Gregory's ServerYes, I've heard that the FBI is now recommending that we use End-to-End encryption. Yes, I am worried about dying of an irony overdose.
 63 comments
 @mattblaze Hey. There's this chip you might be interested in that allows the "good guys" access and keeps the "bad guys" out (why is it always guys?) Let me know if you want to bring one home to research after lunch. FBI (etc): You should use end-to-end encryption, because networks can be easily compromised by national adversaries. Us: Right! Just like we've been saying all along forever! FBI: Never heard that. Anyway, It's even worse than that! They can even compromise wiretapping systems! Us: You mean just like we warned that they would when you mandated them? FBI: Nope, never heard anything like that either.  @mattblaze just wait until the right hand finds out what that pesky left hand has been saying in public.  @mattblaze that's because just a bunch of unwashed nerds and autistics to them. If we're not criminal.  @FinalOverdrive @mattblaze if there's one thing I've learned from one TV depiction of FBI, it's that they call people like me "squints" @FinalOverdrive @mattblaze The show is called "Bones" and I seem to recall that the agent in the show said that the scientists he was tasked with working with all wore glasses and were squinting at tiny evidence. I dunno, the show has its moments but also does not stand up to the test of time in a lot of ways. @FinalOverdrive @mattblaze I'm not talking about the science. The science mostly holds up. It's some of the other, social behavior/toxic masculinity exhibited by some of the characters that comes across as weird and hostile workplace-y. There is also an entire episode dedicated to the characters spending an inordinate amount of time trying to determine the gender of a nonbinary-presenting visiting researcher that is extremely cringey @threatresearch @mattblaze nonbinary trans. Missed the researcher part. Over thinking about what is irrelevant to the task at hand  @mattblaze and just like that, the children and the terrorists were forgotten.  @mattblaze I had a coworker who worked for a company implementing Carnivore decades ago. They had some really low paid Chinese contractors who helped them. The contractors seemed to have more money than you'd expect at their pay level. They also were never in the office during the occasional announced client meetings. It amazes me how naive government officials sometimes are. @lyda @mattblaze The Chinese probably recruit students at their universities, and offer them the chance to travel abroad, make money, and win a place in the Chinese power structure if they can successfully get access to something valuable. I recall when the whole CALEA thing started, the EFF was warning that there was no way to secure it and it would get abused by bad actors. @mattblaze @mvario Paranoid brain: Thatβs exactly what I would tell people to do, if I were the FBI and I had compromised at least one widely used encrypted messaging app, and wanted more people to feel comfortable speaking more freely about their secretsβ¦ :blobcateyescoffee:  @mivox @mattblaze @mvario Bidenβs FBI isnβt interested in doing anything like this. It would upset the right wing who he caters to. @maggiejk @mattblaze @mvario Not if theyβre spying on those filthy leftists like theyβre damn well supposed to! :blobcat_thisisfine: @me @mattblaze @mvario But nobody who was actually paranoid would use a Meta property for secure communications, would they? :blobcateyescoffee:  @mattblaze FBI: ok, the treat from China is gone now. Everyone please go back to how you were doing things before. N  @mattblaze we were particularly amused at them trying to claim it's not a new recommendation @mattblaze yep and weβre supposed be sad trump wants to get rid of Wray? Nah that guy sucks.  @maggiejk I don't think anyone is mourning the ass leaving the chair, it's fear of the new ass sitting down. Someone who, in all likelihood, will make Hoover look like a kind, stable person with surprisingly progressive ideas on gender-normative attire.  You've nailed the ridiculous repetitiveness of this conversation. Now do copyright protection schemes!  @mattblaze  @mattblaze honestly the most surprising thing of that announcement was that the FBI assumed there was privacy in text messages (as in SMS, not RCS with e2ee). @mattblaze Hell that sounds like their nonsense after Jan 6th. Willful ignorance since their Twitter account was literally littered in tags about all the nonsense about to go down. @mattblaze Well, this is true, but I hope we can agree that the worst time to highlight hypocrisy is when we are about to see change for the better 1. Hypocrisy is advocating one thing while doing the opposite, which is not what the FBI is being criticized for here. Theyβre being criticized for being (very) late in advocating an important safeguard. See βclosing the barn doorβ¦β etc. 2. The FBI is not an individual with feelings that must be protected. Itβs a powerful, publicly funded institution subject to public scrutiny and criticism, at least for the time being.  FBI HQ based special agents might want to brush up on their own end-to-end encryption as they head out to their new field office work. Don't want the new management reading everything do we?  @mattblaze Iβm way more afraid of the US Govt than I am Russia or China, because at least the others are honest and donβt pretend to be Good Guy, βsaving the worldβ.  @curmudgeonaf @mattblaze Eh, Russia in particular absolutely does that. Even just tonight Iβve been reporting their disinfo trolls still pushing their bogus βfighting Ukrainian Nazisβ narrative. Best to be afraid of all 3. All are duplicitous when it suits them.  @mattblaze This is why the answer to anyone asking for a backdoor into your communications is "You first." Then, all the reasons they say they can't do it are all the reasons you can't do it.   @mattblaze FBI: we need to mandate backdoors to encrypted messaging services. Us: π so you learned nothing... @mattblaze It may not be the e2e we want. Per Riana they want βresponsibly managed encryption."  @cathygellis @mattblaze βirresponsibly managed encryptionβ is so much cooler though    @mattblaze presumably becuase they just twigged that going forward the 'bad guys' are going to be in charge of their own government. @mattblaze until Kash money Patel gets in. Then he'll want to dismantle it all so he can go after his "deep state' foes.  @mattblaze Now everyone remember how EU clowns still! want to ban E2EE because either think of the children or muh terrorism excuses.   @mattblaze Yes yes, they say that now, but in 6 months, Congresscritters and the administration will be back to their old backdoor idiocy best portrayed by .....  @mattblaze I assume they will offer are private-keys-as-a-serivce Portal, soon? So everyone can download a secure key?  The income being administration seems intent on dropping its pants for free. Hackers can walk straight through the front door.   on the bright side, we certainly wonβt have anemic security with this much irony in our diet. @mattblaze They call for "responsibly managed encryption", so there's room for interpretation π   @mattblaze This makes me glad I was born in the 1980s with irony absorbing crumple zones. |
![Moonraker meme, with two astronauts in outer space looking at Earth.
Astronaut 1 ( me ) : Wait, InfoSec is broken by design?
Astronaut 2 ( GovCorp ): [ pointing a gun at my back ] Always has been.](https://friends.grishka.me/i/kXp1rb4qX_7TJOVNs-KeA92y823T_1hQNudnqUPm3r8/q:90/rs:fit:2560:2560/bG9jYWw6Ly8vcy9tZWRpYV9jYWNoZS9kMzEyNWIxNjI1ZTU0MWRkODJkMjFhOTllNGM4MGZmOS53ZWJw.jpg)
@mattblaze but with the clipper chip right?