The “Chains of Cryptography”: Why Technological Solutions Should be Emphasized in the War Over Mass Surveillance

We can’t afford to wait for political solutions when it comes to mass surveillance. The stakes are too high and the prospects for a meaningful political change are too low. Instead, we should follow in the tradition of the cypherpunks, embracing technological solutions and empowering those building the tools to keep us free.

How did we get here?

When the first leaks from Edward Snowden were released to the public, I hoped they would inspire a political firestorm leading to some kind of reform. While they did spark outrage among civil libertarians, their political impact has been underwhelming to say the least.

While I initially found this somewhat puzzling, maybe it should not have been surprising. Although there are many reasons for the lack of reaction, two issues seem particularly important.

First, short-termism is pervasive in our current political climate. Because supporters of mass surveillance feel that the state’s motivations for wholesale surveillance are currently justified, they are unable to grasp that the massive power it entails becomes both increasingly entrenched and susceptible to abuse over time. But the 20th century is filled with lessons on the dangers of unfettered government surveillance, and their systems of listening were primitive in comparison to our current ones. Even the history of the United States government (tame when compared to the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany) is filled with examples of egregious abuse of surveillance and the information gained through from it. Notably, Martin Luther King was watched by the FBI, who uncovered his sexual affairs and then tried blackmail him into committing suicide.

Second, when short-term thinking is combined with political tribalism, the results are compounded. Even those who decry expansive state power when it’s being wielded by their political opponents, are often comfortable with its use by their allies. Regarding the public’s view on NSA surveillance, this is depressingly apparent. During the Bush administration, most Republicans supported NSA surveillance while most Democrats opposed it. Once Obama entered the Whitehouse, the numbers flipped, with more Democrats finding surveillance acceptable than Republicans. Even worse, some urged their political allies not to join forces with ideologically dissimilar groups in opposition to mass surveillance, claiming it was tantamount to “trading long-held beliefs in social and economic justice for a current hot-button issue.”

If we wait for political change, it may be too late

Simultaneously, “the internet of things” continues to expand, broadening the scope of the listeners’ grasp dramatically. Increasingly, our offline lives are becoming increasingly swept up with our online lives, leaving a smaller and smaller sphere of meaningful privacy to those who fail to protect themselves.

It goes without saying that the potential to abuse this ubiquitous memory is enormous. Nearly omniscient, the listeners will inch closer and closer to obtaining quasi god-like vision. Everyone’s inner worlds, past and present, exposed to the prying eyes of the state.

The longer the current system remains in place, the more entrenched it will become. With constitutional challenges fizzling, and a consensus across party lines that such power is justified even in the absence of existential threats, the system will only continue to solidify as the new status quo. Once an all-seeing state is fully accepted as an essential fixture for maintaining national security in a “free society”, things may be too far gone to turn the tide.

A Way Forward

First, encryption should be utilized wherever possible, and demanded when it’s not offered. The more encryption is built into a service or product by default, the more difficult bulk surveillance becomes. While Google and Apple are far from perfect on privacy issues, both of them have made some progress on this since the full scope of the NSA’s surveillance came to light. Gmail is now encrypted to a certain degree, and iPhones are now encrypted by default.

Second, decentralized systems should be preferred. Facebook or Google are easy targets for governments, as their users information is centralized under the firm’s control. In contrast, decentralized systems like Diaspora allow for users to control their own information, or for it to be widely distributed. In a decentralized system, the government must attack each point individually, making it much more difficult for mass surveillance to be done.

Third, free software should be preferred to closed software. Closed proprietary software lacks the transparency needed to trust it with your information and communications. Using an Apple computer, with opaque software, it’s extremely difficult to tell exactly what that software is actually doing, including whether it is snooping on its users. For example, the Apple Spotlight Search was secretly sending information to Apple every time its users conducted a search. With open software, someone could have seen this easily in the code. If you’re using any closed software, you are putting full trust in the creator of that software, and that trust could easily be misplaced.

