We should be a bit less naive about what this play really is. There is a talking point I've observed in some of my more progressive circles that "nerds aren't the good guys anymore," as managerialists see principled people who demand facts, evidence, logic, and reason as an obstacle to their maintaining control of "The Narrative," which is whatever absurdity authorities and their toadies use to demonstrate their alignment.
This campaign has nothing to do with protecting children - especially given the UK establishment's veritable tradition of both organizing and covering up industrial scale sexual abuse - and it is nothing more than hate speech designed to cast aspersions upon and isolate technologists as part of a broader political effort.
The Rolling Stone article from earler this week said, "The Home Office has hired the M&C Saatchi advertising agency — a spin-off of Saatchi and Saatchi, which made the “Labour Isn’t Working” election posters, among the most famous in UK political history — to plan the campaign, using public funds."
I would encourage HN readers to recognize this campaign is only nominally about encryption, and mainly it is about politically attacking the credibility and reputations of civilian technologists, and by conflating your expertise with abusers this M&C Saatchi agency has produced literal hate propaganda against you. (just following orders, surely!) I'd recommend people to not underestimate what this is.
>it is about politically attacking the credibility and reputations of civilian technologist
No question about it, this is accurate - especially given the way the UK has treated those who have a legitimate reason to use encryption for political reasons.
This is cynical authoritarianism being used to confer a totality over protective technology.
This is from a government that has consistently waged war on expert opinion, "I think the people in this country have had enough of experts from organisations with acronyms saying that they know what is best and getting it consistently wrong." - Gove
This is, quite frankly, from a government that has waged a war on truth.
I've seen this "nerds are the bad guys" pro legacy media narrative too, and in the same places. In the US it's usually built around January 6th and Trumpism and the role of social media in that.
I'm alarmed by the rise of right-wing populist totalitarianism too, but I also feel like we need to remind people to keep their eye on the other players. I heard a funny saying once: the march of tyranny goes "left, right, left, right..." You don't need to posit a conspiracy to explain that pattern, just reaction and opportunism.
I'm hearing rumblings in the USA about a "domestic war on terror" which is every bit as scary as another borderline coup attempt if not more. We'll see that get pushed hard if there is an Oklahoma City scale attack that comes out of the fringe of the militia, right-populist, or Qanon-type circles. That push will include our own version of this UK campaign but framed around surveilling domestic extremism.
I don't think the cryptography wars are over. I think we'll see renewed pushes for more spying and crypto restrictions as we (perhaps) enter a period of increasing domestic and global political instability. I also expect to see pushes to lock down all devices to only run approved code, an open and general war on universal computation, or a push to require all devices to have remote backdoors.
Edit:
Anyone who entertains these arguments needs to remember that "their side" may not necessarily be the ones wielding them. Always picture any increased invasive powers or reduced individual liberties in the hands of your worst political opponents. Political winds can shift quickly, especially in these times.
The irony is most domestic extremism and violence (right and left) is unofficially tolerated because it's useful to be able to direct it at your opponents and just not enforce laws against it, so in many cases it's completely manufactured. I stopped being outraged years ago because that's how they know it's working.
The domestic extremism thing in north america is going to use the same absurdist playbook, which is filling the message with inconsistency and nonsense so that people are so disgusted by it we treat it as too stupid to do anything about - and that in effect neutralizes us so we do nothing, and that is the sufficient condition for evil to prevail.
I'm not a conspiracy theorist so much as a conspiracy arbitrageur, and as long as we think the cadre of people behind these authoritarian plays are stupid and incompetent, the longer we will do nothing to stop them, and the more extreme it will ultimately need to be to dislodge them. There was a time when I would leave these things unsaid, but I think it's important to recognize the time where that was strategic has passed.
If you are among those who can see what's going on, now is the time to articulate it, imo.
This campaign has nothing to do with protecting children - especially given the UK establishment's veritable tradition of both organizing and covering up industrial scale sexual abuse - and it is nothing more than hate speech designed to cast aspersions upon and isolate technologists as part of a broader political effort.
The Rolling Stone article from earler this week said, "The Home Office has hired the M&C Saatchi advertising agency — a spin-off of Saatchi and Saatchi, which made the “Labour Isn’t Working” election posters, among the most famous in UK political history — to plan the campaign, using public funds."
I would encourage HN readers to recognize this campaign is only nominally about encryption, and mainly it is about politically attacking the credibility and reputations of civilian technologists, and by conflating your expertise with abusers this M&C Saatchi agency has produced literal hate propaganda against you. (just following orders, surely!) I'd recommend people to not underestimate what this is.