Do you want the government to have the ability to unlock and computer file you have if they want to? This is not the first time some part of the federal government has tried to do this. This time the FBI is trying.
Some excerpts (Italicized):
The FBI now wants to require all encrypted communications systems to have backdoors for surveillance, according to a New York Times report, and to the nation's top crypto experts it sounds like a battle they've fought before.
Back in the 1990s, in what's remembered as the crypto wars, the FBI and NSA argued that national security would be endangered if they did not have a way to spy on encrypted e-mails, IMs and phone calls. After a long protracted battle, the security community prevailed after mustering detailed technical studies and research that concluded that national security was actually strengthened by wide use of encryption to secure computers and sensitive business and government communications
According to the proposal, any company doing business in the States could not create an encrypted communication system without having a way for the government to order the company to decrypt it, and those who currently do offer that service would have to retool it. It's the equivalent of outlawing whispering in real life.
Cryptographers have long argued that backdoors aren't a feature—they are just a security hole that will inevitably be abused by hackers or adversarial governments.
Should we be worried? Is privacy a right? Is privacy important?
(ORIGINAL LINK) FBI drive for encryption backdoors is déjà vu for security experts
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