinion, it should exist without any government backdoors at all. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 21, 2015 Author Share Posted December 21, 2015 In my opinion, it should exist without any government backdoors at all. We all know your opinion. You've made it abundantly clear. But it still isn't a traditional "right". And it is my opinion that if Tim Cook and others don't find a way to accommodate the govt, then Congress will pass a law you'll dislike a whole lot more. One that just outright makes ANY encryption illegal. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 And then some security researcher will find a way around it and a lot of us will bypass it just like anything else they try to do to hinder our freedoms. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 The part about encryption and such is that it is math.... 100% open source.... if the companies and gov't get together and develop some new crypto that has backdoors, etc.... the bad guys will simply not use it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete! Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 Passing a law against something, only ensures that people who obey the law don't have it. Those aren't the people we need to worry about.... eg - When the Nazis restricted firearms, the resistance started making copies of the British "Sten" in bicycle shops. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robert Posted December 21, 2015 Share Posted December 21, 2015 Anything the govt can hear or intercept, the criminal tracking your kids or wife will too. Better to keep everyone safe with encrypted communications than allow back doors. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 22, 2015 Author Share Posted December 22, 2015 Anything the govt can hear or intercept, the criminal tracking your kids or wife will too. Better to keep everyone safe with encrypted communications than allow back doors. This is getting downright silly. I've been making phone calls for over 70 years and have NEVER felt the need to have one encrypted. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robert Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 (edited) A couple of family stories comes to mind. During the Revolutionary War an ancestor of mine was taken and beaten to death by a Tory militia. They wanted him to reveal the location of money he got from selling his crops. Two things I learn from this are, encrypt your financial data or you could become a target, and the militias mentioned in the 2nd Amendment were the bad guys. These militias were necessary for the govt security, but are not so nice for the regular citizen. The 2nd Amendment is not about arming the militias it is about protecting yourself from them. In 1863 my 2nd great grandmother was taking care of the kids in their adobe home on the frontier. Not far away some Ute indians tried to ambush a detachment of cavalry. The soldiers fled and when they saw the adobe house they barged in. In the hail of bullets and arrows that followed the United States Army kicked my family out the front door to run for their lives. The Ute's stopped firing to let them pass, while the Army continued to fire. The next day when the family returned they found the soldiers had purposely destroyed all their stored food so times were hard for a while. Lesson learned: The organised military does not always behave much better than the militias of 1776. Edited December 22, 2015 by Robert 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goretsky Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 Hello, Then you should not encrypt your phone calls (or text messages, emails, instant messages and the like). That, however, does not mean that just because you do not perceive a need for something that it is incorrect for others to use it. In the 21st century, the right to privacy is increasingly becoming a human right. In the United States, the Fourth Amendment protects us from "unreasonable searches and seizures." The ability for the government to monitor every communication a person makes, their location, whom they are in contact with and so on is essentially a general warrant and allows for all kinds of fishing expeditions and abuses that are antithetical to a free, open democracy where people have a right to think what they want and talk without being put into a political prison/re-education camp. If there is one thing that the short history of our country has shown us, it is that that the government can and will abuse its powers. I, for one, see no reason to roll over and blithely allow our civil liberties to be eroded because of whatever bogeyman the government wants to scare us with. Regards, Aryeh Goretsky Anything the govt can hear or intercept, the criminal tracking your kids or wife will too. Better to keep everyone safe with encrypted communications than allow back doors. This is getting downright silly. I've been making phone calls for over 70 years and have NEVER felt the need to have one encrypted. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 22, 2015 Author Share Posted December 22, 2015 Anything the govt can hear or intercept, the criminal tracking your kids or wife will too. Better to keep everyone safe with encrypted communications than allow back doors. Just how is the criminal going to get a court order compelling Apple to give them your personal key? