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Comment by rahrahrah | Hacker News Reader

I would like the crypto-experts of HN to help understand what consequences this has. For example, I have whatsapp with E2E encryption. Can the government read my texts now?

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"Can the government read my texts now?"

It is impossible to read properly encrypted data. However, this law enables government to require tech firms to deliberately break cryptography in their products.

@grandparent: In other words, no, they can't read the texts you've sent up to this point. But they may be able to a month or year from now. Your texts up to the point the law passed are safe, but you can't be sure about the messages you send from now on.

(well, as safe as they were prior to the Snooper's Charter).

So the question will come down to how much leverage the UK government has over which companies?

Essentially, yes -- it will be down to whether the company is willing to risk having to withdraw from UK market. And if a company does choose to cave in into UK government's demands for backdoors, you can't be sure whether or not they would inform you of this in a timely manner.

You didn't answer my question, you just avoided it.

They key part in my answer is "properly encrypted data". I don't anything about your op sec or crypto tools you are using, so I can't answer if your texts are read by the government. The problem is that soon "properly encrypted data" might be outlawed in UK.

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