Customs and Border Protection Paid $700,000 To Encrypted App Wickr

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), part of the Department of Homeland Security, recently paid encrypted messaging platform Wickr over $700,000, Motherboard has found. The news highlights the value of end-to-end encryption to law enforcement, while other federal law enforcement agencies routinely lambast the technology for what they say results in visibility on criminals' activities "going dark."

The contract is related to "Wickr licenses and support," dates from September 2020, and totals at $714,600, according to public procurement records. Wickr is likely most well known for its free consumer app, which lets users send encrypted messages to one another, as well as make encrypted video and audio calls. The app also offers an auto-burn feature, where messages are deleted from a users' device after a certain period of time, with the company claiming these messages "can never be uncovered," according to its website. Wickr also offers various paid products to private companies and government agencies. Wickr Pro and Wickr Enterprise are marketed towards businesses; Wickr RAM is geared specifically for the military. [...] It is not clear which specific Wickr product CBP paid for. A CBP spokesperson told Motherboard in a statement that "The Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) and other laws prohibit the unauthorized use and disclosure of proprietary information from federal government contract actions. All publicly available information on this contract has been made available at the link you have provided. Any other information is considered proprietary to the awardee (WICKR) and shall not be divulged outside of the Government."

Is this legal?

[BanHammer]

So tomorrow Whatsapp,Telegram,Signal can be cracked?

Re:

[kot-begemot-uk]

Nothing of the kind.

They will not be cracked, they will be used.

The contract is because of the "burn after reading" and guaranteed encryption of the messages. Now, dear human rights lawyers, what exactly did you want to subpoena?

Going back to "they will be used" - Telegram introduced the same features last month and it has had decent encryption day one.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

The contract is because of the "burn after reading" and guaranteed encryption of the messages. Now, dear human rights lawyers, what exactly did you want to subpoena?

Thus coming back to the question, is this legal? Government is required to be keeping records to maintain accountability. Burn-after-read services intentionally vex that requirement. Hopefully CBP finds themselves defunded.

Re:

[nospam007]

They needed this app to discuss and share pictures of caged children.

Is this a good thing?

[fustakrakich]

Or should we be demanding more transparency from the government?

Re:

[zenlessyank]

I, for one, would like to see what I am paying for.

Re:

[fustakrakich]

In that case, I think we have to vote for different people. We won't get it from the old timers

FOIA

[bill_mcgonigle]

Sorry, we can't respond to the FOIA requests because the comms on this case were burned messages.

Definitely not for corruption.

backdoor?

[Admiral Krunch]

It is not clear which specific Wickr product CBP paid for.

Maybe they paid for Wickr backdoor...

Do as I say, not as I do.

[ThomasBHardy]

So now the stance is that encryption is fine for the government but citizens cannot be trusted with it?

Re:

[Rakhar]

Now?

Corrupt Govt Tendering 101

[Canberra1]

In tendering public money, a few things must occur. There must be value for money There must be transparency - including for the auditors and GAO Contracts over X must state what product or service was being acquired - clearly - so others can bid as well There must be competitive competition, you cant write the specifications so narrowly only one possible company or person gets the contract. When setting the contract, you normally have to tick boxes to say the output/report is unclassified or restricted. Amendments or cost overruns must be publicized. Adding to corruption - there is a thing called no-bid contracts, or panel contracts, that aim to hide cost, like price per licence/unit paid. Efficiency reviews, with unclassified outputs, where the report is plastered with proprietary and confidential and a covering page of legalese. Now remember - classifying a document because it is embarrassing, if not a reason for non-disclosure. Then we have official records act, that require even the President to keep records, and not run private emails and servers, do business with handshakes on the xgoldx golf course etc. "The Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) and other laws prohibit the unauthorized use and disclosure of proprietary information from federal government contract actions" is a part truth. There are other laws that require full disclosure on what was acquired, than the 'what on' bit is rarely proprietary. Lets hope the GAO gets stuck in.

Re:

[arglebargle_xiv]

In tendering public money, a few things must occur. There must be value for money

That's what surprises me about this one. As a former user of Wickr, if someone asked me to recommend an encrypted IM app I'd honestly tell them "use absolutely anything but Wickr". It was the buggiest, most unreliable, godawful piece of crap messaging app I've ever used. It was so bad that eventually everyone I knew on it abandoned it, mostly going to Signal.

That, at least should make some people happy: If you dislike CBP and want to see them suffer, siccing Wickr on them is the perfect way to do it.

Re:

[omnichad]

Certainly the government should be disclosing the details. But this release is from Wickr's side, and it's not for them to disclose.