Senior Justice Department officials on Friday made another plea to the tech industry to do away with end-to-end encryption, a digital security measure they argue is allowing child sexual exploitation and other criminal activity to flourish online.
By rendering digital communications and other data virtually inaccessible to law enforcement officers, such encryption schemes have turned the internet into a “lawless space” where nefarious actors can commit crimes while evading detection, officials said during a summit at the agency’s D.C. headquarters. While encryption is critical to protecting personal data safe, they said, law enforcement agencies should be able to obtain that information under certain circumstances.
Government leaders and technologists have frequently butted heads over the creation of so-called “backdoors,” which would theoretically allow law enforcement to access encrypted communications if permitted under a warrant. While the government argues such measures are essential to prosecuting digital crimes, tech companies say backdoors would undermine privacy and security for their users and leave them vulnerable to hacks or surveillance.
Law enforcement agencies have historically framed the technology as an impediment to fighting terrorism, but on Friday, officials focused on its impact on child sexual abuse. The event, which featured speeches from Attorney General William Barr, FBI Director Christopher Wray and other high-ranking officials, comes on the heels of a New York Times report that detailed how child predators increasingly rely on encrypted platforms to share images and videos of their victims.
“While we should not hesitate to deploy encryption to protect ourselves from cyber criminals, this should not be done in a way that eviscerates society’s ability to defend itself against other ty ..
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