Finally, although many of the tools necessary to protecting privacy exist already, some of them are not being used by many who are concerned with their privacy because of their inconvenience or inaccessibility to people without technical backgrounds. Because of this, accessibility and ease of use are extremely important. FreedomBox, among other projects, are aiming to solve this issue, and will hopefully play an increasingly important role going forward.

But in rewriting this, once you had this draft under your eye, perhaps you were fleetingly aware that the editor's question should be "Why?" Is this draft an answer to the question "Why should we bother with better technology when politics could do this for us?" It hardly seems likely that there is a reader whose mind is in that condition. Is the point "Which technical measures should be most important to us, once we have agreed that technical measures to improve privacy are necessary?" If so, what have you said that is novel on that point? Seems to me that "deploy strong encryption everywhere, federate centralized services, make software transparent to and modifiable by users" is a good technical program: in fact, it is the one I presented through the term. Wouldn't your essay in that case benefit from taking what I have argued as the explicit starting point? "I agree with Eben that we need technical solutions, and in general these are what we need, therefore [your new ideas here]" seems to be the right model for the next draft in that event.

Or perhaps that's not what I should be taking from the draft. That I missed the point beyond. In that case, I still recommend, as I did last time, that you lead with the point you consider your own.

Why not state your own ideas at the beginning of the essay, instead of using other peoples' words and general background? You don't have space enough for wastage. Let us know what you have to say, and then put it in context in the course of development.

Cryptography is not a solution to the problem of "state overreach." Security of communications is an objective which has many benefits and no drawbacks.

Tools like PGP

GPG isn't PGP.

and Tor allow anyone to achieve a high level of secrecy and anonymity, shielding their communications and online actions from surveillance. The emergence and availability of strong cryptography to the general public, combined with the growing importance of online activity, has massive implications for balance of power between individuals and large institutions.

Why did you use these, rather than HTTPS, SSL, IMAPS, and all the other obvious examples of strong encryption being used all the time by everybody? You've exoticized what is in fact already completely mundane, thus setting up all sorts of anlaytic traps for yourself you're going to fall into later.

The most obvious implication of secure communications is that we have $trillions of e-commerce and secure business operations on the public net. The second most obvious implication is that the world financial system is stable. Then there are these comparatively trivial other points.

This is purely irrelevant. If you were going to write about it knowledgeably, you would need lots of space, and whatever this essay is about (we still don't know, after all, because you haven't given us your idea yet, just a bunch of semi-accurate technical description) it isn't about this.

Really. Where did you have in mind?

Third, strong crypto is difficult to use.

Bushwah. This is the consequence of talking about stuff you don't use, and ignoring HTTPS, TLS and SSL that you use everyday all the time. Is it harder to use HTTPS websites than HTTP ones? Do you find electronic banking and PayPal? very hard? It's just nonsense that came from not thinking through first your own idea, and then second the background you would need to be sure the reader had in order to understand it. You reversed cart and horse, and have now spent hundreds of words in technical description, which turned out to bear down your own thinking, allowing mistakes like this one to occur.

While great progress has been made since the 1980’s in making it accessible to everyone, it is still not convenient for those who are not tech savvy, and it is easy to make mistakes. FreedomBox, among other projects, are aiming to solve this issue, making it easier for the average person to use cryptographic tools correctly in order to ensure their privacy.

This draft clears away brush, so the next draft can do some construction. You don't need to teach me about the technology this time, or to write for a general readership. Instead, start from the idea of your own that is the essay's payoff, and develop from there. Instead of teaching basic techfacts, show me what you have thought your way to, and why.

The Incorruptible Guardian: The Promise and Limitations of Cryptography as a Protector of Freedom

-- By DanielShiner

“While I pray that public awareness and debate will lead to reform, bear in mind that the policies of men change in time, and even the Constitution is subverted when the appetites of power demand it. In words from history: Let us speak no more of faith in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of cryptography.”- Edward Snowden

Quis custodies ipsos custodes?

The question of how to protect against predation without allowing the protector to abuse their power has been a fundamental question of political theory since at least the time of the ancient Greeks. However, despite thousands of years of trial and error with differing institutional arrangements aimed at constraining those entrusted with power, this question has no satisfactory answer.

