US government seizes Texas gun mass murder to demand backdoors While US President Donald Trump thinks it's too early to discuss gun control in the wake of Sunday's Texas church massacre – America's latest mass shooting – his Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is just fine exploiting the murder-suicide of 26 people to push for backdoors. Specifically, a backdoor so investigators can …
Thanks to the FBI bloke for confirming what I've always known - yes I'm an unreasonable person when facing scumbags like you, yes I _did_ write silly notes to my cousin in a made-up alphabet when I was a kid and yes I'd very much like to see you try cracking something like that if I'd have a go at it _properly_ today or try outlawing the right to write down unintelligible symbols/words.
"No reasonable person questions our right, and obligation, to access the phone," Rosenstein said today.
How about insisting on a back door on guns?
"No reasonable person questions our right, and obligation, to access the gun and stop you shooting at innocent crowds of people"
Does that read better?
Access to nutters phones won't help keep people alive.
"How about insisting on a back door on guns?"
Or just finding out why this person, who was on record as being unable to legally get a firearms license, was able to pass the basic background check and buy a gun in the first place. This isn't about changing gun control or access to encrypted devices. It's about why the existing system failed in the first place.
As a reasonable person I don't question their right to access the phone if they convince a judge to give them a warrant, but I very much question their obligation. It is very, very unlikely that there is anything stored on that phone that would help solve a crime or prevent another crime. His guns and ammunition for example were all purchased perfectly legally at gun stores (except the US government neglected to put him on a list of people not allowed to buy guns and ammunition).
No you gibbon, it's not personal; they purposely designed the operating system so that NO-ONE can access it.
Not quite. I was thinking something very similar...
No you gibbon, it's not personal; they purposely designed the operating system so that only authorised people can access it. FTFY
What follows is for stimulating discussion, etc. Feel free to pick holes, and so forth.
It's worth exploring what "Authorised People" means also. The common understanding is that includes
the handset owner, and no one else.
However, the only thing making that so is the OS design and implementation. Anyone who can change the design and implementation (i.e. make changes to the OS and issue a signed update that the handset will accept and install) can make it so that they're also authorised (i.e. create a back door). This is kinda what the FBI wanted in the San Bernadino case.
So, who can do that?
1) Apple.
2) Er, no one else, unless it all gets pinched?
The point is that so long as Apple have signing keys, source code, a build system and firmware release channels a back door exists in potentia. That is, we trust Apple to not do those things.
Comparing Levels of Trust
When you think about it, that's not really any different to trusting Apple with the keys to a pre-existing back door. The same level of trust is required. For example:
* No back door, but if Apple's private signing keys and source code leaks your iPhones is potentially wide open, and so is everyone else's.
* Back door: and if Apple leaks your back door access code. your iPhone is wide open. Assuming the access code is unique to each separate phone, no one else's is affected.
Discourage Source Code / Keys Copying
Getting hold of Apple's source code and signing keys is a huge opportunity to whomsoever achieves that, and there's no doubt many a hacker / state actor out there burning lots of manpower aiming to achieve such a significant hack. It's such a big, juicy target. If ever achieved, Apple / iDevices have a massive problem.
The existence of an official back door would dilute that.
For the sake of argument, suppose that some TLA agency did successfully and unofficially acquire Apple's source code and signing keys, and was in a position to push malicious firmware upgrades out. Sure, they'd be able to confer God Mode upon themselves.
But device Users would all now (unknowingly) need that TLA to safeguard all of that properly, and that's seemingly not guaranteed these days... And if they shared that with a trusted partner agency, that's another party that has to safeguard that properly. And so on. Every copy of the source code and signing keys is at risk, and the more copies there are the higher the risk of a complete iDevice security breakdown. Bad for the TLA, bad for Apple, but especially bad for all of us Users.
However if the TLA knew that it could access a back door on request, they'd never go looking for the source code / signing keys in the first place; thus they cannot leak it. There's fewer copies in existence, so the risk is less. If the TLA agency lost a backdoor access code, that's bad for the TLA, bad for Apple, but for all but one User it's a complete non-event.
