The Backdoor is a Victory for Terrorists

When authorities realized the Paris terrorists used strong encryption to send messages to one another they went off the encryption deep end. Now, many nations are considering legislation to ban strong encryption. If strong encryption is banned, only terrorists will have it. Moreover, restricting strongly encrypted speech over the Internet would be a victory for the terrorists. After all, one aim of terrorism is to scare us into giving up our freedoms. Once we give up our freedom to communicate privately we are sliding down the slippery slope of despotism—and the terrorists win. Continue reading The Backdoor is a Victory for Terrorists

How Much Higher Can ICT Rise? On the Final Limits of ICT

Information and communication technology (ICT) is the most distinctive cultural accomplishment of the last half century. It is unprecedented in sophistication and transformative power. Presumably there’s no limit to sophistication. Moore’s law will reach a silicon limit, but it is likely other physical substrates and structures will take over and extend computational limits. But what about the cultural transformations? Is there an end in sight? Continue reading How Much Higher Can ICT Rise? On the Final Limits of ICT