I get the sentiment but the attorney general is hardly the person to debate this with.
Clear laws need to be established to govern encryption,unfortunately in the US it will end up mirroring australia's laws that were passed recently.
Perhaps educating the public would be best. When doctors tell the public something is bad for them,the public generally listens and demands the government enforces the doctor's opinions. But when technologists do the same it quickly becomes a partisan issue. It could be because there are too many power hungry actors in the government that want to abuse tech,but I think it also has a lot to do with how technologists in general have opted to use a "taking sides" approach to social issues in general.
The US is polarized, right now I feel confident at least half of the country will oppose strong crypto simply because they don't trust tech companies and technologists and their attempts to educate the public can be mistaken as a partisan propaganda.
But regardless of the outcome laws must be enforced and this will have a cascading effect all over the world.
All that said I wonder why "presumption of innocence" as a doctrine can't be applied here? I am innocent therefore suspicion of guilt without probable cause can't be used to force or forbid me to communicate with other innocent persons in any particular way. A company offering me a particular means of communication can't be stopped from doing do because I or any other person might be guilty.
If it comes down to it,perhaps an OTA update with remote access to a suspect's device (after warrant has been issued) is the best way to do it. Even if popular apps backdoor crypto,it's not that hard for actual criminals to get a hold of apps that perform good crypto or even steganography! For legitimate lawful intercept,backdoored crypto is not that useful while device access is. Backdoored crypto is useful only for dragnet surveillance, to retroactively decrypt content.
Since most americans have never been anywhere near an actual hostile government that uses informants and surveillance to "disappear" dissidents, they will not side against backdooring crypto.
Clear laws need to be established to govern encryption,unfortunately in the US it will end up mirroring australia's laws that were passed recently.
Perhaps educating the public would be best. When doctors tell the public something is bad for them,the public generally listens and demands the government enforces the doctor's opinions. But when technologists do the same it quickly becomes a partisan issue. It could be because there are too many power hungry actors in the government that want to abuse tech,but I think it also has a lot to do with how technologists in general have opted to use a "taking sides" approach to social issues in general.
The US is polarized, right now I feel confident at least half of the country will oppose strong crypto simply because they don't trust tech companies and technologists and their attempts to educate the public can be mistaken as a partisan propaganda.
But regardless of the outcome laws must be enforced and this will have a cascading effect all over the world.
All that said I wonder why "presumption of innocence" as a doctrine can't be applied here? I am innocent therefore suspicion of guilt without probable cause can't be used to force or forbid me to communicate with other innocent persons in any particular way. A company offering me a particular means of communication can't be stopped from doing do because I or any other person might be guilty.
If it comes down to it,perhaps an OTA update with remote access to a suspect's device (after warrant has been issued) is the best way to do it. Even if popular apps backdoor crypto,it's not that hard for actual criminals to get a hold of apps that perform good crypto or even steganography! For legitimate lawful intercept,backdoored crypto is not that useful while device access is. Backdoored crypto is useful only for dragnet surveillance, to retroactively decrypt content.
Since most americans have never been anywhere near an actual hostile government that uses informants and surveillance to "disappear" dissidents, they will not side against backdooring crypto.