> France isn't a safe country for open source privacy projects. They expect backdoors in encryption and for device access too. Secure devices and services are not going to be allowed.
If this is true, it's a bit concerning for Ledger users. One state-mandated firmware update away from losing all your crypto?
Fortunately it's not true. GrapheneOS seem https://xcancel.com/GrapheneOS/status/1993061892324311480#m to be reacting to news coverage https://archive.ph/UrlvK saying that although legitimate uses exist, if GrapheneOS have connections to a criminal organization and refuse to cooperate with law enforcement, they could be prosecuted nonetheless:
« il existe pour une certaine partie des utilisateurs une réelle légitimité dans la volonté de protéger ses échanges. L’approche est donc différente. Mais ça ne nous empêchera pas de poursuivre les éditeurs, si des liens sont découverts avec une organisation criminelle et qu’ils ne coopèrent pas avec la justice. »
Charitably, GrapheneOS are not in fact a front for organized crime, but merely paranoid, assuming that the news coverage is laying the groundwork for prosecution on trumped-up charges. Notably, there doesn't appear to have been direct communication from law enforcement yet.
How would the government mandate a backdoor of such a hardware/software system without attracting eyeballs?
The government just doesn't care.
If there is a backdoor in an open-source system, and people know about it, then they will organize independently to patch it out. So it will be ineffective to the extent that the technology allows reprogrammability.
The only way you can beat it, as a governement trying to insert a backdoor, is through use of tivoization or some other technology that clinches control during manufacturing or other centralization weak points around economies of scale that the re-programmers don't have.
When all the remaining freedom fighters will flee out of all the oppressive states into the last remaining citadel of human rights, which may well turn out to be some drifting icefield in Arctic, and the oppression finally catches them up there, is there any plan B for the humankind?
Why are we giving up. Shouldn't we stand up against Oppressive governments and Corporations.
[delayed]
Satellites?
Satellite operators are still required to comply with the Federal Wiretap Act (and equivalent in every other country of the world).
The result is a less-than-optimal network that requires routing communications through a ground station (where it can be intercepted) even when it's technically feasible (and optimal) to use point-to-point communications.
The resulting technical solutions (at least) double the bandwidth and processing required by the network, and bandwidth/processing are critical resources for communications satellites. These requirements can make or break the economic feasibility of a proposed system.
Can be jammed and/or destroyed.
Easily blackmailed by a lazer beam..
The One place that has not been corrupted by Capitalism… space!
I can hear Tim Curry's delivery of that in my head. So good.
Looks like Musk and Bezos are going to beat you to it.
Capitalism didn't corrupt privacy. Literally every major messaging and smartphone maker integrated e2e encryption because the user wants it. It is government regulations, that wants to kill privacy. Which is not free markets or capitalism, this is more socialism.
Capitalism didn't corrupt privacy.
Meta, Microsoft, and Google's extensive user tracking beg to differ.
It's not either or.
Meta, Microsoft, Google, & Apple have a profit motive for scooping up everything they can.
Every government in the world wants to do the same scooping, but their motive is "security."
These are not separate activities either. Governments are mandating the collection by corporations, so they can use that channel for their own purposes.
If I read it correctly, they’re not physically “moving” out of France. They are merely switching servers away from OVH.
"France isn't a safe country for open source privacy projects. They expect backdoors in encryption and for device access too. Secure devices and services are not going to be allowed. We don't feel safe using OVH for even a static website with servers in Canada/US via their Canada/US subsidiaries."
Would surprise me if they weren't moving out of France entirely.
seems as physical as anything, this includes OVH servers in france
which is one of several server locations they operate on, including Germany and Switzerland
... to Canada.
Out of the frying pan, into the fire?
Canada does not restrict or ban encryption: https://www.gp-digital.org/world-map-of-encryption/
” In Canada and the US, refusing to provide a PIN/password is protected as part of the right to avoid incriminating yourself. In France, they've criminalized this part of the right to remain silent.”
> refusing to provide a PIN/password is protected
In theory. In practice there's a case where a defendant is being held in contempt (jailed) for years now, for refusing to provide her encryption passwords. At that point both the 5th and the idea of contempt are busted.
> In practice there's a case where a defendant is being held in contempt (jailed) for years now, for refusing to provide her encryption passwords.
Link to story?
The only one I know of was this
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13629728
And he was freed after about 4 years.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/02/man-who-refused-...
> Prosecutors were able to gain access to the laptop, and police say forensic analysis showed Rawls downloading child pornography and saving it to the external hard drives.
Does it mean they do not respect democratic values in France?
If by "democratic values" you mean US and Canadian law, they don't.
Depends, did the people vote for it?
Could you say a few words on what you think democracy is?