[Cryptography] Response to "I don't have anything to hide"

[Stephen Farrell]

On 26/02/16 00:49, Matthias Wulfeck wrote:
>> "Do you want the government to have free access to your phone"?
> 
>> "I don't have anything to hide. They can look at they want."
> 
> I'm sure many of us who have tried to explain the backdoor problem to their
> friends and family have heard this response to the question
> 
> Part of building support for Apple and fighting the backdoor is a grass
> roots effort to educate our friends of the real risk here (as we see them).

This comes up generally in relation to pervasive monitoring and
isn't at all specific to the apple case.

> I figure I would toss this question out and seek advice from the general
> community. How do you respond to "I don't have anything to hide"? How do
> you explain to non-technical (and non-paranoid) friends of what's really at
> stake?

The response I use to "I've nothing to hide" is that everyone who
abides by their local laws will have something to hide from someone,
sometime. Most people seem to accept that, but it's not clear to me
if they really find it convincing.

For older IT literate folks, I've also found that this really does
work: If a large set of your emails from decades ago was leaked today,
would all of the language you then used be considered acceptable now?

S.


> 
> --
> Matt
> 
> 
> 
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