[cryptography] Apple's refusal, crypto wars shifting to OS/device wars

[John Young]

It's good to see The Intercept and others smell a 
rat with the fake fight between
Apple and the USG (hardly only the FBI). Crediting Snowden and his flacks
with this phony crypto war is a bit much, though, opposition to government
instrusions around the world have been persistent for decades, especially
against the ever increasing digital violations and forever failing protections
against them. "Strong crypto is hard to do while making it easy for users."

What is most needed from the Snowden 90% still-secret wad are defenses
against the USG now that alarms have been repeatedly clanged about redacted
and incomplete offenses. Most peculiar that almost no defensive measures
have been released, although Snowden may have insisted on not releasing
those as threats to US national security.

Snowden's alleged demand that outlets check with USG before releases
to assure no national harm is institutionalized in national security
reporting, but is also required by fear of prosecution of outlets and
their investors such as Omidyar, Slim, Bezo, all the major media.

Withholding the 90% of Snowden material which he claims was given
to the public, is damnable betrayal of the public for monetary and
professional benefits. In this way the Snowden material has been
handled like the USG handles it, as if it is owned by the handlers,
not by the ones who paid for it.

It would not be off-base to accuse the Snowden handlers of what
Apple and the USG are doing, engaging in a fake fight "in the public
interest" for pecuniary gain. Privacy and civil liberties are being
peddled as commercial products, cheered yesterday by Apple
investors.

The DNI's Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board is as much
a marketing scam as the American Civil Liberties Union, same
kind of people populate both, testify in Congress, meet with
POTUS, work the lecture circuit.

At 11:05 AM 2/27/2016, you wrote:
>John Young wrote: > USG is not USA. Apple is not 
>its buyers. USG v Apple is not about citizens 
>and privacy. It's about secretkeepers against 
>the public. Therefore, except for members of 
>“the public” who have no secrets (no credit 
>card PINs, no private medical conditions, no 
>private relationships, no private future plans, 
>no private original ideas, no private and 
>unpopular political views, etc.), “it’s 
>about secretkeepers” against themselves? I 
>suppose then we should all file amicus briefs on 
>both sides? John Young wrote: > Govs may concede 
>crypto public protection to assure other means 
>remain effective. Promoting public crypto as a 
>cloak appears to be the campaign underway, now 
>as in the 1990s, so beguiling to crypto 
>advocates to claim a win (for the 
>industry-org-edu to continue doing openly and 
>secretly what it does best). This has been 
>addressed previously and yesterday by an article 
>at The Intercept. 
>https://theintercept.com/2016/02/26/fbi-vs-apple-post-crypto-wars/  
> > After the 2013 Snowden revelations, as 
>mainstream technology companies started 
>spreading encryption by putting it in popular 
>consumer products, the wars erupted again. Law 
>enforcement officials, led by FBI Director James 
>Comey, loudly insisted that U.S. companies 
>should build backdoors to break the encryption 
>just for them. > > That won’t happen because 
>what these law enforcement officials are asking 
>for isn’t possible (any backdoor can be used 
>by hackers, too) and wouldn’t be effective 
>(because encryption is widely available globally 
>now). They’ve succeeded in slowing the spread 
>of unbreakable encryption by intimidating tech 
>companies that might otherwise be rolling it out 
>faster, but not much else. > > Indeed, as almost 
>everyone else acknowledges, unbreakable 
>encryption is here to stay. > > Tech privacy 
>advocates continue to remain vigilant about 
>encryption, actively pointing out the 
>inadequacies and impossibilities of the 
>anti-encryption movement, and jumping on any 
>sign of backsliding. > > But even as they have 
>stayed focused on defending encryption, the 
>government has been shifting its focus to 
>something else. > > The ongoing, very public 
>dispute between Apple and the FBI, in fact, 
>marks a key inflection point — at least as far 
>as the puublic’s understanding of the 
>issue. > > You might say we’re entering the 
>Post-Crypto phase of the Crypto Wars. Think 
>about it: The more we learn about the FBI’s 
>demand that Apple help it hack into a 
>password-protected iPhone, the more it looks 
>like part of a concerted, long-term effort by 
>the government to find new ways around 
>unbreakable encryption — rather than try to 
>break it. Withoutt Ed Snowden’s 
>whistle-blowing, Glenn Greenwald’s, Laura 
>Poitras’ and Ewen MacAskill’s journalism, 
>reporting by the Intercept and by the Washington 
>Post’s Bart Gellman, and Apple’s refusal, 
>“the public” would not be discussing this at 
>all. 
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