The topic of encryption and law enforcement has been back in the new cycle with the EARN IT Act being reintroduced to congress this year. Part of this act resurfaces the idea that there should be a way for law enforcement to eavesdrop on communications—even when they’re encrypted.
How does this relate to christians?
If you are in a country which persecutes christians or have friends in a country which does, then strong encryption is vital for your safety. For example, in 2011 Iran partially succeeded at monitoring Google searches made in their country. This year Iran ranked 9th in Open Doors world watch list which reports on persecution of christians around the world. This attempt was thwarted because the cryptographic techniques used in modern browsers could detect that something wasn’t right and warn the people that the connection was not secure. Without these sorts of protection, many people can be put at risk for simply searching the internet for John 3:16.
The good the bad and the vulnerable
Much of the language used to support the EARN IT Act presents the problem of access to encrypted data as the good guys, being law enforcement, versus the bad guys. Simple put, the good guys need a “golden key” to be able to open up encrypted messages. There are three major issues I see with this framing. What happens if the “good guys” abuse this “golden key”? Can the bad guys prevent the “golden key” from working in the first place or could the “bad guys” steal the golden key? What happens when a country like Iran, or any other on the world watch list, starts using these tools to spy on christians?
Bad Apples
Whether it’s bad intentions or incompetence, everyday people can be hurt when law enforcement abuses their power or fails to proetect people. Unfortunately this isn’t a hypothetical question. A news story in 2020 reported that a victim of domestic violence was planning to flee but her plan’s were leaked to her abuser by members of the victorian police, who were his colleagues. It seems unrealistic to expect that we can weed out all the bad apples, which raises the risk presented in creating a “golden key” which could access people’s private information.
A lesson from the Clipper chip
In 1994 the clipper chip was developed and released in the USA to encrypt communications like phone calls but give law enforcement agencies a “golden key” to access the information with a warrant. The reason why this idea was abandoned after a few years was the realisation that the “bad guys” could simply make their own encrypted phones, or even more embarrassingly, they could easily modify a phone with a clipper chip to prevent the “golden key” from working. The idea of being able to wiretap the “bad guys” was a resounding failure, because the “bad guys” just moved on to something that law enforcement could wiretap.
Summary
The promise of catching the “bad guys”, by mandating companies to create these “golden keys”, appears to be misguided and may in fact undermine technology which provides safety and free flow of information to people in persecuted countries. Unfortunately Australia already has legislation which undermines these protections.
By encouraging companies to create tools with strong encryption, it provides more tools for vulnerable people to communicate safely. But, if we continue to legislate a need for the “good guys” we normalise this practice for governments and groups which actively persecute fellow believers.
Sources and further reading
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EARN_IT_Act
https://opendoors.org.au/world-watch-list/
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-06-17/victoria-police-officers-domestic-violence-lisa-neville/12332238
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/08/iranian-man-middle-attack-against-google
https://www.wired.com/1994/06/nsa-clipper/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clipper_chip
Sam Gillespie is a composer, programmer and PhD candidate at the University of New South Wales.Sam Gillespie's previous articles may be viewed at www.pressserviceinternational.org/sam-gillespie.html
