Rupert Murdoch raises encryption concerns: ‘Vast majority want safety over privacy’

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch has endorsed Republican presidential contender Lindsey Graham’s stance on encryption after the former South Carolina senator said American tech businesses should stop allowing customers to communicate in secret.

With recent attacks in Paris and California rekindling national security discussions in the U.S. and abroad, presidential hopefuls for all parties have weighed in on what the next commander in chief should do to keep terrorists from communicating under the radar of authorities.

“There is technology available to terrorists where they can communicate without — even with a court order, they can communicate without us knowing. That has to change,” Mr. Graham told Fox News’s Greta van Susteren this week.

“Here is my message to Silicon Valley: Change your business model tomorrow,” Graham said.

Mr. Murdoch, the billionaire behind the News. Corp media empire, agreed.

“Lindsay Graham right in calling out Google, etc on encryption. Vast majority want safety over privacy,” Mr. Murdoch, 84, tweeted Wednesday to his 670,000-plus Twitter followers.

Though Mr. Graham is lagging in the polls, his stance on Silicon Valley with respect to security concerns isn’t far from that of Donald Trump, the party front-runner who said earlier this week he favored “closing the Internet up in some way” to keep terrorists from using it.

Tech companies, including Google and Apple, have taken heat in recent months from local and federal government officials for providing users with programs that let them communicate with ciphertext and stay hidden from eavesdroppers — including government agencies interested in monitoring conversations for counterterrorism purposes.

Despite new concerns that correlate with the rise of the Islamic State terror group, senior White House officials told privacy advocates at a meeting Thursday that the Obama administration will not seek a legislative solution for the time being, The Washington Post reported.