ENCRYPTION - TELEGRAM'S - ENCLOSED* : MASTER GLOBAL ESSAY

 

ENCRYPTION in spotlight after Telegram founder's arrest. These charges raise concerns about the app's approach to privacy and security.

'' A lot of Telegram's users thought the landlord didn't have a key to their apartment,'' said John Scott -Railton, a security researcher at Citizen Lab, a cybersecurity watchdog at the University of Toronto.

'' They're now discovering that the company actually has keys for four out of five of their rooms. That has frustrated U.S, tech executives, who said that Pavel Durov had played into the public's lack of understanding of encryption to bolster Telegram's image as a secure place to communicate.

Apple, WhatsApp and Signal declined to comment on Mr. Durov and Telegram. 

Apple, WhatsApp and Signal have regularly gone to court or fought high profile battles with governments to protect encryption. Last year, WhatsApp threatened to pull out of Britain if lawmakers approved a measure ordering it to remove encryption from its app.

Meredith Whittaker, the president of Signal, said last year that the company would '' absolutely 100 percent walk '' away from offering service in Britain if it were forced to weaken the app's security.

And in 2020, Apple pushed back against a Federal Bureau of Investigation request that the company break its encryption to access data on two iPhones that belonged to a gunman who opened fire at a naval base in Florida.

The European Union has been debating a new law that would require messaging services to scan the photos and links to detect possible child sexual abuse material, which has raised alarms among encryption supporters.

Silicon Valley executives are now watching Mr. Durov's case closely for the French authorities' next moves on encryption. Some of the tech companies were surprised by the cryptology charge because it was unclear to them that a license was needed in France for the technology.

Apart from the encryption charge, Mr. Durov, who was barred from leaving France, was also indicted with complicity in managing an online platform to enable illegal transactions by an organised group, complicity in crimes such as enabling the distribution of child sexual abuse material, drug trafficking and fraud, and refusing to cooperate with law enforcement.

His case has led to a debate about whether Telegram's less robust standards for encryption contributed to the French authorities' so heavily scrutinizing the platform.

Harmful and illicit material on Telegram is often out in the open, whereas the contents of the conversations on WhatsApp and Signal are only available to the sender and recipient of a message. 

If the history of tech is any guide and encryption increasingly becomes a focus in Mr. Durov's case,  Silicon Valley firms could eventually speak up to defend private messaging - even if it means rallying behind an imperfect messenger in Telegram.

'' I wish I could say that it was a settled debate that more security is better, '' Will Cathcart, the head of WhatsApp, said in an interview with The New York Times last year.

'' I think encryption is still under threat in parts of the world.''

The World Students Society thanks Mike Isaac, and Sheera Frenkel. Adam Satariano, contributed from London.