So that's the premise; Apple's position is fine so long as their source and keys don't get accessed by anyone else. But they've made a mighty big hacker / intelligence agency target of themselves, and if breached it's potentially a disaster for the company and all of us Users.
An alternative - cooperation with the TLAs on request - would change the behaviours of the TLAs in a way that ensures that they would never have (or need) access to Apple's actual source code / signing keys Crown Jewels. I don't know about you, but I think that the fewer people trying to access that lot, the better.
False News Alert (new icon required)
We all KNOW they're bugging everyone.
Proof, and no they are not, they are intercepting traffic with a view to identifying miscreants as defined by their political masters. Once identified then they may 'bug' said miscreant.
Do you really thing they have the resources to 'bug' every property, office, car, person?
The NSA may or may not be able to read the contents of that phone. But, just as in the Bernardino case, it is obvious to anyone willing to use his braincells that there is nothing of interest on that phone. That's also obvious to the NSA. There is no way they would admit that they could read that phone when they know it doesn't serve any purpose.
IF they can read the contents of that phone model (and nobody knows if they can), then they will keep that information secret. Either decrypt phones and never, ever admit they could do it, or read it and publicly admit they did, if it is a really important case.
How very sensible. How about you contact the criminal and try to explain that. Ooh, so there is a rule that you cannot force the criminal to implicate himself? That's very inconvenient, I wonder why that was written into the law. And in this case the defendant is dead? Well, I'd say that case is closed and you should focus on the next one. And remember, no cheating allowed ;).
Wait until the Fake news starts circulating that these mass shootings are being staged by the government to persuade congress to enforce backdoors in iPhones.
I hesitate to even suggest this, but it's the USA - no idiotic story is too stupid for Facebook in America.
that if a backdoor were mandated the Russians and Chinese would make it a priority to find and exploit it.
That would be illegal... They would change their laws to require that the companies supply them with the same access they had provided to the US government or have that phone banned in their countries. So much easier than trying to find the backdoor...
Gun Control failed because this Democrat should never have been able to obtain one (Devin Patrick Kelley got his gun illegally.)
But then; Texas church massacre: Man hailed a hero for chasing gunman after killings
"The shooter got in his truck, the gentlemen with the rifle came to my truck as the shooter took off, and he briefed me quickly on what had just happened and said we had to get him, so that's what I did," he said.
That's the spirit. And maybe we can concentrate on something else now.
Who's talking about gun control? Just get rid of them all from the civilian population.
I really don't get how it can be acceptable for more people to be killed by citizens each year than by terror attacks.
And no, I'm not a pacifist - I've served with the military and am quite happy handling weapons, but the general population does not need them.
"Who's talking about gun control? Just get rid of them all from the civilian population."Most analysts admit it's difficult to know exact numbers of fatal shootings because of poor reporting by the police. That said, the data suggests that more innocent people are killed by police than civilians. Usually, the civilian is shooting at someone they know has committed a crime; they are the victim of it. The police shoot people they believe to be criminal. As in the case of Justine Diamond. Her crime? Calling the police to report an assault.
Did they not teach civics in school anymore?
- You can't just make a law to ban guns because of the 2nd Amendment. Any laws that attempt to skirt around that will quickly get ruled unconditional.
- The chances of the 2nd being repealed is pretty much nil.
- Even if it somehow did get repealed, how do you propose unarming everybody when there are millions of guns out there?
- How do you keep somebody from making their own gun and/or ammunition. It's not exactly hard. Either that or just smuggle them back into the country from Mexico.
If you take all of the guns away, they'll just resort to another method. Would you rather have another McVeigh or Kaczynski?
"If you take all of the guns away, they'll just resort to another method. "After the Port Arthur Massacre set a new world record for the number of dead, draconian new gun laws were enacted in Australia and a huge number of guns destroyed. An acquaintance in the field of gerbillism decided to see how hard it was to acquire a gun under the new regime. He received his illegal handgun at a café within sight of the Russell Street headquarters of the Victorian Police in Melbourne within half an hour after making his request.
Note that handgun ownership in Australia has always been severely restricted and so they have always been exceptionally difficult to obtain. For some arbitrary meaning of "difficult"...
