Feinstein-Burr: The Bill That Bans Your Browser

I couldn't agree more, Feinstein has an hidden agenda.

And if they fail this time they have a bill ready the next time 'an attack' takes place. See The Shock Doctrine [0] which centers on the exploitation of national crises to push through controversial policies while citizens are too emotionally and physically affected by disasters or upheavals to mount an effective resistance.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shock_Doctrine

I wouldn't assume that the general public is strongly against this kind of legislation. A subset (our subset) is, but the HN demographic is small compared to the rest of the country.

The basic concept of strong encryption is not something that most people understand. People are projecting their ideas of physical locks and warrants onto digital systems because that's what they understand. It's flawed, but it's hardly the first or even biggest/most important issue where poor understanding by the public leads to bad legislation.

Every now and then I have to drive through bumfuck Oregon, and the only radio stations are AM talk radio. It would be "educational" to spend some time listening to that every now and then. There are real people on the other sides of these issues that seem blindingly one sided to us. I think a lot of Congress probably just thinks that passing this kind of legislation (on encryption) will make most of their voters happy. Just like shutting down the EPA, or ...

> I believe that Feinstein is a genuinely bad person, and we would be better off without her

As a Californian, I am constantly ashamed at calling her "my" senator. Why the fuck can't someone reasonable run against her? I guess for the same reason that Bernie is having so much trouble: the Democratic Party is sorta like the Communist Party in USSR; you have to be an insider to get anywhere.

That's why it's so important to add another Feinstein to the Senate from California this fall. Kamala Harris is a classic anti-drug warrior prosecutor with no respect for civil rights to join Feinstein.

Don't even think of choosing a grassroots Democrat like Loretta Sanchez instead. The Washington establishment wouldn't like it.

It's too often this instead:

Senate Committee on Candy: "Gum is a problem. Okay, life sentences for anyone caught chewing that evil stuff in public."

The Public: "Well, the law's the law. If criminals don't want to wind up in prison getting raped then they should have thought of that before they chewed a bunch of gum. This is fine. Everything is fine."

It's so classic it has a name: an ambit claim.

That's clawed price anchoring tactic. Just make a high price offer and everything below that seems very cheap. Same with this bill, but I guess everyone knows that his bill can't change the reality but badly damage it.

Don't underestimate their potential for ignorance and stupidity. I think the Feinstein bill represents a genuine attempt to push their solution through and not an attempt to force a false compromise later. For that strategy to work, they'd at least need a decent understanding of encryption in order to draft a proposal that was so over the top that the desired compromise would look palatable by comparison. Have you come across any statements from Feinstein, Burr, or their supporters to suggest that they have anything remotely close to that sort of technical understanding of the issues at stake? I sure as hell haven't.

Their bill's text is actually pretty straight-forward when read in light of the level of ignorance on display in their interviews and the WSJ op-ed piece. In fact, the bill matches up really well with how they think encryption actually works: encryption is bad, so just make it effectively disappear.

Unfortunately, the people who can best explain to them why they're wrong are the same people they've already written off as just another competing advocacy group instead of subject-matter experts.

To be fair, that's pretty common in Washington. But the jadedness it creates is hugely problematic when they mischaracterize things. So instead of recognizing the community's pretty obvious credibility, they see the exact opposite.

You seem to imply (but sort of dance around it) that this is a bad thing. It's a good thing that politicians can't be outright bought.

Most senators are afraid of looking weak on national security, and this usually outweighs whatever financial clout you can bring to bear. Your average voter does not understand encryption, but understands "this will let us crack into terrorist's phones."

Recent articles would suggest that tech firms are spending a lot of money on lobbyists: http://www.wired.com/2015/07/google-facebook-amazon-lobbying... and http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/02/09/which-tech-...

And this database would suggest some tech companies fall into the 5th highest spending industry: https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/top.php?showYear=2015&inde...

So, a the question is, why, despite these efforts are we still seeing this sort of thing? A few reasons, I'd guess...

1) Lobbying efforts by other industries and groups (law enforcement has a vested interest here, for example)

2) A tendency to wanting to look tough on crime and terrorism, especially going into an election year. Moderation and wise restraint are always a tough sell in politics.

3) The Unbearable Asymmetry of Bullshit - politics edition. See http://quillette.com/2016/02/15/the-unbearable-asymmetry-of-... and

4) A propensity on the part of many in government to want to hold more power (closely related to point 2, but more self-serving).

You're assuming they've tried. I honestly think that the encryption controversy is still too recent for the big tech firms to fully engage their lobbying efforts. And I also think they honestly did not think this issue would get out of hand so fast - they would have considered outlawing encryption so insane that they probably have barely even prepared even their own thoughts in regard to how to argue against the idea.

