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New U.K. online surveillance proposal could have international reach

A new surveillance proposal in the United Kingdom is drawing criticism from privacy advocates and tech companies that say it gives the government far-reaching digital surveillance powers that will affect users outside the nation’s borders.

The Draft Investigatory Powers Bill released by British Home Secretary Theresa May Wednesday would force tech companies to build intercept capabilities into encrypted communications and require telecommunications companies to hold on to records of Web sites visited by citizens for 12 months so the government can access them, critics allege.

Policy changes are necessary to maintain security in a changing digital landscape, the government argued. “The means available to criminals, terrorists and hostile foreign states to co-ordinate, inspire and to execute their plans are evolving,” May wrote in a forward to the bill. “Communications technologies that cross communications platforms and international borders increasingly allow those who would do us harm the opportunity to evade detection.”

The bill has some new judicial oversight mechanisms, but the response from privacy advocates was largely negative, with some arguing that those changes aren’t enough to compensate for the expanse of new powers.

“The law would apply to all companies doing business with the UK, which includes basically all companies that operate over the internet,” said Nathan White, senior legislative manager at digital rights group Access. “This means that even wholly domestic encrypted communications in the United States, France, or South Africa would be put at risk.”

Some tech companies themselves also raised alarm bells. “Many aspects of the draft Bill would directly impact internet users not just in the UK, but also beyond British borders,” Yahoo said in a blog post. “Of most concern to us at this stage is the UK Government’s proposal to affirm extraterritorial jurisdiction over foreign service providers.”

The U.K. government says some of the controversial aspects of the draft, including the requirement to unlock encrypted communications, date back to laws already on the books and it replaces a patchwork of powers which go back to the early days of the Web. However, while a Code of Conduct for Interception Capabilities released by the British government earlier this year said communications companies were required to maintain a “permanent interception capability,” it made no mention of decrypting such content.

Privacy advocates say the government is reinterpreting earlier laws in problematic ways. “This is a major change” that would effectively outlaw end-to-end encryption, a form of digital security where only the sender and the recipient of a message can unlock it, White said.

In meetings before the draft was released, the government pressed at least one tech company to build in backdoors into encrypted communications, according to a person familiar with the issue who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to comment on the issue.

Apple’s iMessage system uses end-to-end encryption as do an increasingly number of standalone messaging and calling apps including Signal. If the proposal becomes law, critics warn, such services may be forced to alter their systems to include such “backdoors” to allow the government to access encrypted content — something encryption experts say would undermine security by making the underlying code more complex and giving hackers something new to target — or exit the market. Apple declined to comment on the bill, but chief executive Tim Cook has been a vocal opponent of government-mandated backdoors in the past.

Encryption was at the heart of a U.S. policy debate over the last year. The dialogue was triggered when Apple moved to automatically protect iOS devices with encryption so secure the company itself cannot unlock data stored on an iPhone even if faced with a warrant, assuming that a user turns off automatic back-ups to the company’s servers.

Some law enforcement officials warn that criminals and terrorists are “going dark” due to such technology. But the Obama administration decided not to press for a legislative mandate that would require companies to build ways to access such content into their products, although it has not yet come out with a full policy position on the issue.

Critics argue that has led to ambiguity which emboldened British officials. “This draft proposal from the U.K. government demonstrates the lack of leadership on encryption policy from the Obama Administration” and could lead to similar proposals in other parts of the world, said White.

If one country is able to force companies to unlock encrypted data it will be hard to fend off such requests from others including China and Russia, some inside tech companies fear.

When asked about the British proposal by The Post, National Security Council spokesperson Mark Stroh declined to weigh in. “We’d refer you to the British government on draft British legislation,” he said via e-mail.

New UK laws ban unbreakable encryption for internet and social media companies

Companies such as Apple and Google will be banned from offering unbreakable encryption under new UK laws.

Set to be unveiled on Wednesday (November 4), internet and social media companies will no longer be able to provide encryption so advanced that they cannot decipher it, according to The Daily Telegraph.

It will see tech firms and service providers required to provide unencrypted communications to the police or spy agencies if requested through a warrant, and comes as David Cameron urged the public and MPs to back his new surveillance measures.

On ITV’s This Morning earlier today (November 2), the Prime Minister argued that terrorists, paedophiles and criminals must not be allowed to communicate secretly online.

