Europol Suggests Two Solutions to Bypass Encryption in Home Routing

• Europol said that encryption on Home Routing makes it difficult to intercept communication during criminal investigations.
• It has offered two solutions for the issue: disabling Privacy Enhancing Technologies and creating a cross-border mechanism that will allow the authorities to quickly issue and process interception requests.
• Legislators, authorities, and telco service providers are now expected to come together, share their opinions, and come up with solutions that benefit all parties involved.

Encryption on your home router might be helping you but it's certainly not helping the law enforcement authorities. That's why Europol has suggested two solutions to tackle this issue.

The first solution is to disable Privacy Enhancing Technologies (PET) in Home Routing.

Doing so will allow domestic service providers to intercept communication from users through foreign SIM cards without accidentally disclosing information about the person of interest with parties from different countries.

The second option is to create a cross-border mechanism that will allow the authorities to issue interception requests within the European Union which will then be processed quickly by service providers.Which is a Better Solution?

The first solution is easier to deploy and technically feasible. Plus, both local and roaming customers would benefit from an encryption similar to that offered by national SIM cards. The only ones who would not be benefitting from this added security are the subscribers abroad.

This solution maintains the current level of security, including privacy, and is equal for roamers and local users." - Europol

The second option, on the other hand, enables PET for everyone but then, people from other member states will learn about the person(s) of interest in an investigation. Plus, this will require a structural implementation of cross-border standards."

Read more: Europol warns that criminals already misuse ChatGPT

What is Home Routing?

Home Routing is a system in which customers traveling abroad can route their calls through their home network instead of the network of their present country.

When PET is enabled for such communication, neither foreign service providers can help local law enforcement agencies with data for their investigation nor can the law enforcement agencies intercept the communication themselves.

This affects both locals using foreign SIM cards and foreign nationals using local SIM cards. This is the loophole that criminals are using to evade detection and although there are ways to gain information, none of those are practical.

• For example, the authorities can issue a European Investigation Order, but it's too slow and often takes up to 120 days to process. This basically means that it's useless in emergencies.
• The authorities can also rely on the voluntary cooperation of foreign service providers, which, again, is not practical.

Hence, the agency is trying to bring about a change to strengthen its domestic investigatory powers.

It's important to note that these are not the only two solutions. Europol right now is only trying to bring attention to the problem brought by Home Routing encryption in law enforcement and hoping that legislatures, national authorities, and telco service providers can work together to come up with a robust solution.

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