Quote from: edmundedgar on June 05, 2013, 11:34:32 PM

Quote from: kjj on June 05, 2013, 10:40:00 PM

In regards to all of the talk about banning encryption, I guess no one remembers the 90s any more. The cypherpunks won that battle in the past. The genie is out so far now that no one even remembers that there was a lamp before.

They did indeed, and the way they won it points to how we'll win this one. You build systems that everybody else uses and make them essential to the operation of the economy. Everybody depends on SSH and SSL, you can't censor dissidents without censoring everyone.
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I was involved with the internet in the mid 90's an following some of the cypherpunks work, but was not involved aside from piddling around with early versions of PGP and such. I've been a politically aware US citizen since that time.

I can tell you that there have been notable shifts in popular opinion and expectations over this 20 year preriod. There have been even more significant shifts on how the internet is used and viewed.

If you get complacent and think that what the cypherpunks achieved is sufficient to stand in stone forever more, you may very well be in for a rude awakening. Certainly the Obama admin does not accept that military grade encryption is without a backdoor to assist our fearless leaders in protecting us is the right path forward (see the EFF story I posted.)

As I mentioned, it is clear that we need SSL and probably SSH for business reasons. That is NOT the same thing as needing these two to be capable of resisting 'authorized' analysis. If you are going to stand up and say you don't trust the FBI, NSA, etc, your message is not going to resonate with either the legislative bodies or a healthy percentage of the population who is scared shitless by the 'Christmas bomber.'