geoff.mollyandgeoff.com

This is not a political blog. My personal politics run toward the fiscally conservative and the socially liberal. As a result, I’m generally too disgusted with both sides to offer an endorsement to either. This time, though, I’m truly irritated. There’s this myth in the USA that the media is exceptionally liberal and attacks conservatives while giving liberals a pass. Recent events prove that this notion is nonsense. Mark Foley, a prominent republican, was caught sending very sexually explicit emails to minors. He’s resigned. But “Liberal media” coverage of thsi has been minimal. In fact, you might say there’s been a cone of silence. The fact that the religious right could tolerate this behavior in one of their own should be non-stop news. The lack of reporting should forever dispel the notion of a “Liberal Media” in these United States.

Anyone who’s been paying attention has seen this coming for some time.

Now, I’ve never been opposed to reasonable police powers. If the cops can convince a judge that a warrant is justified, they should certainly be able to obtain the wiretaps they need to perform their duty. That’s not disturbing in the least. But coupled with stories of “designated free-speech areas” and people being arrested and/or harrassed for such things as t-shirts advocating peace, the notion that backdoors should be built into every piece of communications equipment gives me pause. In particular when the regulation requiring the backdoor includes provisions for activation without a warrant. I opposed this crap during the previous administration and opppose it now.

So my big question about the proposed regulation is: will my activities now be criminal? See, my needs aren’t served by the communications equipment on the mass market. I’m presently building my own communications equipment to service my requirements. My build includes:

• A Soekris single board computer
• Two wireless cards: one for my own secured communications, and one for the convenience of passerby, as a public service
• Firewall, VPN and routing software developed in Switzerland
• A hardware cryptographic accelerator developed in Taiwan

Now, it’s a real safe bet that neither the crypto accelerator nor the firewall software will ever include the backdoor the feds mandate. Frankly, if they did, I’d write my own firewall and do my crypto in software I’ve personally audited for holes before I’d consider using them. It’s absolutely impossible to design a backdoor such that authorized police agencies can access it and no one else can. Any assertions to the contrary are over-optimistic, disingenuous or both.

Do they honestly plan to make the use or distribution of this correctly functioning equipment illegal? That sounds unthinkable to me, but apparently I’m an exception in this regard. I’m patriotic. I have no intention of doing anything harmful or illegal. But this really rubs me the wrong way. Am I the only one?

This Calvin and Hobbes cartoon from July 7, 1995 seems to ring even truer these days.