“We shouldn’t allow the internet to be a safe space for them to communicate and do bad things,” he outlined.

Measures in the Investigatory Powers Bill will place a duty on companies to be able to access their customer data in law, and is also expected to maintain the current responsibility for signing off requests with the Home Secretary, but with extra judicial oversight.

The bill will also require internet companies to retain the browsing history of their customers for up to a year.

NSA, Apple Chiefs Decode Encryption Views

LAGUNA BEACH, Calif.—The heads of the National Security Agency and the world’s most valuable company appeared to try to make nice Monday night over their contrasting views on encryption—to a point.

NSA Director Adm. Michael Rogers and Apple Inc. Chief Executive Tim Cook, appearing at The Wall Street Journal’s technology conference, WSJDLive, spoke in broad terms about encryption in back-to-back interviews.

Asked about efforts by Apple and other tech firms to build products that protect user data and communications from law enforcement, Mr. Rogers said, “Strong encryption is in our nation’s best interest.”

But asked if that included impenetrable encryption, he quickly interrupted, “That’s not what I said.”

Mr. Cook, appearing later, disagreed on the latter point. “I don’t know a way to protect people without encrypting,” he said. “You can’t have a backdoor that’s only for the good guys.”

Apple and federal officials have been at odds for more than a year, since Apple issued a new version of its mobile-operating system that it said safeguards user information, even from law enforcement. But the White House signaled recently that it won’t seek new laws to force tech companies to make products that allow law enforcement to eavesdrop.

Messrs. Cook and Rogers said both sides in the encryption debate need to turn down the vitriol. “Reasonable people can have discussions and figure out how to move forward,” Mr. Cook said.

On other subjects, Mr. Cook said, Apple has 15 million users on its streaming music service, including 6.5 million paying subscribers.

Apple launched Apple Music on June 30, offering every user a three-month trial period. Once the trial period ends, customers pay $9.99 a month for individual users and $14.99 for families. The first batch of customers came off the trial period at the end of September.

Mr. Cook also spoke unusually frankly about the automobile industry, although he declined to address Apple’s interest in building an electric car. The Apple CEO said he sees a “massive change” coming in the automobile industry as major technologies shift the sector away from today’s combustion-engine focus.

He said he sees software, electrification and autonomous driving technologies playing a crucial role in the cars of the future. “That industry is at an inflection point for massive change, not just evolutionary change,” he said.

The next steps for the White House on encryption

THE OBAMA administration’s decision not to seek legislation requiring technology companies to give law enforcement access to encrypted communications on smartphones has a certain logic. In this age of hacking and cyberintrusion, encryption can keep most people safer. But the decision also carries risks. Encryption can give a tiny band of criminals and terrorists a safe haven. The United States must now make the most of the useful side of encryption, but without losing sight of the risks.

FBI Director James B. Comey warned last year that law enforcement might be “going dark” because technology companies, including Apple and Google, are introducing ways for users to send encrypted messages by smartphones that can be unlocked only by the users, not by the companies. Mr. Comey was alarmed this would give criminals and terrorists a place to communicate that was beyond reach even of law enforcement with a court order. Mr. Comey suggested Congress require tech companies to provide what is known as extraordinary access to encrypted information, a “lawful intercept” capability, sometimes referred to as a backdoor, or a special key for the government. We sympathized with Mr. Comey’s appeal and urged all sides to look for a compromise.

No compromise was forthcoming. The reaction to Mr. Comey’s suggestion in the technology world was a strong protest that any weakening of encryption — even a tiny bit, for a good reason — creates a vulnerability for all. The firms also made the argument that encryption can be a positive force in today’s chaotic world of cyberattacks; their customers want absolute privacy, too, for the digital lives held on the smartphones in their pockets. They also pointed out that if backdoor access is granted to the U.S. government, it will provide cover for authoritarian governments such as China and Russia to demand the same or worse.

Mr. Comey said last week that private talks with the tech companies have been “increasingly productive.” That is promising. There are methods the FBI might use to crack encryption case by case or to find the information elsewhere. The FBI and state and local law enforcement are most in need; the National Security Agency has much stronger tools for breaking encryption overseas.

Having stood up to Mr. Comey, Silicon Valley should demonstrate the same fortitude when it comes to China and Russia and absolutely refuse to allow intrusions by these and other police states. It would help, too, if President Obama articulated the principle loud and clear.

