Bill Gates on Apple v. FBI: A balance has to be made between the needs of investigators and privacy rights

Bill Gates thinks new laws are needed to sort out the encryption conflict going on between law enforcement and tech companies.

“The sooner we modernize the laws the better,” Gates says in a Reddit “Ask Me Anything” session.

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He says it’s clear the government under certain circumstances needs to be able to tap into encrypted communications, but also that there should be oversight so that power isn’t abused. “Right now a lot of people don’t think the government has the right checks to make sure information is only used in criminal situations,” he says. “So this case will be viewed as the start of a discussion.”

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