Deputy AG Rosenstein calls for law to require encryption backdoors

Two things

1st. Can they even enforce this when the devices ship from China and I am sure it would not be hard to move the systems that compile the code off shore thus the product is never exported.

2nd. I'll use this the second the USA confirms that all government agencies including the military use the same encryption for all their communications!

Not necessarily...

"..the Feds eventually opted instead to pay for a zero-day vulnerability to circumvent the passcode."

That's what they said. Also possible is that it had been broken before inadmissably (no warrant), and they wanted to avoid having the technique (or the act) publicised.

We promise not to look

OK, maybe just a bit....

Do it the old fashion way, shut up, figure it out and don't tell anyone you can get in. Why are there so many idiots in positions of power.

Of course it is possible some of them have figured it out and then they let the idiots provide a smoke screen to make it look like they can't get in, but now I am starting to assume what you see is not what you get and that is usually wrong.

If I chose to use AES encryption during communication thats my decision

What happens when...

... Russia, China, and the other 260, or so, law enforcement require access for their criminal investigations? And that investigation involves agencies or persons working for the government? In a classified matter? Need I go on? Beware what you ask for.

Habeas corpus?

After a terrorist attack, obtaining stored electronic information is an effective and necessary law enforcement technique.

Yeah, who needs a crime to start investigations? Just start suspecting everyone!

Fortunately, the US Supreme Court would almost certain to slap down anything like this and the DoJ know it. So, it's the usual kind of posturing.

Oh boy.....

'He also made a point somehow related to encryption when he referenced the natural disaster unfolding in Texas.'

Wow. The man just make the biggest quantum leap since Sam Beckett. Where's Al and Ziggy? Do do do doodoo do do do doo..

Essentially that would make US products unbuyable to the rest of the world...

... at least that's the common idea. The counter-argument is of course Blackberry, who have been found to have back doors many times, but still manages to sell their products.

They need to test this first ..

.. so let's ensure that the not-so-esteemed deputy AG is stripped of all crypto. He should not be able to set a password other than "1234" and "password", and must be mandated to access his bank only online.

If he objects, well, he's only exposed to the natural consequences of what he proposes so why the protests?

Bloody idiot.

Laws of Math vs Laws of Men

The Reg readership doesn't need to have it explained why Rosenstein is talking complete drivel, but you do have to wonder why politicians, political appointees and even moderately smart guys like the late not-much-lamented Comey simply *will not* understand that the backdoors idea cannot work, will have no effect on the Black Hats it's supposed to be targeting and will render everyone less safe. Even the kind of intellectual pond life infesting DC are surely capable of understanding that π is not 3.000. It will never be 3.000. No amount of political gobshittery from a mouth-on-a-stick will make it become 3.000. The laws of math trump those of men and that's all there is to it.

Then again, perhaps I overestimate them. Maybe their stupidity should be diverted into a more harmless route: leveraged, in a word, rather than us simply banging our foreheads in frustration.

So someone please tell these nincompoops that the problem is prime numbers. Get Trump to twat something presidential like "Primes unamerikan. Helping nookoolar tursts. Bad!" Congress obviously must set itself to pass a law to make it easier to perform prime factorisation on large numbers. It's scandalous that this has been overlooked for so long. Give them a mountain of paper and as many pencils as they like (there's always some attrition, as Representatives in particular keep sticking them in their ears and noses) and leave them to secure the nation and make America great again. Should keep them from causing trouble elsewhere for years at least.

IANAL but I have a question:... if they demand your password, and you give it to them, and it still doesn't work (perhaps, just perhaps, they are using the wrong program to decrypt it....), are you obliged to tell them?

And how do they prove you gave them the wrong password then?

Or do they require you to do the decrypting?

Isn't that where the whole "self incriminating" thing kicks in?

All your secrets are belong to us.