That leaves a nagging worry. The United States is a rule-of-law nation, and encryption technology is creating a space that is in some ways beyond the reach of the law. Encryption may indeed be valuable to society if it protects the majority. But what if it enables or protects the 1 percent who are engaged in criminality or terrorism? That threat has to be taken into account, and so far it remains unresolved. It will not go away.

Encrypted Smartphones Challenge Investigators

Law-enforcement officials are running up against a new hurdle in their investigations: the encrypted smartphone.

Officials say they have been unable to unlock the phones of two homicide victims in recent months, hindering their ability to learn whom those victims contacted in their final hours. Even more common, say prosecutors from New York, Boston and elsewhere, are locked phones owned by suspects, who refuse to turn over passcodes.

Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance says his office had 101 iPhones that it couldn’t access as of the end of August, the latest data available.

The disclosures are the latest twist in a continuing dispute between law-enforcement officials and Apple Inc. and Google Inc., after the two tech companies released software last year that encrypted more data on new smartphones. The clash highlights the challenge of balancing the privacy of phone users with law enforcement’s ability to solve crimes.

“Law enforcement is already feeling the effects of these changes,” Hillar Moore, the district attorney in Baton Rouge, La., wrote to the Senate Judiciary Committee in July. Mr. Moore is investigating a homicide where the victim’s phone is locked. He is one of 16 prosecutors to send letters to the committee calling for back doors into encrypted devices for law enforcement.

The comments are significant because, until now, the debate over encrypted smartphones has been carried by federal officials. But local police and prosecutors handle the overwhelming share of crimes in the U.S., and district attorneys say encryption gives bad guys an edge.

Encrypted phones belonging to victims further complicate the issue, because some families want investigators to have access to the phones.

“Even if people are not terribly sympathetic to law-enforcement arguments, this situation might cause them to think differently,” said Paul Ohm, a Georgetown University Law Center professor and former prosecutor.

Last week, Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey told a Senate hearing that the administration doesn’t want Congress to force companies to rewrite their encryption code. “The administration is not seeking legislation at this time,” White House National Security Council spokesman Mark Stroh said in a written statement Monday.

Some independent experts say the handful of cases that have emerged so far isn’t enough to prove that phone encryption has altered the balance between law enforcement and privacy. In many cases, they say, investigators can obtain the encrypted information elsewhere, from telephone companies, or because the data was backed up on corporate computers.

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‘In the past this would have been easy for us. We would have an avenue for this information, we’d get a subpoena, obtain a record, further our investigation.’

—Evanston Police Commander Joseph Dugan

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“It depends on what the success rate is of getting around this technology,” said Orin Kerr, a George Washington Law professor.

Apple encrypted phones by default beginning with iOS 8, the version of its mobile-operating system released last fall. The decision came amid public pressure following former national-security contractor Edward Snowden’s revelations of tech-company cooperation with government surveillance.

With iOS 8, and the newly released iOS 9, Apple says it cannot unlock a device with a passcode. That means Apple cannot provide information to the government on users’ text messages, photos, contacts and phone calls that don’t go over a telephone network. Data that isn’t backed up elsewhere is accessible only on the password-protected phone.

“We have the greatest respect for law enforcement and by following the appropriate legal process, we provide the relevant information we have available to help,” Apple wrote in a statement to The Wall Street Journal.

Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook is an advocate of encryption. “Let me be crystal clear: Weakening encryption, or taking it away, harms good people that are using it for the right reasons,” he said at a conference earlier this year.

Only some phones, such as the Nexus 6 and the Nexus 9, running Google’s Android Lollipop system are encrypted by default. Google declined to comment about the role of encryption in police investigations.

Three of the 16 district attorneys who wrote to the Senate—from Boston, Baton Rouge and Brooklyn—told the Journal they were aware of cases where encrypted phones had hindered investigations. Investigators in Manhattan and Cook County in Illinois also have cases dealing with encrypted phones. Investigators say, however, they have no way of knowing whether or not the locked phones contain valuable evidence.

Mr. Moore, of Baton Rouge, thinks there might be important information on a victim’s phone. But he can’t access it.

Brittany Mills of Baton Rouge used her iPhone 5s for everything from sending iMessages to writing a diary, and she didn’t own a computer, her mother said. Ms. Mills, a 28-year-old patient caregiver, was shot to death at her door in April when she was eight months pregnant.

