![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() On Wednesday the House of Lords approved a government amendment on the online safety bill related to scrutiny of encrypted messaging. British users could end up as one of the most isolated and insecure groups in the world. He said: “If the government push on regardless then Apple will simply join the growing band of vendors that would leave the UK. The company said the proposals would “result in an impossible choice between complying with a Home Office mandate to secretly install vulnerabilities into new security technologies (which Apple would never do), or to forgo development of those technologies altogether and sit on the sidelines as threats to users’ data security continue to grow.”Īlan Woodward, a professor of cybersecurity at Surrey University who has signed an open letter warning against online safety bill proposals that could dilute encryption, said Apple’s submission on the 12-week consultation represented a “stake in the ground”. “Together, these provisions could be used to force a company like Apple, that would never build a backdoor, to publicly withdraw critical security features from the UK market, depriving UK users of these protections,” Apple said. In comments implying that encrypted products such as FaceTime and iMessage could ultimately be endangered in the UK, Apple said it never built a “backdoor” into its products for a government to use, and it would withdraw security features in the UK market instead.Įnd-to-end encryption is the core security technology for FaceTime and iMessage and is viewed by Apple as an intrinsic part of those services. The proposals would “make the Home Office the de facto global arbiter of what level of data security and encryption are permissible”, Apple wrote.Īpple also expressed concern over a proposed amendment that it says would allow the government to immediately block implementation of a security feature while a TCN is being considered, instead of letting the feature continue to be used pending an appeal. The Home Office consultation proposes “mandating” operators to notify the home secretary of changes to a service that could have a “negative impact on investigatory powers”.Īpple wrote in a submission to the government that such a move would in effect grant the home secretary control over security and encryption updates globally, when allied to further proposals strengthening requirements for non-UK companies to implement changes worldwide if – like Apple – they operate via a global platform. Apple’s latest concerns centre on the Investigatory Powers Act 2016, which gives the Home Office the power to seek access to encrypted content via a technology capability notice (TCN).Įnd-to-end encryption, which ensures only the sender and recipient of a message can see its content, is a key tech privacy feature and is a hard-fought battleground between governments and tech firms.Īpple said the changes included a provision that would give the UK government oversight of security changes to its products, including regular iOS software updates. ![]()
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