The NYPD is spending $390 million on a new radio system that will encrypt officers’ communications — reversing a near-century-old practice of allowing the public and the press to listen to police dispatches.

Archived at https://ghostarchive.org/archive/eqTTk?wr=true

  • spudwart@spudwart.com
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    10 months ago

    But I thought you said E2E encryption a danger to national security, hmm?

    You said you wanted a backdoor, didn’t you?

    If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear, right? Right?

    Standard double standard bullshit.

  • ares35@kbin.social
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    10 months ago

    tbf, cops ‘doxx’ people over the radio all the time. not just suspects, either, but potential witnesses, and normal folks caught-up in ‘stop and frisk’ or ‘papers, please’ stops. full legal names, birth dates, genders, government id numbers, addresses, and so forth are broadcast for all to hear. that data should be encrypted, and is in many jurisdictions already.

    • Pennomi@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Not just that data should be encrypted, ALL data should be encrypted, with very few exceptions. It’s scary how much privacy we lose through unencrypted communication.

        • Pennomi@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          Right, and that’s morally wrong. Not only should they be able to, they should be required to do so.

        • skuzz@discuss.tchncs.de
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          10 months ago

          I swear there used to be a law on the books that specifically said this, and it included police radio as they use the RF spectrum owned by the People. Police radio would be unencrypted and it would just contain the day-to-day traffic, and anything sensitive they’d transmit via other means like Nextel or even before that, the police phone booths.

          IIRC it was one of those “check and balance” things to keep police honest. Although I haven’t been able to find any law stating this, so perhaps I am mis-remembering some other law.

          As for encryption in practice, cellular is encrypted, as others mentioned WiFi is encrypted, satellite communications are encrypted, a whole bunch of radio traffic is encrypted.

          To counter @pennomi@lemmy.world , no, all transmissions should not be encrypted. The lack of openness and transparency by creating closed systems means there’s no more “watching the watchers” and we have to take organizations in power at their word. Most human communication dating back centuries was not encrypted, and humanity got along just fine.

          Likewise, when we assume our communications are “secure” we all are much more willing to share things over networks that we probably shouldn’t. It makes security on the human side inherently lazy. Think about all the things people probably share over iMessage that they shouldn’t. Apple has the keys to every conversation. A bad actor could gain access to a whole bunch of peoples’ personal data they just assume is safe.

          There are places where encryption should be used, but it should be used thoughtfully, not just, “lock it all down.” It creates a dangerous complacency factor.

          It is a very gray area topic that does not have one universal answer.

          Edit: Formatting.

      • 32b99410_da5b@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        Well then cough up your public data:

        1. full legal name
        2. birth dates
        3. gender
        4. government id numbers
        5. addresses
        6. and so forth
  • NatakuNox@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    It’ll take all of two min to break into the encrypted coms. The NYPD is a lot of things, smart is not one of them

  • irmoz@reddthat.com
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    10 months ago

    Right, so now they’re operating in total secrecy. Nothing at all like a gang!

  • TomMasz@kbin.social
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    10 months ago

    I assume this means encrypted P25 . Public service agencies have been using it for years, though not all of them encrypt.

    • enki@lemm.ee
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      10 months ago

      And it’s easily decoded when you have the keys which, based on every other department that uses them, won’t take long to leak or be cracked.Lot of folks use SDR setups on a PC to decrypt and stream police and fire radio to a service like Broadcastify

      • MimicJar@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        From a legal standpoint does that change things? Especially if the keys aren’t intended to be public?

        • enki@lemm.ee
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          10 months ago

          I assume it depends on where you live, but police scanner radios have been around and on the shelf at stores for half a century. I imagine it’s a legal grey area similar to radar detectors.