The Justice Department is giving up on an encryption truce with Big Tech

The Justice Department has essentially given up hope that tech companies will voluntarily build into their products a special way for law enforcement to access encrypted communications to help track terrorists and criminals. Instead, the department is focusing on getting legislation that forces companies to cooperate –  and is hoping encryption-limiting laws in Australia and the United Kingdom will ease the path for a similar law in the US, said John Demers, assistant attorney general for national security. “If there were a proposal from tech companies or a desire to talk about this issue that wasn't just everybody rehashing their own positions…then we'd be happy to hear it,” he said. “But we really haven't gotten anywhere in however many years we've been open to talk.”  The shift illustrates how law enforcement believes it now has a political advantage in the debate over warrant-proof encryption – especially in Congress where lawmakers harangued officials from Apple and Facebook over the systems during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in Dec.