Current Events > Anti-encryption and censorship legislation is still going strong in the Senate

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/03/proposed-us-law-is-trojan-horse-to-stop-online-encryption-critics-say/

You can read more about this bill and why it is a terrible idea, and why it isn't necessary at all to protect children:
https://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/blog/2020/01/earn-it-act-how-ban-end-end-encryption-without-actually-banning-it

Bottom line

Vote the GOP out

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Doom_Art posted...

Bottom line

Vote the GOP out

Unfortunately, the EARN IT act is a bipartisan piece of legislation. It's too early to say how much support it will receive from either party in the House or Senate, but it was authored by a pair of Democrats and Republicans.

VOTE anybody who isn't technologically literate out.

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If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear

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AlephZero posted...

If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear

You keep on licking that authoritarian boot while they stomp on your neck and rummage through every aspect of your life with a fine tooth comb.

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McgeesAlice808 posted...

Hes being sarcastic.

I'm not though

AlephZero posted...

If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear

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These clowns will not rest until they completely have the internet in it's entirety gripped beneath their dirty, grimy fingernails. They're a threat to freedom and need to be treated as such.

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Duncanwii posted...

I'm not though

I don't think you understand the scope of what's being discussed. Without Section 230, websites become liable under civil and criminal law for everything users say and do. Any website that can't completely dump all user generated content would be forced to comply with whatever the committee (or just William Barr, because the AG is free to do whatever he wants with the rules regardless of what the committee says) decides the new rules are, or stop doing business.

Here is a list of some issues and what Barr and Republican lawmakers at large think about them:

1. Barr believes that encryption should be broken for law enforcement regardless of the consequences. No encryption means no secure and private internet browsing, no secure and private banking, no secure and private online access to medical records, and no secure and private chats through email or instant messaging. Even if encryption isn't outright banned, there exists no way to create a means of access for police and not criminals, so it will be open season on everything. There is a reason all computer scientists not employed by the DOJ keep telling them to get bent.
2. Barr doesn't believe police should need a warrant to access information.
3. It has long been the opinion of the DOJ--even under Obama--that mass surveillance of communications of Americans by the government and police isn't covered by the 4th Amendment, so long as they only look at what they've uncovered after you are suspected of a crime (hint: parallel construction is a thing).
4. There have been increasing calls by conservatives these last few months to ban porn. Unless this bill contains some provision I haven't seen, the AG could cite some nutjob conservative source about how porn leads to the abuse of children and require that no site carry adult material of any kind.
5. You could apply #4 to any conservative political position that can be even sort of applied to child safety if you squint hard enough.

It's undoubtedly the case that any of these things would be challenged in court immediately. Would such challenges be successful? Who the hell knows? And if you happen to somehow agree with every conservative position and find the prospect of a security, privacy, and porn-free internet mouth watering, do remember that at some point in the future, someone of the opposite party will appoint a different AG who will do whatever the hell they want.

Forget social issues, forget political parties, and even forget encryption: it makes absolutely no sense to create a means for a single unelected official to control the entire internet at his whim. The required committee members would almost all come from a law enforcement background given the requirements, but hell, that doesn't even matter because the AG can just ignore them all and make whatever rules he likes.

The argument behind the need for EARN IT is also deceitful. Section 230 does not absolve businesses of their responsibility to federal law. All internet businesses are already required to preserve and report any child abuse material they find, and every major company actually works pretty hard at finding it (Google even scans cloud storage for known illegal porn). Facebook, for all its many faults, works with charities to identify and proactively take down abuse material. The limitations of existing tools and a finite number of content moderators means they don't catch everything, but they do a damn good job. The idea that companies don't do anything and that we need EARN IT to make them care is a flat out lie.

Does it have a good chance of passing? If so thats a big Yikes.


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ToadallyAwesome posted...

Does it have a good chance of passing? If so thats a big Yikes.

I have no idea. This was authored by Democrats and Republicans, but that isn't necessarily a sign it has broad support. Lindsey Graham told tech companies at the end of last year that if they hadn't given police a back door to encryption by the same time next year, the Senate would impose its will on them. If this is what Graham had in mind (his one of EARN IT's authors), it seems early to deliver on the threat.

A lot of things could happen: it could be changed to make it sound more reasonable (like change the AG's role or give Congress some control), it could be rolled into the next must-pass spending bill so that everyone can vote for it while claiming they didn't actually vote for it (this happened to the CLOUD Act), or they could just pull the "think of the children card" and vote for it in droves (like they did for FOSTA). Or maybe the idea of giving such a huge amount of power to the executive branch in an election year will be seen as a non-starter by both parties. I consider it possible that this legislation is a warning shot designed to spook tech companies and pave the way for more "reasonable" anti-encryption legislation that will be proposed later this year. But it's dangerous to assume things like that.

I've been told my views are optimistic, and the government will always give itself more power when the opportunity arises. =/

Saying anything to Duncanwii other than shut the fuck up or fuck off should be moddable

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I don't want the government knowing what I have Rule 34 of.

:(

darkmaian23 posted...

You can read more about this bill and why it is a terrible idea, and why it isn't necessary at all to protect children:
https://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/blog/2020/01/earn-it-act-how-ban-end-end-encryption-without-actually-banning-it

"Think of the children!" is always a vector for tyranny. Always.

In the end, crackdowns on crypto will only lead to a renaissance of steganography.