Apple has $233 billion in cash in real terms (as of the just reported quarter). They hold most of it in short term assets; it's equivalent to cash in that they can access the capital on very short notice if needed. If Apple had to write a check for $50 billion next week, they can do it.

Who's saying they can't? You don't have to buy into all the conspiracy arguments to believe that this kind of thing is coordinated, probably at her level. And talk is cheap. She can propose next week that we all have to wear funny hats.

There are two questions to ask. 1) Is this a serious effort intended to pass or something else? and 2) If it is something else, how would Feinstein benefit from doing this?

You'd have to be brain dead to think she believes this will pass. So obviously the answer to #1 is "It's not a serious effort"

#2 gets much more interesting. If she's doing this as a stalking horse, why? My money says it's to hold on to blue collar workers come the next election. She'll be first in line talking about how she did all she could to make computers "safer". But that's just my intuition. Politicians have a tendency to propose things their sponsors don't like, that they know will not pass, in order to have both their cake and eat it too. The system has been working like that for decades in both the House and Senate.

Who's to say that those companies are not in favor of this kind of stuff as long as they can get the right provisions in the final bill? If real encryption is illegal for all other software vendors that makes your software a much safer bet for the people who actually care about that stuff.

"It is very interesting that the richest* industry in the US cannot make their home senator bend to their will."

I think they can, and did.

I think the entire apple/iphone/fbi storyline was a ruse. The government went to apple and told them which way things were going to go and Apple pushed back and insisted that they needed some kind of plausible deniability and PR cushion for the eventual state of affairs.

So they worked together to concoct a (fake) dispute between Apple and FBI, which Apple "won", but which still allowed the FBI to get what they needed through a heretofore unknown third party.

I am not sure who I would consider having the upper hand in this relationship, but I know it's not you and I.

Thank you for pointing me to TryVoices, it was helpful in finding the contact information for my representatives for Washington (state).

Unfortunately, the rusted-on wowsers in her district will never stop voting for her.

Given the voters in California, someone needs to mount a primary challenge because no one will beat her in the general election. That how Rep Eric Cantor got ousted.

I've voted against her (and Boxer) every time she comes up for re-election since I've been able because of her support of anti-technology laws. Unfortunately they're incumbents in California, so it's really difficult to get them out because they're incumbents so getting primaried is hard, and California is very liberal so it's hard to get a republican in unless they're an actor.

I've always thought this. Limit all representatives, especially the president, to one term. That way they have no motivation to waste their time and our money on getting reelected. You don't even need to touch age then. If you then make it illegal for all representatives, especially the president, to accept donations and maybe give each candidate a set sum to spend we might actually bring democracy back. I'm certainly not holding my breath though. It's basically asking Congress and the president to commit permanent political suicide.

I'd rather have a lottery system, like jury duty, where ordinary folks who are qualified could end up running the country for 4 years. I trust ordinary people way more than psychopathic politicians to do the right thing.

I can't believe that it isn't a blend of both.

She is for sale, and apparently worth the money.

Willfully ignorant. She has been a staunch opponent of "gun rights" (where you & I stand on it matters little for this post), with a very long train of making staggeringly ignorant comments about the subject - long enough, with enough intense involvement by both sides, to show she can't possibly be "plain ignorant" as at some point you have to absorb some objective facts about the matter and show some competent basis for your stance (say, when debating a subject you should know enough about the opposing view to be able to present a competent argument on their behalf). With that kind of precedent in place, it's safe to conclude she knows little - and literally wants to know little - about the objective facts of the encryption issue.

She's more of an equality of outcome person than a equality of opportunity person. It leads to drastically different definitions of what a free society looks like.

Most people aren't interested in capitalist striving, they want to live an average life free from any real danger.

You can always reverse a password hash. It just takes fucking forever. ;)

What makes you think that? Anyone who worked on non-compliant software who lives in the US (or in a US-friendly jurisdiction) would likely be found liable, and fined and/or jailed.

The point of this kind of law is not to make encryption disappear, it is meant to always have some reason to prosecute you if you disobey.

>>would you want us to do the same for foreign governments?

Well ofcourse the wizards making magic... err software would have to ensure no other government ever will be able to access the data..

Only the Good Guys (American Government Agents) are the only that should possess the magic to unlock the wizard's text...

Here's some 'Truth' for you: your post is indicative of the exact kind of thinking that leads people to demand back doors on encryption in the first place.

"I think the solution to all of this starts with creating alternative means to access encrypted networks. You should be able to key into the someone's computer without doing any crypto work for the privilege. Once crypto comes with back doors, and the keys our in our hands, freedom will blossom and terrorist protections will fade away."

Maybe if your solution were in any way practical or realistic, or if you -- the layman -- knew the difference between how to actually solve a problem and merely proposing fantastical solutions, we wouldn't need this discussion in the first place.

She seems to be pro-encryption as long as it comes with a backdoor.