A majority of the UK public is apparently reluctant to grant government additional surveillance powers.

It doesn’t matter what the UK government says, the majority of the UK public is reluctant to hand over additional surveillance powers that require tech companies to build backdoors to access encrypted communications. That’s based on a poll release Thursday by the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), a US-based advocacy group.

UK officials still want to wreck encryption

The poll comes as the UK government renews its attempts to pursue a top secret order to force Apple to build a backdoor into iCloud encryption, even if doing so will make people less safe. There’s little doubt any state-mandated backdoor would be found and exploited by today’s new generation of AI-augmented hacking systems.

The government should know this, but seems resistant to reality — though it did revise its approach to taking this action under pressure from the US. This new version targets “only” UK citizens.

What makes it worse is the underhand way the UK attempted to put these new rules in place. While we know Apple ceased offering Advanced Data Protection in the UK in response to these demands in 2025 — and opposed the demands at the time — we don’t know what arguments were made. The US said last year the order was being dropped, but Apple is now returning to court to fight a renewed attempt.

When the government issued the euphemistically-named “Technical Capability Notice” to Apple requiring backdoor access to encrypted iCloud data, it not only prohibited Apple from disclosing the order, but “most of the British public (55%) were unaware it had happened at all.” That’s because the UK kept it all out of sight. Privacy International and Liberty are also challenging the use of Technical Capability Notices.

The UK public does not agree with its leaders

CDT polled 2,000 people in the UK to find out if they supported the government’s efforts to quash encryption with dangerous backdoors. Just 12% of respondents agreed the government should have the power to access private data; the vast majority opposed the idea.

Read More: UK says ‘no’ to backdoors, but the government isn’t listening