Tech firms ‘will win’ encryption battle
Technology firms will ultimately win the encryption battle to protect data from governments, Google’s executive chairman says.
Eric Schmidt, speaking at a Washington think tank yesterday, said he was ‘‘sympathetic’’ to the arguments of law enforcement and intelligence agencies seeking to thwart crime and terrorism, but it was not feasible to create access only for ‘‘the good guys’’.
‘‘We don’t know how to build a trap door in these systems which is only available to the good guys,’’ the Google chief told an American Enterprise Institute forum.
‘‘If we put a trap door in our system, first, we would have to disclose it because people would find out anyway. And second, some evil person in addition to the good guys would figure out a way to get in.’’
Schmidt’s comments came after the heads of the FBI and National Security Agency complained that encryption on devices being implemented by Google, Apple and others was hurting their ability to track down criminals and terrorists.
The Google chief said allowing special access would be tantamount to a system allowing the government ‘‘to watch what everyone is doing in order to figure out who the bad guys are’’.
‘‘We’ve taken a very tough line in the industry over this issue and I think we will win this one, at least in America,’’ Schmidt said.
NSA chief Michael Rogers said last month he hoped to see a compromise that allowed intelligence services to snoop on encrypted devices to combat terrorism, within a ‘‘legal framework’’ to protect user rights.
FBI chief James Comey has similarly warned that encryption could hurt crime fighting.
Schmidt said the disclosures in documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden showed intelligence services had been too broad in their surveillance.
‘‘The government says they would keep metadata records of 300 million Americans in order to identify 50 potential terrorist targets, and identify one who turned out not to be a terrorist,’’ he said.
Schmidt said Google had always co-operated with legal requests for information, but added ‘‘we say we want you to come through the front door’’, not the back door.