Encryption and governments

[Christenson]

Originally Posted by cheesehead

Sort of like when I walk out of my apartment, having pressed the lock button on the knob, and as the door clicks shut I fumble in my pocket for the deadbolt key ... then remember that when I last changed pants I had put all my keys on the table.

That happened to me recently...except it was my car, and the keys were sitting on the front seat.....

[cheesehead]

Do you habitually carry two complete sets of home and car keys, always in separate pockets, as I started doing a few decades ago? (My then-wife's idea)

[LaurV]

Originally Posted by cheesehead

Do you habitually carry two complete sets of home and car keys, always in separate pockets, as I started doing a few decades ago? (My then-wife's idea)

YES!!! For my car. My very own idea, after closing the keys in the car for the second time in an about 6-month interval. The car had "anti stupid" system the doors didn't lock themselves if the keys were in contact. But I removed the keys, put them on the passenger seat, do something else, I don't know what, reading, playing sudoku on my mobile, whatever, then suddenly living the car and lock the door. Both times the same. Luckily Thai people are quite professional in breaking into a locked car, and they are cheap too. Both of the times (different guys, different cities, different companies) they come in 10 minutes max after I called and they even did not trigger the car alarm. Like they were waiting for the call, and prepared to go unlocking some doors... And charged me ridiculous low price. But they made a lot of fun of the "stupid farang locking the keys in his car" and I was really ashamed

Then I took the second key with me always, in a different pocket. Almost 8 years since, and I never locked the car door again. But I am afraid to let the second key home...

(for the house door I never lock/unlock it by myself. Somebody is home all the time, family, maid, etc.)

[retina]

I have a deadbolt setup on all my lockable things. I cannot exit or enter anything without using my key(s), thus it is impossible for me to lock my keys inside or outside something if I am not there. I have have the keys in my hand when I lock anything. All these fancy new remote locking controllers are making humans lazy (see the sugar tax thread).

LaurV: Did you ever wonder how easily someone can break into, or steal, your car? After seeing how easily someone can recover your keys for you it must make you think a little about how secure the average car really is.

[LaurV]

Yes I did, but I always considered that the locks are for honest people. The thief knows how to avoid them, no matter how you secure them. Being a cracker/hacker for all my life :P

(hey, don't tell me that only the thief is afraid of thieves or that some Romanian gypsies went to Frankfurt and ate the swans from the lake in the park :D)

[Christenson]

The thing that keeps people from breaking into my car is a pile of stuff on the back seat...clothes, my boots, some papers, other things I should really move into the house...under which all kinds of valuable things, such as pocket books, become invisible. Thief won't want to rummage through all that junk unless he knows there's a prize.

If a thief wants in, he'll just break the window, done. He/she doesn't care. Last time it was the engine computer, time before that it was the wife's pocket book in the trunk, the thief clearly saw us put it there.

Poor swans....

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by LaurV

(hey, don't tell me that only the thief is afraid of thieves or that some Romanian gypsies went to Frankfurt and ate the swans from the lake in the park :D)

Originally Posted by Christenson

Poor swans....

Hmmm... If one were to insert a swan into a turducken, just where would the swan fit? I'd guess it's bigger than a duck, but smaller than a turkey, so it'd be: turswanducken

[retina]

In another case a man (name unknown) was been released after two years in jail on a contempt charge.

According to the decision anyone who refuses to decrypt their hard drive for law enforcement is covered by the Fifth Amendment.

<snip>

... a man was charged for child pornography but the problem was that all his hard drives were encrypted with TrueCrypt but when he [was asked] to hand over the information needed to decrypt the hard drives he refused; which landed him in jail on a contempt charge from the court.

Here we are two years later and a Appeals Court decision that totally changes the game which is going to really complicate the prosecutions ability to move the case forward.

The full decision is posted here.

=================================================================

Originally Posted by retina

The interesting part of this case is the potential contempt-of-court thing. Assuming that she does formally state in court that she forgot the password then will the judge have no option but to believe her, or will the judge decide to hold her in contempt?

From what I can gather she has until 21 Feb to comply.

In this case, her appeal was rejected and she was ordered to comply. She has until 28-Feb-2012 before such things as contempt start to take effect.

I seems the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. But there are subtle differences. In the first case above, the man never said anything about the contents of his drives (this is probably the smart thing to do), but in the Fricosu case she was recorded speaking with her ex-husband (one of them was in prison speaking to the other over the phone) and they discussed about some files on the laptop.

Anyhow, I hope that Fricosu has "forgotten" her password and is unable to decrypt. Not because I think she deserves a break or anything, just because I want to see what happens to her.

[imwithid]

Originally Posted by retina

... with PGP, or any other unknown crypto, the communication is simply blocked. If they can't spy on you then you are not allowed to communicate.

Is this really the case? Can you not "candy-wrap" or stratify encryptions (making all but the core easy to decipher) hence granting the semblance that the message has been deciphered? Are the resources of governments in use currently so great that each message is screened by highly skilled, diligent individuals or that current sorting, screening or analytic systems are adept enough to block such messages?

[retina]

Originally Posted by imwithid

Can you not "candy-wrap" or stratify encryptions (making all but the core easy to decipher) hence granting the semblance that the message has been deciphered?

Maybe, but if they catch you then you are in trouble.

Originally Posted by imwithid

Are the resources of governments in use currently so great that each message is screened by highly skilled, diligent individuals or that current sorting, screening or analytic systems are adept enough to block such messages?

For some systems, like phone communications, yes. For others things like steganography then perhaps they would be stymied, but once again, if you are exposed then off to jail with you (or at the very least you won't be able to communicate to/from that country ever again).

The point is it should not be this way. The premise is wrong: "to fight terrorism" or "stop child pron" or whatever is the latest bogey-man to fear. Whereas actual terrorism/CP incidents are tiny compared to other much more damaging things like heart disease, cancer or traffic accidents. The media is blowing it out to huge ridiculous proportions and the politicians use that to pass whatever laws they please.