Comment by jeffparsons
4 hours ago
> just stops shy of asking Australian tech companies, like Fastmail, to build backdoors into their products so that the government can "legally access" data from them
It stops just short of saying that you must do thispreemptively, but is pretty clear that you must do it if they ask you to.
Why do I never hear about this ‘feature’ from American products like gmail which 99% of the HN audience is using? Isn’t USA a member of Five Eyes?
I admit it is a concern, as a Fastmail user, but this discussion only seems to happen on the Fastmail threads, yet no one bats an eye if one is suggested to open a gmail account like everybody else.
Because Fastmail is one of the relatively rare non-American companies that's managed to get a good position in a challenging market. The UK's "Snooper's Charter" also has a mechanism to send Technical Capability Notices that require tech companies to build things to spy on their users.
Because everybody on HN is most likely aware that Google is an American company and that by using them you pretty much can assume that your data can be compromised without your knowledge or recourse. Post Snowden there should be zero doubt about that. Fastmail is worthy of scrutiny because people might believe that they are materially different when in practice they probably are not.
Because it's a criteria for choosing Fastmail.
And you can’t tell anyone if you do, on pain of jail.