"After the Port Arthur Massacre ... ..received his illegal handgun at a café within sight of the Russell Street headquarters of the Victorian Police in Melbourne"
You mean the building on Russell Street that was the former police HQ -- having been vacated in 1995, the year before the 1996 Port Arthur shootings?
Something doesn't sound right with your anectdote there.
Some people will always see guns as the problem, just as some people will always see privacy as a problem. In both cases the legal use of gun and security is about protecting themselves from external threats and of course an external threat is someone who wants to take away such security.
Those who use both cases illegally will use whatever means necessary to achieve their aims (terrorism or just gangs or most illegal activity). And the protection of the population is expected by the population either by the right of defending themselves or being protected. In the UK we seem not to feel either way as the gov seeks to remove our right to security but become less effective against criminals. So I can understand people in the US not believing their best interests are being taken into account when attacked over security which includes gun ownership in their case.
"You mean the building on Russell Street that was the former police HQ -- having been vacated in 1995, the year before the 1996 Port Arthur shootings?I haven't lived in Melbourne since 1970 and truly had no idea the police headquarters had moved. My bad. I used to work nearby in late 1970.Something doesn't sound right with your anectdote there."
@ HarleyBird
My gerbillist friend says you are being somewhat disingenuous. Russell Street was indeed vacated in 1995, but it didn't cease to be "Russell Street", or "Russell Street Headquarters" when context was insufficient, until 2004 when the buildings were finally repurposed and renamed.
The café my friend received the weapon in apparently remained a favourite location for business dealings between criminals and police for some time after the move.
I freely admit to jumping to an unwarranted conclusion, that the gun was supplied by a policeman or other employee of the force. But it wasn't a very big jump. After all, Martin Bryant's main weapon was purchased by the Victorian Police in a gun buyback some years before Bryant acquired it according to my gerbillist friend. And not forgetting the illicit drugs, weapons and money found in the ceiling of the St Kilda nick many years ago.
>After the Port Arthur Massacre set a new world record for the number of dead, draconian new gun laws were enacted in Australia and a huge number of guns destroyed.
...and the incidence of gun crime plummeted (despite some mythical black market deal).
Gun control works. That's why the NRA are against it.
"...and the incidence of gun crime plummeted (despite some mythical black market deal)."Plummet: To cause to drop rapidly, to hurl down.
Bullshit!
Homicides 1990–2010
“The number of homicide incidents involving a firearm decreased by 57 percent between 1989-90 and 2013-14,” the government crime trends report says. “Firearms were used in 13 percent of homicide incidents (n=32) in 2013-14. In 1989-90 it was 24 percent (n=75) of incidents.”
http://www.factcheck.org/2017/10/gun-control-australia-updated/
@ Rob V. The following is worth a read:
"However, at that point the price of a gun had doubled, that's how tight the market was."When the Port Arthur Massacre occurred, the local butcher was selling a whole sheep, butchered, for $AU15–20. I purchased one last week for $AU260. While it's not the only factor, the very great increase in vermin eating the farmers' grass plays a big role in this. Of course such price increase only affects the poor and nobody really gives a fuck about them.
You can't just make a law to ban guns because of the 2nd Amendment.
Yes you can. You can legislate the definition of "militia" to clarify it means members of the National Guard while officially deployed. You can also expand the established precedents legitimising restrictions on the right to "bear arms" (e.g. concealed carry bans and gun free zones etc.) to clarify that the entire country is a "gun free zone" in respect of public places so anyone transporting a firearm off private property must do so dismantled, unloaded and inside a locked weapons transport container. Anyone found in possession of a functional firearm in public: 25 years to life.
After that, it's a question for the courts who have never explicitly ruled on the meaning of the militia clause, nor set absolute parameters on the limits of other restrictions.
Even if it somehow did get repealed, how do you propose unarming everybody when there are millions of guns out there?
The same way the millions of firearms Europe was awash with after both world wars were dealt with. Pulling millions of firearms (not to mention explosives) out of civilian circulation has been a solved problem for 100 years.