Police submitted a device and account information subpoena to Apple, which responded that it couldn’t access anything from the device because it was running iOS 8.2. Mr. Moore thinks the iCloud data Apple turned over won’t be helpful because the most recent backup was in February, two months before her death. The records he obtained of her phone calls yielded nothing.

“When something as horrible as this happens to a person, there should be no roadblock in the way for law enforcement to get in there and catch the person as quickly as possible,” said Barbara Mills, Brittany Mills’s mother.

Investigators in Evanston, Ill., are equally stumped by the death of Ray C. Owens, 27. Mr. Owens was found shot to death in June with two phones police say belonged to him, an encrypted iPhone 6 and a Samsung Galaxy S6 running Android. A police spokesman said the Samsung phone is at a forensics lab, where they are trying to determine if it is encrypted.

The records that police obtained from Apple and service providers had no useful information, he added. Now the investigation is at a standstill.

“In the past this would have been easy for us,” said Evanston Police Commander Joseph Dugan. “We would have an avenue for this information, we’d get a subpoena, obtain a record, further our investigation.”

Barbara Mills is committed to making sure more families don’t have to see cases go unsolved because of phone encryption. “Any time you have a situation of this magnitude, if you can’t depend on law enforcement, who can you depend on?”

US Government Will No Longer Push For User’s Encrypted Data

Last year Google and Apple (and other companies) made some changes to the way encryption was handled. Instead of Google and Apple holding the keys to the encryption, they gave the keys to their customers. What this meant is that law enforcement agencies can no longer ask these companies to turn over user encrypted data.

If they want the data, they will have to convince those users to give it up themselves, something which the FBI was not too happy about. However for a while the government did not give up their quest to make it so that tech companies could be forced to turn over encrypted user data, but all of that has since changed.

According to reports, the Obama administration has finally backed down in their battle against the tech companies over encrypted data. This means that if you were worried that these tech companies would one day be forced to install back doors which are supposedly only for government access, you won’t have to worry about that anymore.

The argument made by the tech companies basically stated that by installing back doors, even if it was just for the “good guys”, could leave their products and services open to hacks. While this is no doubt a big victory, there are some who are skeptical that this is the end of that.

According to Peter G. Neumann, one of the nation’s leading computer scientists, “This looks promising, but there’s still going to be tremendous pressure from law enforcement. The NSA is capable of dealing with the cryptography for now, but law enforcement is going to have real difficulty with this. This is never a done deal.”

Argument over strong encryption reaches boiling point as Apple, Microsoft rebuff court orders for data access

A long-running debate concerning recent advances in consumer data encryption came to a head this summer when Apple rebuffed a Justice Department court order demanding access to iMessage transcripts, causing some in the law enforcement community to call for legal action against the company.

Over the summer Apple was asked to furnish real-time iMessage communications sent between two suspects in an investigation involving guns and drugs, reports The New York Times. The company said it was unable to provide such access as iMessage is protected by end-to-end encryption, a stance taken in similar cases that have over the past few months punctuated a strained relationship between the tech sector and U.S. law enforcement agencies.

Sources said a court action is not in the cards for Apple just yet, but another case involving Microsoft could set precedent for future cases involving strong encryption. Microsoft is due to argue its case in a New York appellate court on Wednesday after being taken to task for refusing to serve up emails belonging to a drug trafficking suspect. As the digital correspondence was housed in servers located in Dublin, Ireland, the company said it would relinquish the emails only after U.S. authorities obtained proper documentation from an Irish court.

Government agencies have posed hypothetical scenarios in which strong encryption systems, while good for the consumer, hinder or thwart time-sensitive criminal investigations. It appears those theories are being borne out in the real world.

Further confusing matters is a seemingly non-committed White House that has yet to decide on the topic either way. Apple and other tech companies are pressing hard to stop the Obama administration from agreeing to policy that would, in their eyes, degrade the effectiveness of existing data encryption technologies.

As for Apple, while some DOJ and FBI personnel are advocating to take the company to court, other officials argue that such an action would only serve to undermine the potential for compromise. Apple and other tech firms have privately voiced interest in finding a common ground, The Times reports. To that end, the publication notes Apple did indeed hand over a limited number of messages stored in iCloud pertaining to this summer’s investigation.

