Prime Minister David Cameron would still like to implement a ban on encryption to stop terrorists operating underground, despite the government voting against the ruling, a report has revealed.
It is important the government can access the information hidden behind encryption in order to fight terrorism, the report continued, but it doesn't necessarily need to stop companies encrypting confidential data.
"Cameron never wanted to ban encryption," Eerke Boiten, senior lecturer in computer science at the University of Kent told Wired. "The thing he has always wanted is to be able to access all people's communications without having to ask them."
The latest government views would seemingly support this view, with politicians insisting the information sent between terrorists should be accessible to authorities - although an alternative solution about how this data can be accessed has not been presented.
Technologists have said that there is not a solution to the problem of hackers and terrorists communicating between themselves because backdoor access isn't possible without endangering users and weakening the security protocols put in place to stop hackers infiltrating networks.
"Cameron's advisors are smart enough to know that you can't ban encryption, and probably also to know that you can't build in secure and reliable government backdoors. But that's too complex and subtle for a large number of politicians let alone the majority of the population, so they can get away with Cameron grandstanding on loose sand." Boiten continued.
A spokesperson for Number 10 told Business Insider: "The prime minister did not suggest encryption should be banned...We accept and completely recognise the importance of encryption," but it also explained, "terrorists cannot have a safe space in which to operate [online]."
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