while the story may or may not be true, it’s typical WaPo garbage; unnamed and anonymous sources
and then there’s this gem of a comment from yet another demented government dingbat…
“Sen. Ron Wyden (Oregon), a Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said it was important for the United States to dissuade Britain: “Trump and American tech companies letting foreign governments secretly spy on Americans would be unconscionable and an unmitigated disaster for Americans’ privacy and our national security.””
…pot calls kettle black
more to the point …
“Law enforcement authorities around the world have complained about increased use of encryption …”
really? maybe local and state LE are unable to break reasonably strong encryption, but no one has been able to convince me that the intel community can’t
i’ve spoken with some tech geeks and a former u.s. gov employee who had a crypto clearance and their answers range from ‘we can’t be sure’ to “encryption is useless”, the latter a direct quote from the ex-gov dude and that was ~25 years ago
that encryption is not as full-proof as it says on the tin is also confirmed by statements made by Bill Binney (former NSA), Ed Snowden “it buys you time” and John McAfee, who stated…
“if you think you have any privacy whatsoever with an encrypted system whether it’s an email system like protonmail or an encrypted messaging system like signal you have no f’ing privacy”
[…]
“encryption is a worthless piece of shit old technology that is being marketed as a safe system”
Teachable Moment: John McAfee’s Gmail Rant - by Gabriel
on the rest of this WaPo “news” piece…
“The U.K. and FBI in particular have said that encryption lets terrorists and child abusers hide more easily.”
interesting choice of a word; “abusers” rather than traffickers, of which elements in the u.s. government are major players, a fact which, once again, has made the news rounds with the missing 300,000+ children that crossed our non-existent southern border, many of which who were not accompanied by parents, drugged, and handed off to “guardians” (anyone who would take them), some of which are known criminals
sex trafficking, child trafficking and slavery are at epidemic proportions and multi-billion dollar industries (plural) have been built up around this
“Tech companies have pushed back, stressing a right to privacy in personal communication …”
try selling that to anyone with an internet connection and a modicum of curiosity
the rest i didn’t waste my time reading