This week I've been in the UK again, giving a talk about Lumicall and JSCommunicator in Manchester last night and a talk about Free Real-Time Communications at the mini-DebConf in Cambridge on the weekend of 7-8 November.

An interesting backdrop to these activities has been a national debate about Internet privacy. The UK Government and police are demanding laws to mandate back doors in all communications products and services.

It leaves me wondering about a range of issues:

• Will overzealous UK police, reknowned for singling out and bullying people who don't conform with their idea of normality, start taking a more sinister attitude to people using software like Linux? For example, if airport security asks to inspect a laptop and doesn't see the familiar Windows or Mac OS desktop, will the owner of the laptop be delayed or told to leave it behind? Some people may feel this is extreme, but workers in these roles are known for taking initiative in their own special way, such as the infamous baby pat-down. If the owner of a Linux laptop is a Muslim, like the Texas schoolboy recently arrested because his clock looks suspicious to the untrained eye of a policeman, the chances of a rough encounter with authority probably rise even further.
• Will developers still be able to use technologies like PGP and ZRTP in the UK? Will PGP key-signing parties become illegal or have to be held 20 miles offshore on a boat like the legendary pirate radio stations of the sixties?
• Will Linux distributions such as Debian and Fedora have to avoid distributing packages such as Enigmail?
• Will updates to Android and iOS on smartphones seek to automatically disable or remove apps like Lumicall?
• Even if a user chooses a secure app like Lumicall for communication, will the vendor of the operating system be required to provide alternative ways to monitor the user, for example, by intercepting audio before it is encrypted by the app?
• Without strong encryption algorithms, digital signatures will no longer be possible either and it will be impossible for software vendors to securely distribute new versions of their software.
• Why should the police be the only workers to have their job done for them by Internet snooping? Why shouldn't spouses have a right to all their partner's communications to periodically verify they are not cheating and putting themselves at risk of diseases? Why shouldn't employers be able to check on employee's private communications and home computers to help prevent leaks of customer data? Why shouldn't the NHS be able to go through people's garbage to monitor what they eat given the WHO warning that bacon is more likely to kill you than a terrorist?
• While the authorities moan about the internet being a "safe" place for terrorists and paedophiles, what is their real motivation for trying to bring in these new laws, even when their best technical advisors must surely be telling them about the risks and negative consequences for compatibility of UK systems in a global Internet? If the terrorist scare story is not so credible, is it more likely they are seeking to snoop on people who may not be paying taxes or to maintain the upper hand over rival political parties like the Greens and the UKIP in a time of prolonged and increasingly punitive austerity?
• Australia already introduced similar laws a few weeks ago, despite widespread criticism from around the world. With cricket and rugby now over, is the UK just looking to go one up on Australia in the game of snooping?

Island mentality in the Internet age

Politics aside, what would this mean from a technical perspective? The overwhelming consensus among experts is that secure technology that people use and expect in many other parts of the world, including the US, simply won't be compatible with the products and services that UK residents will be permitted to use. Bigger companies like Google and Apple may be able to offer differentiated versions of their services for the UK but smaller companies or companies who have built their reputation on technical excellence simply won't be able or willing to offer crippled versions of their products with backdoors for the UK. The UK's island geography will become a metaphor for its relationship with the global marketplace.

The first thing to take note of is that encryption and authentication are closely related. Public-key cryptography, for example, simply swaps the public key and private key when being used to authenticate instead of encrypt. An effective and wide-reaching legal ban on encryption would also potentially prohibit the algorithms used for authentication.

Many methods of distributing software, including packages distributed through Linux distributions or apps distributed through the Google Play store are authenticated with such algorithms. This is often referred to as a digital signature. Digital signatures help ensure that software is not corrupted, tampered with by hackers or infected by viruses when it is transmitted and stored in the public Internet.

To correctly implement these mechanisms for installing software safely, every device running an operating system such as Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora or Android needs to include some software modules implementing the algorithms. In Linux, for example, I'm referring to packages like GnuPG, OpenSSL and GnuTLS. Without these components, it would be hard or even impossible for developers in the UK to contribute or publish new versions of their software. Users of the software would not be able to securely receive vital updates to their systems.

An opportunity for free software?

Some people say that any publicity can be good publicity. Now the Government has put the ball into play, people promoting secure solutions based on free software have an opportunity to participate in the debate too.

While laws may or may not change, principles don't. It is a perfect time to remind users that many of the principles of software freedom were written down many years ago, before the opportunity for mass surveillance came into existence. These principles remain relevant to this day. The experts who developed these principles back then are also far more likely to offer insights and trustworthy solutions for the road ahead.

If you'd like to discuss these issues or ask questions, please join the Free-RTC mailing list.