Bungling Microsoft singlehandedly proves that ‘backdoors’ are a stupid idea
“Microsoft leaked the golden keys that unlock Windows-powered tablets, phones and other devices sealed by Secure Boot – and is now scrambling to undo the blunder,” Chris Williams reports for The Register.
“These skeleton keys can be used to install non-Redmond operating systems on locked-down computers. In other words, on devices that do not allow you to disable Secure Boot even if you have administrator rights – such as ARM-based Windows RT tablets – it is now possible to sidestep this block and run, say, GNU/Linux or Android,” Williams reports. “What’s more, it is believed it will be impossible for Microsoft to fully revoke the leaked keys.”
Williams reports, “And perhaps most importantly: it is a reminder that demands by politicians and crimefighters for special keys, which can be used by investigators to unlock devices in criminal cases, will inevitably jeopardize the security of everyone… It’s akin to giving special secret keys to the police and the Feds that grant investigators full access to people’s devices and computer systems. Such backdoor keys can and most probably will fall into the wrong hands: rather than be used exclusively for fighting crime, they will be found and exploited by criminals to compromise communications and swipe sensitive personal information.”
MacDailyNews Take: When liars like U.S. FBI Director James Comey claim the need for “backdoors” that will only be for “the good guys,” point them directly to this news.
U.S. FBI Director James Comey
As we wrote back in March: “Again, encryption is either on or off. This is a binary issue. There is no in-between. You either have encryption or you do not.”
There have been people that suggest that we should have a back door. But the reality is if you put a back door in, that back door’s for everybody, for good guys and bad guys. — Apple CEO Tim Cook, December 2015
This is not about this phone. This is about the future. And so I do see it as a precedent that should not be done in this country or in any country. This is about civil liberties and is about people’s abilities to protect themselves. If we take encryption away… the only people that would be affected are the good people, not the bad people. Apple doesn’t own encryption. Encryption is readily available in every country in the world, as a matter of fact, the U.S. government sponsors and funs encryption in many cases. And so, if we limit it in some way, the people that we’ll hurt are the good people, not the bad people; they will find it anyway. — Apple CEO Tim Cook, February 2016
Oppose government overreach.
Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. – Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759