The United States Constitution was one of these experimental attempts to constrain power. However, as history has shown, it has often been circumvented in times of crisis, and has failed as a guarantor of the rights enshrined within it.

People are corruptible, capable of being pressured, often willing to sell out principle to the prospect of success and status. Institutional arrangements, like those set out in the United States Constitution, may be capable of incentivizing those in power to respect limitations on that power, but they are far from infallible. In the end, the strength of any constitutional limitations relies on the public holding agents of the state accountable when the they violate those limitations.

“The Chains of Cryptography”

One promising, although limited, solution to the problem of state overreach is the use of cryptography. Instead of passively hoping that their rights are being respected, cryptography allows individuals to actively protect their own privacy and freedom.

Tools like PGP and Tor allow anyone to achieve a high level of secrecy and anonymity, shielding their communications and online actions from surveillance. The emergence and availability of strong cryptography to the general public, combined with the growing importance of online activity, has massive implications for balance of power between individuals and large institutions.

The most obvious implication is that people are now able to hide the content of their communications from oversight, in addition to their identities, allowing people to communicate freely without fear of retribution. This effectively backstops freedom of speech and the fourth amendment, creating an environment in which even controversial ideas can be discussed, and privacy protected. Allowing for anonymous reading and exploration of the net, eradicating the chilling effect that occurs as a result of government surveillance, is fundamental to maintaining freedom of thought.

More controversially, cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, when used in tandem with other tools to protect anonymity, potentially ensure economic privacy. In the same way that untraceable cash transactions have been used to evade taxes and government oversight in the physical world, cryptocurrencies can be used to keep online economic activity private, enabling participation in outlawed economic activity. This is not only a theoretical possibility, but is already being done. There is already a thriving online black market in outlawed goods and services, and this will likely continue to grow for better or worse.

The Silk Road, a now defunct online black market using cryptographic tools to hide the identity of its operators and users, ran successfully for multiple years in flagrant violation of laws prohibiting the sale of certain controlled substances. It is estimated that $15 million in transactions were made through Silk Road annually. Despite the almost unlimited power and resources available to the United States government, they were almost entirely helpless to stop the transactions occurring through the marketplace. If it were not for mistakes made by the alleged founder of the marketplace, eventually exposing his identity to law enforcement, the marketplace could have remained operational. Although it was eventually shut down, multiple copycats have emerged to take its place.

Also controversial, cryptocurrencies potentially allow for economic support of political activists and unpopular causes without fear of retribution. For example, in 2010, numerous financial institutions began blocking donations to WikiLeaks, reducing their revenue by 95%. WikiLeaks? quickly began allowing potential patrons to donate bitcoin anonymously, bypassing the barriers erected by financial intermediaries.

Limitations and Dangers

"If we want freedom and privacy, we must persuade others that these are worth having. There are no shortcuts. Withdrawing into technology is like pulling the blankets over your head. It feels good for a while, until reality catches up.” –Hal Finney, Cypher Punk Mailing List

As powerful as cryptography may be for the protection of certain freedoms, is not a panacea.

First, despite the fact that the relative importance of online communications and activity is rising, cryptography can only ensure secrecy and anonymity. It cannot stop abuses of power in areas unrelated to communications and information. Cryptography can hide the identity of an activist, but it cannot stop a predatory state from imprisoning or torturing that activist. However, the more human activity occurs online, the more important cryptography will become.

Second, cryptography itself can and has been outlawed in the past, though this is increasingly difficult to do considering that the government itself, as well as powerful private institutions rely on cryptography to function.

Third, strong crypto is difficult to use. While great progress has been made since the 1980’s in making it accessible to everyone, it is still not convenient for those who are not tech savvy, and it is easy to make mistakes. FreedomBox, among other projects, are aiming to solve this issue, making it easier for the average person to use cryptographic tools correctly in order to ensure their privacy.

Finally, cryptography can be abused. Secrecy and anonymity protect the privacy of the innocent, but can also be used just as easily to shield destructive and predatory activity from oversight. For example, Tor has already been used to distribute and share child pornography.

Despite these limitations, and potential abuses, the promise of cryptography as a tool to protect freedom is high.

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