The Lawfare Podcast: Mayank Varia and Riana Pfefferkorn on Apple's Decision to Scan for Child Exploitation Material

Jen Patja, Alan Z. Rozenshtein, Mayank Varia, Riana Pfefferkorn
Friday, August 13, 2021, 12:00 PM

Published by The Lawfare Institute
in Cooperation With
Brookings

Two of the biggest controversies in tech are how to stop the spread of child pornography and other exploitation material, and whether encryption prevents legitimate law enforcement investigations. In an announcement last week, Apple dropped a bomb into both of these debates.


Apple announced that future versions of its iPhone operating system would scan photos its users post to the cloud and automatically detect if those photos contain child exploitation material. If so, Apple would notify the government. While many in law enforcement and in organizations devoted to child safety have hailed Apple's announcement, it has proven hugely controversial among many technologists, security researchers and digital civil society advocates. They worry that Appleā€™s system will harm privacy and civil rights, especially if governments demand that it be used to scan for content other than child exploitation. To help make sense of all of this, Alan Rozenshtein sat down with Mayank Varia, a cryptographer at Boston University, and Riana Pfefferkorn, a research scholar at the Stanford Internet Observatory.



Jen Patja is the editor and producer of the Lawfare Podcast and Rational Security. She currently serves as the Co-Executive Director of Virginia Civics, a nonprofit organization that empowers the next generation of leaders in Virginia by promoting constitutional literacy, critical thinking, and civic engagement. She is the former Deputy Director of the Robert H. Smith Center for the Constitution at James Madison's Montpelier and has been a freelance editor for over 20 years.
Alan Z. Rozenshtein is an Associate Professor of Law at the University of Minnesota Law School, a senior editor at Lawfare, and a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Previously, he served as an Attorney Advisor with the Office of Law and Policy in the National Security Division of the U.S. Department of Justice and a Special Assistant United States Attorney in the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Maryland.
Mayank Varia is a research associate professor of computer science at Boston University and the co-director of BU's Center for Reliable Information Systems & Cyber Security. He holds a bachelor's degree from Duke University and a PhD from MIT.
Riana Pfefferkorn is a research scholar at the Stanford Internet Observatory. Her Mastodon handle is @riana@mastodon.lawprofs.org

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