CHAPTER 10: INTELLIGENCE
good monitoring capability of communications to one that essentially doesn't
provide that any more."12
10.18. Even the US authorities are unable to access domestically all that they need. The
Director of the FBI has referred to this as ��Going Dark”, a challenge which relates not
just to the powers available to US intelligence and law enforcement but to how
technology is developing, and companies’ practices.13
10.19. The Agencies forcefully point out that if they cannot maintain their capabilities, threats
will go undetected and opportunities to disrupt the ill-intentioned will not be identified.
They struggle with the growth of encryption and the diversification of the
communications market. It would be wrong to assume that the Agencies have a
constant technological edge over their targets, whether through crypto-analytical
power, back-door access or partnership with other agencies. Each side has
advantages, and neither can be sure of the upper hand: rather, in the words of the
Chief of MI6, they are engaged in “a technology arms race” in which resourcefulness
and creativity are at a premium.14
10.20. The Agencies do not look to legislation to give themselves a permanent trump card:
neither they nor anyone else has made a case to me for encryption to be placed under
effective Government control, as in practice it was before the advent of public key
encryption in the 1990s. There has been no attempt to revive the argument that led
to the Clipper Chip proposal from the NSA in the 1990s, when public key cryptography
first became widely available.15 But the Agencies do look for cooperation, enforced
by law if needed, from companies abroad as well as in the UK, which are able to
provide readable interception product.
10.21. The Agencies seek to address impeded access to communications through their own
cryptographic work. They will also need to develop new methods of accessing data,
for example through increased use of CNE. They therefore want the capabilities and
an appropriate legal framework within which this work can be carried out.
Bulk Collection
10.22. The Agencies collect the content and related communications data of external
communications in bulk. This has been highly controversial, particularly since the
Snowden allegations about GCHQ because it inevitably involves their acquiring
material on persons who are not and will never be subjects of interest to them. The
argument for this is two-fold.
(a)
12
13
14
15
First, when acquiring intelligence on activities overseas, the Agencies have less
ability to identify targets than is the case for security and law enforcement
activities in the UK. They argue that they need to collect large quantities of
communications in order to find the ones that are of interest. This has
“Europol chief warns on computer encryption”, BBC website, 29 March 2015.
Speech at Brookings Institution, Washington, D.C. 16 October 2014.
The Chief’s speech to English Heritage, March 2015, MI6 website.
See 4.46 above. Under that proposal, a cryptographic key to any device fitted with a Clipper Chip
would have been provided in escrow to the US Government, which when duly authorised could have
listened to any communication. Whether for technical or political reasons, the idea never took off.
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