Last winter it looked as if there was going to be an international initiative against encryption. However, after some public attention, President Obama announced that there were no such plans – at present. Shortly after that, there was a brawl between Apple and the FBI, ending with the FBI withdrawing its subpoena for Apple to build software to give backdoor access to an iPhone. (The FBI cracked it by other methods.) Meanwhile, the UK is slowly moving towards some sort of ban on encryption.
Now, it seems this issue will get new attention. Last week the French called for a global initiative to “deal with” encryption. Apparently, they are trying to get Germany aboard on such an initiative. If so, we can expect the issue to become a hot topic in the EU shortly.
As most politicians are somewhat ignorant when it comes to IT and the Internet – we can expect some ill-conceived proposals.
It would be very difficult for politicians to ban user managed end-to-end encryption like PGP. That should reasonably not be up for discussion. (But you never know when it comes to the EU.)
My guess is politicians (and law enforcement) will take aim at popular communication apps like Whatsapp and Telegram – and to demand backdoors to smartphones and other encrypted hardware.
Cracking communication apps and installing backdoors is still a terrible idea. These techniques will – sooner or later – end up in the wrong hands. And government having access to citizens communications is still a very unpleasant concept.
However, this will not prevent terrorists and criminals from communicating securely and covertly – if they really want to.
/ HAX
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