Cryptographers warn governments against implementing backdoors

A group of prominent scientists takes a public position in a paper against governments that want to see encrypted communication through backdoors. According to the researchers, this jeopardizes the protection of the most confidential data.

The paper went public on Tuesday, a day before the FBI will plead with the US government to better access encrypted data. The thirteen authors – cryptographers, computer scientists and security experts – warn in their report about the necessary dangers of building in backdoors.

Even if the backdoors ensure that terrorists and criminals can be caught, the advantage does not outweigh the dangers, according to the researchers. There is always a chance that malicious parties will abuse the backdoors, with the result that they can see the most confidential information. As a result, the criminals can seriously harm individuals – something the FBI, among others, wants to prevent.

Moreover, the scientists further warn, the government has recently been unable to keep malicious people out. For example, the data center of the United States Department of State was recently broken into. Ronald L. Rivest, the creator of the well-known RSA encryption algorithm, among others, fears that the government will not be able to protect confidential information without proper encryption. Professors, cryptographers and Google and Microsoft employees support him.

The warning from the leading scientists is a repeat of a similar discussion in 1997, when then-President Bill Clinton wanted computer manufacturers to implement a chip in their products that would give the government access to encrypted communications. The so-called Clipper chip was ultimately not made, because researchers then stated, according to The New York Times, that the chip infringed privacy.