How to end the encryption argument
For pro-government guys: Ask them if they're okay with the other 200+ governments of the world having the same rights to your data. The internet is global. Even if you think you have God on your side, there's 200 other governments and tens of thousands of agents and threat actors that will feel just as entitled to your citizen's data as you do. What's more important -- keeping them out, or eating that risk so you can spy on your own citizens? Choose wisely.
For the but-terrorism: Intelligence operations have traditionally been the most successful way of stopping terrorism. Intelligence is not technology. Intelligence is what sits between your ears. As a native american tracker friend I know said: If you want to find something, use your eyes. Invest in boots on the ground, cultural understanding, and goodwill. The vast majority of the world population doesn't like terrorists either -- but they hate you more. Sun Tzu would kick you in the balls if he saw how you were fighting this war. Spies. Spies. More spies. All the spies. That is how you win. Nothing else. Get off the computer, and go outside. This is just as true for the intelligence community as it is for teenagers in mom's basement!
For the child-porners: No matter how much encryption they have, they need to get the images unencrypted from *somewhere*. That means talking to people, online or offline. Go where they are gathering, which isn't in your office cube masturbating to the idea of 'cracking' someone's phone. Juries will happily convict with hidden-camera footage of them at their computer -- just skip the encryption problem entirely and do that. And once they're in jail... smash their computer with a large hammer and send it off for scrap. No decryption necesary. Bad guy goes bye bye. Again, this is about the intelligence asset lifecycle -- develop your assets, and you can only do that by TALKING to people, not raging at a 'locked' device.
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Encryption isn't something the government needs to be worried about, and making the government's job easier is not my problem (or yours). We all put our 40 hours in a week, and we don't try to set the world on fire just because something is harder than it "should" be. The world is full of "should be", and nobody sitting on a pile of them ever gets anything done. Just accept this, and stop blowing billions on massive dragnets and other surveillance bullsh*t. We're drowning in information already, and it hasn't made you any more effective! We need *analytical ability* far more than large chunks of the internet shoved in some database and indexed to individuals.
In other words... go to the college campuses, and find people who don't suck at investigating. Hire them, sit them down in front of a computer, and tell them to go socialize with the criminal element. Make your inroads, and then go drop the hammer. This hasn't changed since the days of Sherlock Holmes: There is no substitute for critical thinking skills. PERIOD. All the technology in the world won't help you if you can't use what you have... and you're pissing away all your resources on things that aren't actually helping you, with watchlists and data centers and other useless shit. You need people, not technology. Your job is *investigation*. What are all these tools doing for you right now? Dick! Dick, dick, dick. You're drowning in marginally useful information and living on a promise that in some idealized future, you'll be able to collar criminals by pushing buttons. So where's my flying car?
We've been trying to tell you this, gently, as IT professionals... but at this point, it appears we need to start beating your agents to within an inch of their lives because you've gotten so stupid about it you've actually made the situation worse. Stop screwing around with the technology -- make it work for you, and if you hit a roadblock don't rage against it like a moron, screaming "We need access to the everythings or DOOM!"
No, you don't. And it won't help you anyway.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
