EWI Advocates for Balanced Encryption Policy
The EastWest Institute (EWI) has released recommendations on encryption policy designed to help find a balance between the legitimate needs of law enforcement and strong protections for digital information.
The report: Encryption Policy in Democratic Regimes: Finding Convergent Paths and Balanced Solutions, provides nine normative recommendations on encryption policy to ensure strong cybersecurity while enabling lawful law enforcement access to the plaintext of encrypted information in limited circumstances.
“Encryption provides great benefits and presents challenges, but most stakeholders share common interests in safety and security,” said Bruce McConnell, EWI Global Vice President who oversees the institute’s Global Cooperation in Cyberspace Initiative and led the development of the report. “The challenge is how to reach a policy consensus. This report sets out two balanced proposals that acknowledge encryption’s dual nature and that may be adapted, and adopted, by democratic governments.”
The report reflects the contributions of international experts, led by the EWI Encryption Breakthrough Group. The report was authored by Andreas Kuehn and Bruce McConnell, with the participation of a wide range of industry stakeholders, technologists, privacy advocates, law enforcement officials and other experts from organizations in the United States, Europe, and India, including Europol, the European Union Agency for Network and Information Security, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Microsoft, the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, the Cyber Threat Alliance, the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, and the University of Luxembourg.
