[Mailman-Developers] Encrypted lists predictable difficulties and implementation needs

[Rich Kulawiec]

On Fri, Mar 17, 2017 at 09:54:48AM +1100, Morgan Reed wrote:
> I'd submit that this is tantamount to saying "it's impossible to make a
> 100% secure system so why bother even trying".

Then you're not grasping my point.  Let me try again.

I suggest that you re-read what I've written *and* consider as well the
disclosures of the past week vis-a-vis smartphones and their encrypted
communications applications.

In particular, note that entities like Whisper and Signal have been, as
I've said for years, peddling snake-oil.  They cannot possibly deliver
on their promises *even if they do everything they say they can do*
because all of it is immediately and completely undercut if the
underlying system is compromised.

Which is exactly what the disclosures of Vault 7 show everyone,
although it's not really news to anyone who's been paying attention.
Intelligence agencies, vulnerability brokers, organized cybercrime,
and others have been knocking themselves out to hack everything
for years -- and whaddaya know, they've succeeded.  This set of
disclosures is merely the latest, and it and all the other ones
to date are merely the tip of the iceberg.

So what I am saying, and what I hope is obvious, is that you cannot
build a secure system on top of an insecure one.

This isn't about not being able to build a 100% secure system:
as a long-time security professional, I'm fully aware that's impossible
and that the best we can do is to stack the deck in our favor.
This is about building a system that is known 0% secure from the start.

I think, in the end, this will serve the community poorly -- because
people who don't grasp the contemporary security landscape will deploy it,
will rely on it, and will not understand that they lost the game
before they even started to play it.  This will have consequences.

---rsk