Google and Apple urge Obama to resist encryption backdoors

Several huge technology firms have come together to urge US President Barack Obama not to pass legislation demanding backdoor access to encrypted devices.

More than 140 companies and prominent figures in the tech industry, including the likes of Apple and Google, have sent an open letter to the White House proclaiming that “strong encryption is the cornerstone of the modern information economy’s security.”

Read more: Top tech CEOs snub Obama cyber security and consumer protection summit

The letter is likely to be a response to calls from the FBI and Justice Department to include backdoors to allow them to access data on US citizens. Many have pointed out that including such a vulnerability leaves personal information subject to interception and surveillance, not just by the US government, but other parties as well.

The letter has also gained the support of three out of the five members of Obama’s review group set up in the wake of Edward Snowden’s NSA revelations. The letter stresses that the President should carry out the group’s recommendation to “fully support and not undermine efforts to create encryption standards.”

One of the signatories from the presidential review group, Richard A. Clarke, who also worked as cyber-security adviser to President George W. Bush, noted that the government had failed in a previous attempt to pressure phone companies to include a backdoor for encrypted calls.

“If they couldn’t pull it off at the end of the Cold War, they sure as hell aren’t going to pull it off now,” he told the Washington Post.

Read more: FBI use 18th century law to block Apple and Google’s data encryption

While public safety is a valid concern, security experts rightly point out that a backdoor enabling only the US government to access data is simply not possible. By deliberately introducing a vulnerability into devices and networks, President Obama would be introducing a security flaw that could be exploited by many others.

Apple and Google Trying To Keep Your Personal Data Safe From Government

The companies are a part of the 140 tech companies that co-signed a letter calling on President Barack Obama to reject any proposal regarding backdoor access  

Today Google and Apple became the co-signers to a letter sent to President Obama, in which both the companies called on the president to veto any incoming proposal from the government that forces consumer electronics manufacturers to give the government backdoor access to files and calling data on encrypted phones and similar devices.

According to the Washington Post, the letter in question has the backing of over 140 tech companies, civil society groups, and key tech-related figures from the industry and is scheduled to be delivered today.

The signatories urge Mr. Obama to follow the group’s unanimous recommendation that the government should “fully support and not undermine efforts to create encryption standards” and not “in any way subvert, undermine, weaken or make vulnerable” commercial software.

 

Apple previously circumvented the government's request for data by enabling end-to-end encryption in its iMessage messaging service, thereby, even locking itself out from accessing the content of the messages, meaning the company will be unable to comply if the government presents it with a court order, forcing it to reveal the data. Last year, Apple CEO, Tim Cook, said about the service: “It’s encrypted, and we don’t have the key.”

Tech companies have been facing increasing pressure from the FBI to grant law-enforcement authorities backdoor access through the respective companies’ phone and gadget encryption systems, even saying that Apple's refusal to give access may even be the cause for a child’s death. US Attorney General, Eric Holder, also made use of the issue of child safety to hammer in his opinion as to why backdoor access should be provided.

The letter, which singles out Mr.Obama to refute the issue raised by the FBI has been co-signed by the five members of the government too; from a review group assigned by the President in 2013 to take a closer look at policies that pertain to technology in order to avoid another Edward Snowden catastrophe from happening.

Along with the primary concern that this move can potentially eradicate the concept of privacy from the government for its citizens, quite a few tech companies have pointed out that if the backdoor is created for the government, many foreign hackers and governments could easily exploit the backdoor if they discover it, leaving all the phones in the country prone to hacking.

Extra radiology exams may only benefit some women with dense breasts

While it's often suggested that women with dense breasts get ultrasound or other extra screenings after a mammogram, a new study suggests those added tests may only help certain women.

Breast density increases breast cancer risk and can mask tumors during mammograms, the researchers explain in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

In some states, healthcare providers must tell women if they have dense breasts. Those women sometimes then go on to have additional screenings, such as ultrasound scans or magnetic resonance imaging (MRIs).

But in the new study, the researchers found that not all women with dense breasts have a high enough risk for breast cancer after a normal mammogram to justify having more screening tests.

Instead, they found that two specific groups of women with dense breasts were likely to benefit from extra screening, taking into account their risk for breast cancer in the next five years as calculated using an online tool called the Breast Cancer Surveillance Consortium (BCSC) score (bit.ly/1PuxYZF).

The first group consists of women with extremely dense breasts and a BCSC-calculated five-year breast cancer risk of 1.67 percent or greater.

The second group consists of women with heterogeneously dense breasts and a BCSC-calculated five-year risk of 2.50 percent or greater.

Women in these specific groups, which represent about a quarter of women with dense breasts, should discuss whether extra screening may be appropriate in addition to a mammogram every two years as recommended for women are 50 to 74, the authors write.

"Our paper helps women in that it really identifies people for whom screening is most important," said lead author Dr. Karla Kerlikowske of the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center. "Some don’t have to be concerned."

While those additional tests may help in finding tumors, the researchers warn they may increase the risk of so-called false-positives, which may lead to biopsies.

For the new study, researchers analyzed data from more than 300,000 women age 40 to 74 with no history of breast cancer or breast implants. The women received digital mammograms between 2002 and 2011, when their breast density was recorded.

The researchers also calculated each woman’s five-year breast cancer risk using the BCSC online tool, which takes into account age, race, family history of breast cancer, breast density, and whether or not a woman has had a breast biopsy in the past.

Available evidence suggests that women with dense breasts may be 1.2 to 2 times more likely to be diagnosed with cancer than those with average density, but since up to half of women have dense breasts, it is difficult to call density a “risk factor” for cancer, according to Dr. Nancy Dolan of Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, who coauthored an editorial accompanying the new study.

In the U.S. currently, most women who do not have a high lifetime risk of cancer would have to pay out of pocket for an MRI in addition to their recommended mammograms, which likely limits widespread use, Dolan told Reuters by email.

“Supplemental screening increases the rates of biopsy, cost and patient anxiety,” Dolan said. “Even among (women with) above average risk, supplemental screening with ultrasound has a very high false positive rate compared to mammography.”

The new study provides compelling evidence that breast density should not be the sole criteria to guide decisions about supplement screening, she said.