I think that to give the responsibility of security to the government is a fallacy, not only because the government is very capable of abusing the power and screwing up in a huge way, but also because it will make private companies less likely to take the appropriate measures to protect themselves.
Defending yourself from an attack is almost always easier than being the attacker. You just have to know what type of technology you are working with and the inherent security holes in that technology. You don't need to blow millions of dollars on security unless you are already a company worth several hundred million dollars.
And the other problem is that there will always be skillful hackers, and these hackers will always have the means and the knowledge to hide from the government, even if the government has access to a much greater percentage of information going through the internet. If the government has fancier tools to access things like email, hackers will be more careful/liberal with their use of encryption.
I believe that this bill is going to work a lot like DRM. It's going to put hackers and civilians alike in a more uncomfortable position, except that the hackers are going to figure out how to work around it fast enough that its hardly going to make a difference, and the techno-ignorant (for lack of a better term) civilians will just have to deal with it.
Defending yourself from an attack is almost always easier than being the attacker. You just have to know what type of technology you are working with and the inherent security holes in that technology. You don't need to blow millions of dollars on security unless you are already a company worth several hundred million dollars.
And the other problem is that there will always be skillful hackers, and these hackers will always have the means and the knowledge to hide from the government, even if the government has access to a much greater percentage of information going through the internet. If the government has fancier tools to access things like email, hackers will be more careful/liberal with their use of encryption.
I believe that this bill is going to work a lot like DRM. It's going to put hackers and civilians alike in a more uncomfortable position, except that the hackers are going to figure out how to work around it fast enough that its hardly going to make a difference, and the techno-ignorant (for lack of a better term) civilians will just have to deal with it.