It was announced this week that apps such as WhatsApp, Snapchat, and iMessage could all become illegal in the UK after Prime Minister David Cameron announced that the programs scrambled communications, which stopped the government being able to read any messages sent when using the apps.
The law, mentioned in the Queen’s 2015 speech, is called the Investigatory Powers Bill and requires all internet service providers, phone companies, and technology firms, such as Apple and Microsoft, to keep a record of all users’ activities. This would then be available to the UK police and the government when required.
It would also allow the government to ban all instant messaging apps that refuse to remove end-to-end encryption.
The recent Tunisia attacks have prompted the government to act quickly in order to try and prevent any further attacks. Cameron recently commented, “In our country, do we want to allow a means of communication between people which we cannot read? My answer to that is: ‘No, we must not.’”
However, Cameron has had some opposition, including former Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg (who blocked the bill when it was first brought to light in 2012) and commented that “We have the right to invade the privacy of terrorists and those we think want to do us harm, but we should not equate that with invading the privacy of every single person in the UK. They are not the same thing.”
Also, since the WikiLeaks exposure in 2010, firms such as Facebook and Twitter have gone to extraordinary lengths to prove that their websites are secure. None of the aforementioned companies have stepped forward to say they will remove the encryption services that they currently provide.
Apple’s Tim Cook commented in June that it’s “another attack on our civil liberties that we see heating up everyday – it’s the battle over encryption… We think this is incredibly dangerous… We believe the contents of your text messages and your video chats is none of our business.”
Home Secretary Theresa May has set the a deadline for the bill as December 2016, however, she has commented that the bill could be passed as early as autumn this year.
Back to SMS it is!
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