In 2013, authorities in south Pakistan banned Skype, Whatsapp and Viber for a couple of months to facilitate security operations. That same year, the same social media were threatened in Saudi Arabia because according to authorities, it was not in accordance with the country’s rules. In 2014, Whatsapp faced being banned in Iraq because its new owner and founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg is Jewish.
It is 2015 and Prime minister of the United Kingdom, David Cameron has said he could block WhatsApp and Snapchat if he wins the next election, as part of his plans for new surveillance powers which he expressed after reports of shootings in Paris.
The Prime Minister said that he would stop the use of methods of communication that cannot be read by the security services even if they have a warrant. That implicates apps like Whatsapp, Apple’s iMessage and FaceTime which encrypt their data.
“In our country, do we want to allow a means of communication between people which […] we cannot read?” He made the connection between encrypted communications tools and letters and phone conversations, both of which can be read by security services in extreme situations and with a warrant from the home secretary.
But companies such as WhatsApp have remained committed to keeping their services encrypted and unable to be read by authorities. Data encryption is the process of encoding messages or information in such a way that only authorized parties can read it. However, according to Matthew Bloch, encryption is mathematics, not technology – it can’t be suppressed by law. Could this be the beginning of the end of social media in the UK of all places?
Professor Woodward, also, according to bbc.com admonishes that the security forces need better resources not more powers and that whatever route the government elected in the UK in May decides to go, he hopes that it will listen carefully to the technology industry.
See here for a list of countries that have banned social media and the reasons given.
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