For its part, Apple is standing firm against government overtures calling for it to relinquish data stored on its servers. CEO Tim Cook outlined his thoughts on data privacy in an open letter to customers last year and came down hard on unlawful government snooping earlier this year.

Jeb Bush: encryption makes it too hard to catch “evildoers”

Jeb Bush: encryption makes it too hard to catch "evildoers"

Bush, the former governor of Florida, said Tuesday that encryption “makes it harder for the American government to do its job.”

That job would be, according to Bush, “making sure that evildoers aren’t in our midst,” echoing a phrase frequently used by his brother President George W. Bush to describe the threat of radical Islamic terrorism.

If you create encryption, it makes it harder for the American government to do its job – while protecting civil liberties – to make sure that evildoers aren’t in our midst.

Governor Bush’s comments were delivered at a forum hosted by a lobbyist group called Americans for Peace, Prosperity and Security (APPS) with close ties to military contractors, that is pushing presidential candidates to adopt “hawkish positions,” according to The Intercept.

(APPS’s advisory board includes members of what you might call the National Security establishment – including a former national security advisor to George W. Bush and a former CEO of BAE Systems. Its honorary chair is Mike Rogers, formerly the chairman of the US Congress’s Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.)

Bush also advocated for wide latitude for the NSA to continue collecting phone metadata, although the NSA’s surveillance powers over Americans have been curtailed by Congress.

There’s “no evidence” that the NSA abused its powers or infringed on civil liberties of Americans, Bush said.

In fact, Bush said, in the clash of surveillance and civil liberties, “the balance has actually gone the wrong way” – meaning that civil liberties have too much weight.

There’s a place to find common ground between personal civil liberties and NSA doing its job. I think the balance has actually gone the wrong way.

While some US officials have advocated for technology companies to give law enforcement backdoors to read encrypted data, many security experts and tech companies say such a move would jeopardize security for everyone.

Others have pushed for some sort of middle ground, such as a multi-part encryption key that would keep encryption safeguarded by multiple agencies or companies holding part of the key.

Bush falls into this middle ground category, saying at the APPS forum that Silicon Valley companies (like Google and Apple) should cooperate with the government.

We need to find a new arrangement with Silicon Valley in this regard because I think this is a very dangerous kind of situation.

In response to Bush’s comments, some in tech and media suggested that Bush doesn’t really understand encryption.

Andrew Wooster, co-founder of a Seattle mobile software company, tweeted:

The presidential politics of cybersecurity

As the 2016 US presidential election contest has heated up this summer, we’re reminded that cybersecurity isn’t just about technology, it’s also about policy – and that makes it highly political.

It’s still quite early in the election cycle, but cyber issues have taken up a good bit of the debate so far.

At a 6 August Republican debate, two contenders – Governor Chris Christie and Senator Rand Paul – clashed on NSA powers, with Christie claiming that the government needs “more tools” for fighting terrorism, and Paul arguing that the US Constitution requires a warrant for collecting data from Americans.

On the Democratic side, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has largely avoided the issue of NSA surveillance, while her chief rival, Senator Bernie Sanders, has called the NSA activities exposed by leaker Edward Snowden “Orwellian” and “clearly unconstitutional.”

Beyond encryption and surveillance, the cyberthreat from China has also taken up a lot of air time, with Republican candidates Mike Huckabee and Marco Rubio calling for retaliation against China over its presumed involvement in cyberattacks on the US government.

Clinton didn’t go as far as Huckabee or Rubio, but talked up the threat of Chinese economic espionage in a speech last month in which she also claimed that China wants to hack “everything that doesn’t move in America.”

A lot of important policies affecting privacy and security of Americans – and others around the world – will be decided by the next US president.

If you care about any of these issues – encryption, surveillance and the powers of law enforcement; privacy rights; government oversight of the internet and telecommunications; and laws that affect everything from data breach liability, to the rights of security researchers to hack things – it’s time to tune in and make your voice heard.

Apple could be held liable for supporting terrorism with strong iOS encryption, experts theorize

In the second installment of a thought piece about end-to-end encryption and its effect on national security, Lawfare editor-in-chief Benjamin Wittes and co-author Zoe Bedell hypothesize a situation in which Apple is called upon to provide decrypted communications data as part of a legal law enforcement process.

