![]() A non-compliant company could also risk losing access to that market entirely, or even seeing employees jailed or harmed. The mere capability to facilitate backdoor access would subject companies to tremendous pressure, and a failure to comply would have high stakes: Chinese law has no upper limit on the fines they can charge for non-compliance with government demands for access. In the latter case, besides being manifestly unqualified to perform this role, such a stand would be very difficult for tech firms to maintain. If a tech firm introduced a backdoor into its systems, it would therefore have two options: it could facilitate access to all governments equally, which would mean complicity in a wide range of human rights abuses, or they could commit to evaluating all requests for access on their merits and potential human rights impact. The fact that tech firms are unable break their own security features limits states’ ability to make demands for access too user information, though this would certainly change if a backdoor were introduced for American law enforcement. While Apple has indicated that this will not undermine security for users, experts have pointed out that that is not a guarantee they can make. Apple’s acquiescence to relocate its Chinese users’ data into China was made in response to new legislation requiring local storage. Many repressive states, including China, already have laws requiring cooperation from the private sector. While it may seem acceptable enough for a company to cooperate with warrants in friendly democracies with independent judiciaries, like Canada or Germany, a request from the Chinese police to help track dissidents, or Saudi police to catch anyone using Grindr, would place the companies in a difficult position. law enforcement when presented with a warrant, they would face tremendous pressure to provide equivalent services to other governments, and, in some cases, like China, even legal obligation to do so. However, digital communications are international, as are the tech firms at the center of this debate. If Apple, for example, had the technical capability to circumvent encryption on their devices, and they had a policy of facilitating access for U.S. law, including, at a minimum, the receipt of a valid warrant. To American lawmakers, it may seem logical to require that access should be provided to U.S. Even if it were possible to build a backdoor which only “good guys” could use, this would still leave tech companies in the position of having to determine who counts as a “good guy.” However, even putting aside these technical debates, and granting the dubious assertion that a backdoor could be implemented securely, there are a number of practical reasons why backdooring encryption would still be a bad idea.Īny system mandating some hypothetical secure backdoor would need to decide who can obtain access and under what circumstances. ![]() Everyone on the Internet has a shared interest in safe encryption, and so any system that would undermine security should be a non-starter. Additionally, it provides a concrete example of how even the staunchest advocates for encryption can buckle in the face of powerful government actors. The Apple example is a timely reminder that the ongoing debate over encryption backdoors has important global implications. This means all iCloud data – including encryption keys – would have to be stored locally. As a result of these laws, Apple has now announced that it will shift to contracting with a Chinese company for provision of its iCloud service to Chinese users. For instance, in the last few years China has passed a range of laws with serious implications for human rights. Policy experts have further explained that these conversations are increasingly providing political cover for bad laws and practices in other countries. Publicly, security experts have expressed skepticism as to whether a Symphony-like system could be safe, particularly if scaled out the way officials seem to want. ![]() ![]() They further claim that they have spoken with technical experts ( without providing any names), who claim that this approach is possible to implement more broadly. This system, officials argue, could be implemented more broadly to provide for secure backdoor access to all communications for law enforcement. law enforcement officials have re-energized their push for a technical means to bypass encryption, pointing to Symphony: a chat application implemented by banks in 2015 which includes some backdoor access functionality to be utilized in the case of an investigation. By Amie Stepanovich and Michael Karanicolas ![]()
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