June 2016

The House Homeland Security Committee has produced this primer to briefly describe important themes and considerations surrounding the widespread use of encryption technologies—including the practical and economic value encryption brings to certain industries and the wider market; the impact ubiquitous encryption is having on law enforcement; the ways in which various governments around the world are responding to this challenge; and a discussion of some existing legislative proposals. Finally, this document explains why future progress in addressing these challenges will likely depend on a more formal national discussion involving the necessary stakeholders in the form of a national commission on digital security.

Sir Roger Gale was puzzled when a string of e-mails from Donald Trump’s presidential campaign landed in his inbox. As a Briton and a member of Parliament, Gale is barred by US law from giving Trump money, much less voting for him. “I’ve gotten rid of most of that rubbish,” Gale said. The e-mails to Gale were among a wave of fundraising pleas inexplicably sent by the Trump campaign in recent days to lawmakers in the United Kingdom, Iceland, Australia and elsewhere.

The solicitations prompted watchdog groups in Washington to file two separate complaints with the Federal Election Commission alleging that the Trump campaign was violating federal law by soliciting funds from foreign nationals. “The scale and scope of this does seem somewhat unprecedented,” said Brendan Fischer, associate counsel for the Campaign Legal Center, which joined Democracy 21 in one of the complaints.