Feinstein Vows Legislation on Requiring Tech Companies' Compliance With Warrants on Encrypted Data
Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said Wednesday that she and Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Burr, R-N.C., are working on legislation in response to the recent Paris and San Bernardino, California, terrorist attacks to compel tech companies to decrypt data under court orders. “I think this world is really changing in terms of people wanting the protection and wanting” data encryption to “be able to be pierced,” she said during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on FBI oversight. The Paris and San Bernardino attacks have resulted in renewed calls for increased government surveillance and may be an impetus for progress on cybersecurity information sharing legislation passed by both houses of Congress and now being negotiated in a conference committee (see 1511240023 and 1512070056).
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“I’m going to seek legislation if nobody else is,” Feinstein said, saying Burr “thinks somewhat similarly” about the need for ways to guarantee court-order access to encrypted data. A Burr spokeswoman later clarified that legislation isn’t likely to be introduced until next year. The White House opted in October against pursuing similar legislation in the short term but is continuing to have conversations about the issue, FBI Director James Comey told Senate Judiciary. “I would very much like to get to a world where if a judge issues an order, companies are able to comply with it,” Comey said. “Either to unlock a device, or to provide the communications between terrorists or between drug dealers or kidnappers.”
Feinstein said she’s “very concerned” about tech companies’ ability to comply with court orders because they’ve told her some data can’t be unencrypted. “I have concern about a PlayStation, which my grandchildren might use and a predator getting on the other end talking to go them, and it’s all encrypted,” she said. “I think there really is reason to have the ability” to view encrypted data after obtaining a court order “if you have cause to believe that criminality may be going on.” Comey said tech companies face a “business model question” rather than technical hurdles in choosing not to unencrypt some data. “There are plenty of companies today that provide secure services to their customers and still comply with court orders,” he said.
Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, questioned Comey’s argument in favor of mandating full law enforcement access to encrypted data with a court order, saying it would essentially require companies to intentionally create back doors into their software. Comey said any effort to mandate access to encrypted data would involve cooperation from other countries.