The US and 6 other countries are pressuring tech companies to weaken encryption and make it easier for police to snoop on apps like iMessage or WhatsApp

Chris Howell, CTO of encrypted messaging app Wickr, said the governments’ calls would effectively imperil people’s privacy and make apps more vulnerable to cybercriminals in an interview with Business Insider earlier this year.

“There is no security mechanism that can discriminate between a hacker trying to crack it and a law enforcement officer trying to do the same thing,” Howell said. “Either we secure it or we don’t, it’s that simple.”

Read more…