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Dark day for online privacy in the UK.

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[-] CouldntCareBear@sh.itjust.works 88 points 1 year ago

After bouncing back and forth between the house of lord's and the house of commons This bill is a shadow of it's former self. I'm glad to say.

Three things that were massively damaging for privacy and security have, as far as I can see, been scrapped.

  1. The bill no longer requires tech companies to control 'harmful but legal' content. A blurry, ill defined concept that would have been impossible to regulate.
  2. The bill no longer requires all end to end encrypted communication channel's (WhatsApp etc) to have a backdoor for governments and enforcement agencies to access unencrypted messages between people. Something that would have broken effective security in every way.
  3. The bill no longer requires porn to only be accessible to UK citizens after they have proven they are an adult. This was by providing bank details or ID to porn websites (lol no thanks), possibly through a third party company that is supposed to assure some privacy ( lol still no thanks).

And what's left in the bill is going to be regulated by Ofcom, a toothless underfunded shell of a regulatory body.

[-] leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zone 14 points 1 year ago

re your 2nd point, that's most certainly not been scrapped. The language has changed to basically say, they're aware thetech doesn't currently exist to do this but as soon as it does, it must be done. It's a temporary reprieve at best.

[-] mrbubblesort@kbin.social 12 points 1 year ago

OK great, because that tech will never exist.

[-] leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zone -3 points 1 year ago

Of course it will. As soon as quantum processing becomes a reality, which is getting nearer and nearer to happening, encryption will be simple to crack.

[-] RandoCalrandian@kbin.social 9 points 1 year ago

Oh please.

Only a very specific and unfortunately common encryption protocol will be affected by quantum computing.

Prime factorization based encryption is hosed, Elliptic curve cryptography is already the promoted standard and it’s not susceptible to the same issue.

[-] leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 1 year ago

Yeah, I just discovered that on a different thread. Something of a relief, I admit.

[-] mrbubblesort@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago

OK, but then at that point we're fucked anyway and it ALL becomes moot.

[-] CouldntCareBear@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago

I think the bill words it as 'if feasible' or something similar. But that's enough wiggle room to drive a bus full of lawyers through.

[-] leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago

And enough room to be justifiably concerned about it being reintroduced whenever they decide. The point remains however, it's most certainly not been scrapped.

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this post was submitted on 19 Sep 2023
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