We cannot secure email!
It is with complete dismay we read these headlines at Maidsafe, secure email is impossible due to ‘man in the middle attacks’, ‘providers need keys’ and all of the associated diatribe that accompanies such terms that are alien to a MaidSafe team member. Business models that require user access control are ludicrous, benign, illicit and ill thought out. Of course if you have somebodies access, you have their security, it’s abundantly obvious.
If people could understand that the world with gatekeepers will never provide security (who watches the watchmen, did we all miss the film?). Servers require gatekeepers, think what life is like when we have a world without them, or if it’s easier, look at every single one of the trillions of organisms that we know of and try to find a server equivalent there. The world is not flat, some theories may work assuming it is, that does make is so, nature will always win, server based solutions will always fail us.
OK then a world without servers, access controls, managers of accounts, system administrators and companies who control you, what would it look like ?
Good question, may we retort? Why do you have any of these things? stop and think!
Anyway lets answer, no matter how much it frustrates us to:
You are an individual, not a number, not an access code or a password. You should not be forced to loan all of your life’s data to anyone, you are able to control yourself. What age were you when you did not require stabilisers, or somebody to take you to the loo?
As a person you decide what to say, where to go and who to share intimate secrets with. How would you feel if Larry Page of Google or Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook stood over every conversation you have with friends, colleagues and partners looking to take pictures and sell your desires to the highest bidder ?
That is the internet today, think again! Is this a requirement of sharing ? No! You are not a number, you are a person and need to be treated like a person, in fact you are so special you should be allowed to go where you want, talk to whom you want and keep any secret you want, If we want to share then we must design systems to share, not to snoop, if we want to talk, the connection must only be between the parties who talk, not through a third party (why on earth does this exist) and if we want to browse, we should ask nobodies permission we just browse.
So the bottom line, remove servers, remove admins and middle persons and components and secure email is not only possible, it is logical and simple.
For further info and code see http://www.maidsafe.net/network-platform.html
Step away from the dark side
