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Comment by comboy | Hacker News Reader

If government comes to you and says you must send data here and there or log this and that and you must not tell anybody about it, then you have to comply and you can't do much about it even with your best intentions. I don't think it should be like this but as far as I understand it is the current state of affairs.

Even if they shouldn't be able to force you to do some things the best you can do is take them to court, still completely outside public eye, and they can provide some plausible reasons regarding say national security which are likely pretty much impossible to verify.

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> government comes to you and says you must send data here and there or log this and that and you must not tell anybody about it, then you have to comply and you can't do much about it

Eh, this is unsettled law [1]. If you have logs and the U.S. asks for them, you must turn them over. But it's unclear the U.S. can compel you to write new software.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI–Apple_encryption_dispute#L...

Plus, Mullvad is jurisdictionally in Sweden, and to my knowledge Swedish authorities have no legal right to force developers to write any software.

> Swedish authorities have no legal right to force developers to write any software.

“A party which conducts activities which are subject to a reporting obligation pursuant to Chapter 2, section 1 of the Electronic Communications Act (2003:389) ("LEK") is obligated, upon request of the enforcement agency, to cooperate in connection with the enforcement of covert surveillance of data.”

https://mullvad.net/en/help/swedish-covert-surveillance-data...

> 2. What significance does the law have for the Mullvad service?

> Mullvad cannot be made subject to a duty to cooperate in connection with the enforcement of a decision authorising covert surveillance of data since VPN services are not an activity subject to a reporting obligation pursuant to Chapter 2, section 1 of the LEK.

Same page.

Thanks.

> If government comes to you and says you must send data here and there or log this and that and you must not tell anybody about it, then you have to comply and you can't do much about it even with your best intentions.

There is some nuclear options https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavabit#Suspension_and_gag_ord...

Even if you go the nuclear option, you might risk being arrested:

> Levison said that he could be arrested for closing the site instead of releasing the information, and it was reported that the federal prosecutor's office had sent Levison's lawyer an email to that effect.

> Even if you go the nuclear option, you might risk being arrested:

Surely, in a free society, you are free to close down your business for whatever reason you want? Someone might feel like the business is no longer fun to run for X reason, it just happen to have coincided with law enforcement wanting to add wiretaps.

He is free to close down his business//not take on new customers, but that doesn't change his non compliance with a warrant for previous customer information.

Much like you are free to destroy your belongings in general, but not once their is or there will be a legal order for their surrender (I.e. Destruction of evidence).

> Surely, in a free society, you are free to close down your business for whatever reason you want?

Sure, but it’s not something you can do within a day. You need to settle your legal obligations.

My favorite memory of this is when the founder provided his private keys but as a print out in like size 0.5 font.

The Lavabit founder made the right decision instead of letting law enforcement tap his servers.

Regarding printing it in 0.5 font, I don't think this kind of passive-aggressive rebellious act accomplishes anything, and actually highlights how powerless he is. It caused extra work and frustration for the poor guy who got handed the job of transferring the private key from paper, but nobody else was bothered. His shutting down the service was much more of a stance.

I mean good. The NSA request was unjust so fuck the person having to type in the private keys lol.

There is also the distinct possibility that a government would just hack your system secretly if they thought it was a worthwhile target. I would assume that is the case for these well known VPN companies that operate outside US jurisdiction. The actual attacks that might be used are a different discussion but I don't think this is a remote possibility. I think it's quite likely the US government would target companies like these.

I personally feel that mullvad would just shut down if they felt pressure like that from a state actor. I believe they said as much.

This can be mitigated by incorporating and hosting in a country that has a government that doesn’t do this.

Do you know any countries where this actually works? Usually if a powerful country wants something from a small supposedly independent country, this doesn't really apply anymore. One well documented example is how the US lobbied Sweden into raiding The Pirate Bay (https://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-investigator-to-cash-in-...)

The Pirate Bay was openly defying copyright as defined in just about every country except Sweden with barely any legitimate use. It’s a household name for lawlessness.

That’s really not comparable to a vpn service if a significant proportion of users are using it to legitimately protect against privacy invasion when using an open WiFi network.

> if a significant proportion of users are using it to legitimately protect against privacy invasion when using an open WiFi network

How do you know? It could also just be "terrorism" and "child pornography" and that's often reason enough. Similar to the current discussion about banning Telegram in Germany: https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2022/01/26/germany-consid...

You don’t need to actually know, it’s enough to extrapolate from their own advertising material and the general public sentiment.

Besides, if it’s “terrorism” and “child pornography” the vpn endpoints would attract attention quickly enough. It’s not like a VPN is a magical anonymous entry into the internet, it just changes the location and mixes your traffic with other customers’.

> You don’t need to actually know, it’s enough to extrapolate from their own advertising material and the general public sentiment.

I'm pretty sure if someone is determined enough to shut down a service or force them to add logging they don't really care about the marketing material of said service. Just like EncroChat didn't brand themselves as phone brand for organized crime.

I there's an entity that wants WireGuard to add logging they'll make up a "terrorism" reason and all the existing "anti-terrorism" laws will open many doors to do just that.

Sure but with no evidence either way the task of proving it to a judge, politicians or the general public could be done pretty effectively using the companies marketing material or general public sentiment.

Encrochat was never really taken down, it took itself down because it was cracked and so lost its sole asset, the secrecy of the communications.

Depends on the jurisdiction. As far as I know, this is what NSLs etc can force you to do if being an company in USA.

But the thing you propose would require quite a few changes to Swedish law to be possible to happen. Mullvad is a Swedish company.

Read about Lavabit

Which government?

Do you know of any where that wouldn't be the case?

It’s unlikely a Russian vpn provider would respond to a demand from a US government

Remember when Reddit removed the warrant canary?

Aaron Swartz.

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