>>105
Leaving aside that crypto is just mathematics and banning mathematics is senseless, let's look at the issue from a practical point of view. Oh and forget about key escrow because
it's fundamentally flawed (Google is your friend).
Suppose crypto is legal, and inaccessible to the general public (the current situation). Then:
- expert criminals use it, since they have the money/power to coerce geeks into teaching them how to
- the criminally insane (e.g. paedophiles) use it, since they don't want to get caught
- sheeple don't use it, because it's inaccessible
- government uses it for internal communications
- secret services can't really find any criminals or sick fucks by digital means (because they use crypto, and because they have "better" things to do such as sparking wars abroad and maintaining dictatorships in African countries oh look they're supporting child abuse...), so they spy on the sheeple instead, hoping to justify cancellation of privacy (as well as their massive budgets) by cornering a few low-level criminals or sick fucks; the cancellation of the right to privacy is done for the purpose of detecting annoying activists and getting rid of them; since they are part of the sheeple, most of them don't know how to use crypto so they can't defend themselves -- chilling effect on potential activists
- law enforcement uses classical means of investigation, sometimes given helpful hints by techies
Suppose crypto is legal, and so accessible that an untrained monkey could use it. Then:
- expert criminals use it, since it's accessible
- the criminally insane use it, since they don't want to get caught (no change here!)
- sheeple use it (and protect their right to privacy), because it's accessible
- government uses it for internal communications (no change there!)
- secret services can't really find any criminals or sick fucks by digital means (no change here!), except now they can't really spy on sheeple either; best-case scenario, major budget cuts when people realize they're not really doing anything useful, or good for that matter; activists can't be detected and eliminated because they use crypto so they are empowered vis-a-vis the secret services; activism flourishes; activists organize and encourage cowardly sheeple to report criminals and sick fucks without fear of retribution or stalking laws issues
- law enforcement uses classical means of investigation, sometimes given helpful hints by techies (no change there since the criminals and sick fucks are using crypto anyway); extra hints given by "not technically legal" activist sources in order to get warrants
Suppose crypto is outlawed. Then:
- expert criminals use it (in conjunction with undetectable steganography), since they have the money/power to coerce geeks into teaching them how to
- the criminally insane use it (in conjunction with undetectable steganography), since they don't want to get caught
- sheeple don't use it, because oh no it's illegal; most activists are afraid to use cryptography so they don't
- government makes an exception for itself and uses it for internal communications (citing "national security issues")
- secret services can't really find any criminals or sick fucks (no change here!, see reasons above), but they can spy on everyone else and make lists of people that get in their way or know too much; illegal operations flourish since activists can be effectively detected and silenced
- law enforcement uses mass surveillance, with no hints from (disgruntled) techies; mass surveillance is ineffective since criminals and sick fucks don't really care about the law and use (undetectable) crypto anyway, but hey now we have a database of what every law-abiding citizen does, better not let that fall into the wrong hands hmm