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Comment by 2arrs2ells | Hacker News Reader

If you remove the word "encrypted" from this sentence in the Bloomberg article:

Social media platforms based in the U.S. including Facebook and WhatsApp will be forced to share users’ encrypted messages with British police under a new treaty between the two countries, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Then the article matches Stamos's account entirely.

With the word "encrypted," the article makes no sense – it would take legislation to force US companies to build backdoors to encryption, not an international accord.

I agree the HN headline could be better (my fault!) - but my money is on another Bloomberg security reporting error. Hope they actually issue a correction this time...

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> With the word "encrypted," the article makes no sense – it would take legislation to force US companies to build backdoors to encryption, not an international accord.

It makes sense if you take it to mean that WhatsApp with share the encrypted messages, without any means to decrypt. It's not a very meaningful statement though, and will only confuse people.

If that's truly what they mean, that's far more than confusing - it's flat-out deceptive.

it would take legislation to force US companies to build backdoors to encryption, not an international accord.

Would it? It might take Congress ratifying a treaty, but at that point doesn't it take the force of law?

ISTR that this has been one of the big arguments over things like the TPP with Investor - State disputes (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investor-state_dispute_settl...) and assorted copyright measures being placed in treaty proposals instead of being addressed legislatively.

"This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land" (emphasis added) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_Six_of_the_United_St...

Edit: fix italics

Treaties are generally not self executing. It's also very hard to get ratification for various political reasons.

> it would take legislation to force US companies to build backdoors to encryption, not an international accord

Such a law already exists in Australia, so I don't think it's out of the question.

The resolution is simple. Originally, WhatsApp encrypted end-to-end, and they had no ability to examine traffic. Now, it is encrypted between you and the server, decrypted and scanned, and then re-encrypted for transmission.

If you want end-to-end encryption, you will need to use something else.

It is still encrypted end-to-end. I don't know where you're getting your information from.

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