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 Hello, Then you should not encrypt your phone calls (or text messages, emails, instant messages and the like). That, however, does not mean that just because you do not perceive a need for something that it is incorrect for others to use it. In the 21st century, the right to privacy is increasingly becoming a human right. In the United States, the Fourth Amendment protects us from "unreasonable searches and seizures." The ability for the government to monitor every communication a person makes, their location, whom they are in contact with and so on is essentially a general warrant and allows for all kinds of fishing expeditions and abuses that are antithetical to a free, open democracy where people have a right to think what they want and talk without being put into a political prison/re-education camp. If there is one thing that the short history of our country has shown us, it is that that the government can and will abuse its powers. I, for one, see no reason to roll over and blithely allow our civil liberties to be eroded because of whatever bogeyman the government wants to scare us with. Regards, Aryeh Goretsky EXACTLY!! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 22, 2015 Author Share Posted December 22, 2015 (edited) Hello, Then you should not encrypt your phone calls (or text messages, emails, instant messages and the like). That, however, does not mean that just because you do not perceive a need for something that it is incorrect for others to use it. In the 21st century, the right to privacy is increasingly becoming a human right. In the United States, the Fourth Amendment protects us from "unreasonable searches and seizures." The ability for the government to monitor every communication a person makes, their location, whom they are in contact with and so on is essentially a general warrant and allows for all kinds of fishing expeditions and abuses that are antith etical to a free, open democracy where people have a right to think what they want and talk without being put into a political prison/re-education camp. If there is one thing that the short history of our country has shown us, it is that that the government can and will abuse its powers. I, for one, see no reason to roll over and blithely allow our civil liberties to be eroded because of whatever bogeyman the government wants to scare us with. Regards, Aryeh Goretsky EXACTLY!! Exactly??? That post is peppered with errors. Sentence two was just an opinion but sentence three states that privacy is becoming more of a human right in direct contradiction of the facts. CCTV cams everywhere, stoplight cams tracking license plates, auto computers turning in their owners for violations, retail stores tracking your purchases, etc etc. Get real! The Fourth Amendment protects us from UNREASONABLE search and seizure. Not ALL search and seizure. The SCOTUS has ruled many times that govt tapping your phone or reading your mail, WITH A COURT ORDER, is NOT unreasonable. Edited December 22, 2015 by lewmur Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 Exactly??? That post is peppered with errors. Sentence two was just an opinion but sentence three states that privacy is becoming more of a human right in direct contradiction of the facts. CCTV cams everywhere, stoplight cams tracking license plates, auto computers turning in their owners for violations, retail stores tracking your purchases, etc etc. Get real! The Fourth Amendment protects us from UNREASONABLE search and seizure. Not ALL search and seizure. The SCOTUS has ruled many times that govt tapping your phone or reading your mail, WITH A COURT ORDER, is NOT unreasonable. It is unreasonable if you are innocent. Of course the SCOTUS ruled that way. You do not actually expect them to care about the people, do you? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 22, 2015 Author Share Posted December 22, 2015 Exactly??? That post is peppered with errors. Sentence two was just an opinion but sentence three states that privacy is becoming more of a human right in direct contradiction of the facts. CCTV cams everywhere, stoplight cams tracking license plates, auto computers turning in their owners for violations, retail stores tracking your purchases, etc etc. Get real! The Fourth Amendment protects us from UNREASONABLE search and seizure. Not ALL search and seizure. The SCOTUS has ruled many times that govt tapping your phone or reading your mail, WITH A COURT ORDER, is NOT unreasonable. It is unreasonable if you are innocent. Of course the SCOTUS ruled that way. You do not actually expect them to care about the people, do you? No, it is NOT unreasonable if there is enough evidence to convince a Judge that it IS reasonable. Innocent people are prosecuted every day for crimes they didn't commit. That is NOT a violation of their rights if a Grand Jury, or a Judge at a preliminary hearing says there is sufficient evidence to present it to a jury. And, yes, I do expect SCOTUS to care about the people. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 So spying on everyone is ok even if their not a target? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lewmur Posted December 22, 2015 Author Share Posted December 22, 2015 So spying on everyone is ok even if their not a target? No, spying on people a JUDGE says there is enough evidence to suspect they are guilty of illegality. Why do you INSIST upon distorting the FACTS. >_< Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted December 22, 2015 Share Posted December 22, 2015 So spying on everyone is ok even if their not a target? No, spying on people a JUDGE says there is enough evidence to suspect they are guilty of illegality. Why do you INSIST upon distorting the FACTS. >__ Mass surveillance in the United States Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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