Would you rather have another McVeigh or Kaczynski?
Yes. The body counts people like that achieve are a rounding error compared to the overall firearms murder rate. McVeigh killed 168 people. Chicago (one city!) clocks up that many firearms murders every three months or so.
I think there's just a quirk in the USA mentality that fetishises guns and am resigned to living with the mild insanity of my neighbours(I'm a Brit resident in the USA). This country will never get rid of its guns. There's a kink in the USA psyche that makes them prone to shooting each other. Canada has a lot of guns too, but a fraction of the shooting deaths. And whats the European country with a high gun ownership - Sweden? Switzerland? Lots of guns. Not much shooting each other. I think Americans just hate each other and every so often one of them indulges their angst by going on a rampage. C'est la vie. I love you all anyway; Weird as you are. I think a bit of socialism is what you need. Love for your fellow critter.
"And whats the European country with a high gun ownership - Sweden? Switzerland? Lots of guns. Not much shooting each other. I think Americans just hate each other and every so often one of them indulges their angst by going on a rampage"
I ran across a (possibly unreliable) statistic some years back that *relative to the gun-toting population size*, the US is actually fairly typical of countries in general for rates of gun-sourced killing. Norway, on the other hand, has a disproportionately high level. (Turf wars between the Hell's Angels and the Banditos contribute to this. That shocked my late wife, because both these outfits are endemic in parts of California where she grew up, but they are not obviously part of Norwegian culture.)
A lot of people are killed by people using guns in the US not because USians are trigger-happy maniacs, but because a lot of people have guns.
> After that, it's a question for the courts who have never explicitly ruled on the meaning of the militia clause, nor set absolute parameters on the limits of other restrictions.
Yes, they have. The Heller case. If you're REALLY hung up on that clause (even though Heller and the actual notes in the Federalist papers blow that out of the water), 10 U.S. Code § 246(b)(2) states:
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.
So how do you tell who is in the unorganized militia or not?
> Yes. The body counts people like that achieve are a rounding error compared to the overall firearms murder rate. McVeigh killed 168 people. Chicago (one city!) clocks up that many firearms murders every three months or so.
We're talking about mass killings here, not gang violence. None of the gang bangers buy their guns legally anyways. The Chicago PD even published stats to prove it.
@Lysenco
"Yes you can. You can legislate the definition of "militia" to clarify it means members of the National Guard while officially deployed. "
But the supreme court has already ruled on this deciding that the second amendment is irrespective of the militia part. http://constitution.findlaw.com/amendment2.html
@Timmy B
The Supreme Court ruled on Dred Scott as well - and then it reversed itself. More broadly, the country ratified the 18th Amendment - and then it reversed itself. The Constitution isn't an immutable work of divine dictatorship, it has been amended and re-interpreted dozens of times but it requires legislative action to bring a matter back to the table.
However, even if we concede that point, it doesn't prevent other steps being taken. For example, the Gun-Free School Zones Act 1990 (that's a Republican Presidency, incidentally) has never been ruled unconstitutional so the question is merely how big a "school zone" is. There is nothing to stop Title 18 USC s921(a)(25) being amended from it's current definition (1000ft) to something more like 10km (approximate maximum range a rifle could cause ballistic damage). Other options? Well, just like cigarettes, you could use taxation. Civilian purchase of 9mm parabellum: $100 per round, possession of untaxed contraband, felony.
Nothing is unconstitutional until SCOTUS says it is and that can't happen until after you legislate.
Startling lack of understanding of history and the origins and purpose of the 2nd amendment. This amendment was purposely not about standing armies, it was about codifying citizens natural rights organize to protect the free state and by extension, themselves. After all, how can you defend someone else, if you can’t defend yourself? Further, the militia in the 2A is a group of private citizens, not a national guard or other state sponsored entity. Militias of the day were self funded, provided their own arms and ammo. Well regulated, for,you public school types and liberals, meant well trained, back in those days. Do you not understand how the USA was founded by people who had just overthrown a standing Army that tried to disarm them, among other things. There is no way that the founding documents would have been talking about making yet another standing army that might decide to impose its will on the citizens.
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