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https://www.techdirt.com/2023/06/12/council-on-foreign-relations-burns-earn-it-to-the-ground-in-powerful-post-criticizing-its-anti-encryption-aims/>
"The EARN IT Act (the tortured acronym stands for Eliminating Abusive and
Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act) has been bad news ever since
its introduction way back in March of 2020. The bill’s original backers were
all people who either hated encryption (AG Bill Barr, Sen. Dianne Feinstein) or
“Big Tech” (Trump acolytes Josh Hawley and Lindsey Graham).
The stated aim is the disruption of CSAM (child sexual abuse material)
distribution. The real goal is the punishing of tech companies for imagined
slights by removing their Section 230 immunity and the undermining of
end-to-end encryption so law enforcement (and others) can shoulder-surf
internet communications. There’s nothing in the bill that targets CSAM
producers and consumers. It’s all about going after tech companies for
supposedly being willing enablers.
Resisting the bill means siding with child molesters, or so EARN IT’s
proponents would have you believe. But if it becomes law, it’s going to make
the internet worse for everyone, not just the criminals that take advantage of
its distribution features. With its targeting of Section 230 immunity and
end-to-end encryption, it will reduce the number of communication services
available to people to those that either choose to engage in zero content
moderation or remove/break any encryption they offer to users.
The bill kind of went into hibernation for the latter part of 2022, only to
reawaken in a no more rested state in April 2023. Nothing much has changed in
the interim. This year’s model looks pretty much like the 2020-2022 models:
Section 230 on the chopping block and the wording that misleadingly suggests
the law won’t target encryption while providing plenty of options for the
government to do exactly that.
And the problem it creates — the destruction of encryption — hasn’t gone away.
While plenty of government officials like to pretend it’s possible to create a
form of encryption that is still secure despite apparently being able to be
broken at will, those who actually work in the encryption field or exercise
common sense know both things can’t be true."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
