While the FBI and their national security brethren insist that they need back doors built into all encryption systems to allow law enforcement to monitor any communications they want (because certainly nobody else would ever be able to exploit such back doors, right?), they've also figured out they can get around the problem by backtracking and infecting with spyware the computers of people whose communications they want to monitor.
And here's word that there are plans to coerce technology companies into abetting this. Downloading a security patch or update to your PC? Perfect opportunity to slip a little bit of monitoring malware, courtesy of cooperative tech companies.
Never mind that this means a lot of people might not now download security patches and the like. Never mind that will in turn perpetuate vulnerabilities to virus and identity theft and all that other good stuff. This is national security at stake!
(You would think the FBI would learn from the example of the CIA, who has tainted vaccination efforts in places like Pakistan and Afghanistan by inserting agents onto medical teams performing such projects, with the result that the doctors are now shunned, or shot at.)
This is why we can't have nice things (4,327 in a Series).
Originally shared by +Les Jenkins:
The FBI has no trouble spying on encrypted communications
Every time the Bureau wants to spy on someone whose communications are encrypted, they just hack them.
Why not?