Since Apple does not, and on devices running iOS 8 cannot, readily hand over decrypted user data, a terrorist might leverage the company’s messaging products to hide their agenda from government security agencies. And to deadly effect.

As The Intercept reported, the hypotheticals just made the ongoing government surveillance versus consumer protection battle “uglier.”

Wittes and Bedell lay out a worst case scenario in which an American operative is recruited by ISIS via Twitter, then switches communication methods to Apple’s encrypted platform. The person might already be subject to constant monitoring from the FBI, for example, but would “go dark” once they committed to iOS. Certain information slips through, like location information and metadata, but surveillance is blind for all intents and purposes, the authors propose. The asset is subsequently activated and Americans die.

Under the civil remedies provision of the Antiterrorism Act (18 U.S. Code §2333), victims of international terrorism can sue, Lawfare explains, adding that an act violating criminal law is required to meet section definitions. Courts have found material support crimes satisfy this criteria. Because Apple was previously warned of potential threats to national security, specifically the danger of loss of life, it could be found to have provided material support to the theoretical terrorist.

The authors point out that Apple would most likely be open liability under §2333 for violating 18 USC §2339A, which makes it a crime to “provide[] material support or resources … knowing or intending that they are to be used in preparation for, or in carrying out” a terrorist attack or other listed criminal activity. Communications equipment is specifically mentioned in the statute.

Ultimately, it falls to the court to decide liability, willing or otherwise. Wittes and Bedell compare Apple’s theoretical contribution to that of Arab Bank’s monetary support of Hamas, a known terrorist organization. The judge in that case moved the question of criminality to Hamas, the group receiving assistance, not Arab Bank.

“The question for the jury was thus whether the bank was secondarily, rather than primarily, liable for the injuries,” Wittes and Bedell write. “The issue was not whether Arab Bank was trying to intimidate civilians or threaten governments. It was whether Hamas was trying to do this, and whether Arab Bank was knowingly helping Hamas.”

The post goes on to detail court precedent relating to Apple’s hypothetical case, as well as legal definitions of what constitutes criminal activity in such matters. Wittes and Bedell conclude, after a comprehensive rundown of possible defense scenarios, that Apple might, in some cases, be found in violation of the criminal prohibition against providing material support to a terrorist. They fall short of offering a viable solution to the potential problem. It’s also important to note that other companies, like Google and Android device makers, proffer similar safeguards and would likely be subject to the same theoretical — and arguably extreme — interpretations of national policy described above.

Apple has been an outspoken proponent of customer data privacy, openly touting strong iOS encryption and a general reluctance to handover information unless served with a warrant. The tack landed the company in the crosshairs of law enforcement agencies wanting open access to data deemed vital to criminal investigations.

In May, Apple was one of more than 140 signatories of a letter asking President Barack Obama to reject any proposals that would colorably change current policies relating to the protection of user data. For example, certain agencies want Apple and others to build software backdoors into their encrypted platforms, a move that would make an otherwise secure system inherently unsafe.

Google is Keeping the NSA Out of Your Data, Eric Schmidt Brags

Google (GOOGL) Chairman Eric Schmidt boasted on Wednesday about how improving the encryption of Google’s products has successfully shut out warrantless surveillance by the NSA and other law enforcement. Schmidt talked about the encryption advances, and how former NSA contractor Edward Snowden’s leaks prompted them, at BoxDev, a yearly developers conference for Box.

“When the Snowden revelations came out, we were very, very upset,” Schmidt told Aaron Levie, CEO of Box. “They never said anything to us. So we embarked upon a program to fully encrypt the information that our customers entrusted to us.”

Encryption makes it very difficult or impossible for information passed electronically to be deciphered, either by the NSA or even by the company doing the encryption. Snowden’s leaks showed how the NSA uses warrantless mass surveillance of metadata, which Schmidt argued went beyond proper use of the Patriot Act. He and other tech company leaders started boosting their encryption to keep the security agencies from being able to read any email or communication without a warrant. Now encryption is not just a Google project, and it appears to be working.

“Apple and others did the same,” Schmidt said. “And we know our program works, because all the people doing the snooping are complaining about it.”

He’s right about that. FBI Director James Comey told Congress that they should ban phone encryption because of how it helps criminals get away with their crimes. The surveillance is party of what the tech and Internet industry wants to see changed in the Patriot Act and why they are hoping it won’t be renewed in its present form.