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MONITOR OCTOBER 30, 2014
A Werewolf in retail
OPINIONS
EMILY BURKHARDT / MONITOR
FBI protests against commercial encryption Technology ban will stifle economy and innovation NADJA ADOLF Contributing writer FBI Director James Comey told listeners at the Brookings Institute this month that he is outraged that Apple and Google are now offering their customers privacy-protecting encryption technology. “D e e p l y c o n c e r n e d” James Comey wants Congress to “fix” laws to ensure police can access private data. He insists that if users can keep their correspondence private, it will “have very serious consequences for law enforcement and national security agencies at all levels.” He said of secure encryption: “It’s the equivalent of a closet that can’t be opened. A safe that can’t be cracked.” Such concerns are nothing new. For centuries, politicians and law en-
forcement have demanded bans and restrictions in the name of crime control and national security. Included in the list of technologies seen as deadly menace to society are items such as automobiles, radios, railroad trains, steamships, telegraphs, and telephones. Bans on technology have rarely been effective at either reducing or eliminating crime – but they have succeeded in stifling innovation and harming the economy. England banned early fore and aft sailing rigs (luggers) centuries ago after the government discovered that these boats were far more maneuverable than the patrol boats used to apprehend smugglers. The result was that the British trade and fishing fleets were eco-
CAMPUS COMMENT
THE GOVERNMENT HAS TO JUSTIFY ITS INTRUSION INTO YOUR RIGHTS -EDWARD SNOWDEN nomically handicapped by being required to carry the larger crews needed to handle more cumbersome rigs, while sailors and passengers were exposed to a greater risk of death and injury because the added complexity of the legal rigs made it harder to respond to an emergency. The FBI is trying to sell the myth that there is a magical way of allowing the “good guys” a back door into computer systems that would be inaccessible to the “bad guys.” The EFF notes that this is simply false. What Mr. Comey is really demanding is that everyone be required to use weak security so that if the FBI – or the North Korean security police – decide someone is a “bad guy,” they can easily access that person’s personal in-
formation. The reality is that weak security is not selectively weak for alleged bad guys – it is weak for all of its users. Criminals are becoming more and more successful at exploiting security weaknesses, and prospective customers for American products are unlikely to purchase American products with weak security with other vendors available. Not only do technology users fear hackers, they fear industrial espionage, from both competitors and governments. Economics are not the most important issue in online privacy; the issue is whether or not we have the right to free speech without government harassment or prosecution. Do we speak freely, or do we
self-censor and suppress dissent lest what we say be misinterpreted? To q u o t e E d w a r d Snowden: “ We are no longer citizens, we no longer have leaders. We’re subjects, and we have rulers. When you say, ‘I have nothing to hide,’ you’re saying, ‘I don’t care about this right.’ You’re saying, ‘I don’t have this right, because I’ve got to the point where I have to justify it.’ The way rights work is, the government has to justify its intrusion into your rights – you don’t have to justify why you need freedom of speech.” And the penchant for close, secretive cooperation with the government will only cost companies money and jobs, Snowden added, because no one would want to buy a phone made by a company that provides inherent backdoors for third parties to access your information. “The same rights that we inherited, our children deserve to inherit the same way,” Snowden said.
What was your worst Halloween experience? SARAH HAMMONS Art “When I was 8, a guy in a black outfit with red eyes chased me down the street. It was horrible” ALEX DULCAN Chemical engineering “My friend tried to throw a pumpkin out of a car and it hit the window and exploded inside ” KENDALL DAWSON Undeclared “I volunteered to drop a girl off at her house and she threw up in the car”
PHILLIP ANDERSON Fine arts and theatre “In Junior High, people in scary costumes chased me through a haunted corn maze at night”
JASLEEN CHUG Business law “My Dad tried to scare my aunt and uncle with a light; they got so scared they called the cops”