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Putting back doors in encryption programs scares reader
During the recent debate, a lot was said about encryption and wanting to force programmers to put back doors in encryption programs. This is extremely troubling for a number of reasons.
First, if a backdoor exists, others will find it; many encryption programs are open source and if the backdoor can be seen, it can be exploited by anyone, not just government. A backdoor would mean giving Russia, China, and even ISIS a way to gain access to Americans’ most private information. Keep in mind your banking, credit card purchases, online shopping, and anything of that sort is done with encrypted connections. If a backdoor exists, this means any hacker can easily gain access to all of your information.
Secondly, the Fourth Amendment guarantees our right to be secure in our papers and effects. If they need our encryption keys, they should have to obtain a warrant, just like gaining access to your home or safe.
Also, if backdoors are written into new encryption programs, terrorists will just write their own programs. Keep in mind many of these methods are already available as open source programs, so ISIS making their own program would just be a matter of copy-paste-compile. Thus, the only ones that would be hurt by this would be those who are following the law and using the new programs.
Benjamin Franklin said, “Those who would give up essential liberty [for] safety, deserve neither...” Asking us to give up security for security makes even less sense to me.
James Weeks II, vice-chair
Libertarian Party of Livingston County