I think that earnest acceptance of “well, it’s for a good cause” style arguments indicates a severely stunted ability to generalize: either to generalize applications of the technology (it works on any proscribed content, not just stuff people generally agree is bad) or to generalize outcomes of this kind of corporate behavior (Apple will continue to actively spy on their customers as long as they can come up with a tenuous justification for it).
You got that right—this is a bullshit back door. That's my favourite kind of back door. Because it does one thing incredibly well: it starves of oxygen the one remotely tractable argument politicians have found to break real E2E encryption with real, non-bullshit back doors.
With this technology in place, never again will the Government be able to wail "think of the children" when claiming E2E needs a back door in order to protect the the children.
I think that earnest acceptance of “well, it’s for a good cause” style arguments indicates a severely stunted ability to generalize: either to generalize applications of the technology (it works on any proscribed content, not just stuff people generally agree is bad) or to generalize outcomes of this kind of corporate behavior (Apple will continue to actively spy on their customers as long as they can come up with a tenuous justification for it).