"the EU wants to scan your messages" implies its every member state and not one freak from Denmark putting this forward where it will die.
The EU has always been 90 days from passing mass surveliance for the last decade. Until member states start actually backing this these articles are nothing but click bait.
concinds · 9h ago
In previous EU presidencies it's only been defeated by a slim margin, in part thanks to grassroots pressure. The attitude of the governments in favor of it has been: "whatever, we'll keep trying and we'll get it eventually".
So getting upset that people talk about it when it gets tabled once again is illogical and unjustifiable.
soco · 6h ago
I'm confused now: is now the EU the baddie or the governments? Because these are two different entities - and not at least, also "the EU" is a group of government representatives. So folks if you're in the EU and don't like something the EU does - you do have levers, go vote, campaign, do something to move your own folks to do something on the EU level. And if you're in the US maybe better check your own backyard, I think it's on fire.
hcfman · 6h ago
Unfortunately the EU is far from democratic. The people making these decisions are allowed to be anonymous as well.
Roark66 · 5h ago
Not quite, the people making these decisions are all in EU commission and they are there because they were submitted by their national parties. Also there is the EU parliament that contains people that also belong to national parties.
If they look like they support a very unpopular decision a big public backlash can definitely make them reconsider. Depending on how secure they are in the national politics.
For example why do you think Denmark is submitting this now? Because the somewhat right wing gov in Poland that vetoed it last time is no longer in power. Instead Mr Europe (Tusk) is the prime minister. If EU beurocracy was embodied in a person it would be him. He was the president of the commission. He was the vice-leader of the EU People's Party - the biggest party in the EU parliament. He had his first political party funded by German SPD in cash... He also lost last parliamentary election in Poland, but still came out on top by making a coalition with three smaller parties (some say one was made exactly for that purpose few years ago). He will for sure do everything in his power to have this passed.
But his government is a minority one, and at least two of these three coalition parties are mainly supported by young people from large cities. And those were the people that undermined it last time by demonstrating (believe it or not the previous mildly right wing gov was not entirely opposed to having more control over people, but they had to quickly change their mind and veto it after mass demonstrations). So I'm hoping there is no chance in hell it'll pass.
Also, if it did, there is no chance it will be signed into the law by the current president or not be deemed unconstitutional by the constitutional Court... The EU and Tusk have claimed the court is "illegitimate" for years, but that is a long story. So in short, pushing this issue despite strong opposition definitely has a potential to blow up Polish politics. No PM leading a minority gov would do something like this intentionally while his party is loosing popular support every month.
emptysongglass · 9h ago
It's not clickbait. Many member states do support this. Much of the disagreement is on just how rights-violating the scanning should be.
The situation here in Denmark is dire: nobody in the Danish media reports on it, so everybody just shrugs. I've gone out of my way to educate my coworkers and most are unaware many members of our parliament want this. The number of parties that support it outnumber those who don't. Writing to our representatives is met with silence.
Everyone looking to Denmark as a model state should beware what happens when you have a population with such high trust in its government: the roots of autocracy are allowed to grow unfettered.
azalemeth · 7h ago
Denmark is very liberal in some ways but very much not in others. MitID -- digital id-- is a gateway to everything and is very much gated in terms of access; it took me months to sort out. It's a crime to not tell the state where you live, or to have too many people living in your house (I'd love to know what happens if you give birth on a "full" house -- is there a grace period, or do you have to move?). The work laptop I have been issued with is filled with invasive spyware that no British university employee would tolerate, and it is run (very well) as a benign dictatorship. You can't get a phone SIM card without personal registration. The tax agency know exactly to the øre how much money you received and what you spent it on in a given year as basically every transaction is recorded.
I'm not complaining that much about it -- you have a fantastic social security system, low inequality, high pay and high taxes, leading to a happy and well educated population and great food (no upf!) -- but it is a vision of the 1960s nanny state that really does think it knowd best.
We also accidentally legalized child pornography for a short period after 1969. That was unintentional though.
FirmwareBurner · 7h ago
Wait, wait, hol' up, double take. How does one accidentally legalize child pornography?
mrweasel · 6h ago
You forget to exclude it from the law that legalize pornography. Denmark was the first country to legalize pornography, so obviously there where a bunch of, should we say "edge cases" that the lawmakers forgot to think about.
The Danish national television made a documentary, there's also a short article: https://www.dr.dk/om-dr/programmer-og-koncerter/candy-film-d... you can probably just run it through Google translate. The worst part is that it took like 10 - 11 years to fix.
mrweasel · 7h ago
Not sure about the laptop with spyware, that's mostly illegal, though some security software could easily be used to spy on users if the company ignores the rules.
A lot of the stuff the government registeres about an individual is required to ensure that things runs as smoothly and efficiently as they do, even if Danes will frequently complain that the government is anything but smooth and efficient. There was always an understanding and laws protecting that data from being misused. Those rules have slowly been eroding over the past 20 years or so, by increasingly zealots politicians seeking to be "tough on crime and misuse of government services (i.e. brown people not working and living on social welfare)".
Illegal access to information about citizens are pretty frequent, yet our politicians don't seem to ever wanting to back down from collection and analysing data. They are either not smart enough to see the dangers or they are deliberately attempting to create a surveillance state.
soco · 6h ago
So that's exactly how it is in Switzerland and people still say it's the best place in the world. Maybe sometimes the trust in the authorities is also warranted, right? Just keep them in check all the time, it's the only way to keep that trust - or you have this happening.
mardifoufs · 4h ago
I mean Singapore is a pretty nice place to stay in too, but it's still not super free and pretty authoritarian. There are tons of factors that make a place "nice" to be in. In my experience though, at least Danemark is a bit of an odd place. It looks nice for Danes but it's a very monocultural place. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it's something that was a bit apparent to me from an outsider's pov.
hollowonepl · 8h ago
The way article is formulated little bit as clickbait.
Title tries to scare while content says it's just a topic being reintroduced.
If anybody knows EU laws and is aware that to introduce such change all states need to agree... then I just wish DK good luck until it's anyhow confirmed at _all_ not many states do support this.
I come from different EU state and I first time hear this is big topic, seems then it's not such a big topic outside Denmark maybe?
brabel · 8h ago
> Everyone looking to Denmark as a model state should beware what happens when you have a population with such high trust in its government: the roots of autocracy are allowed to grow unfettered.
Denmark is currently one of the nicest places you can find in the world. If that’s what happens when you trust the government then sign me up!
PS. I know the situation can quickly deteriorate if you’re not constantly monitoring what the government does and agree with OP on that. Just thought it was incredibly naive to try to make the point that this can lead to an autocracy while showing one of the most well functioning democracies in the world. The USA seems like a much better example, and even then compared to most countries in the world, as you can see by the amount of people trying to move there, it’s still a pretty damn nice place to go.
mardifoufs · 4h ago
Yes, if you are an ethnic Dane in the majority, that's probably true. But that's almost always true. Governments, even autocratic ones, usually don't go against the majority. But for everyone else, yes it's absolutely worrying. Just a small example, Danemark is the only country that has force deported almost every Syrian refugee, children included back, in 2021. I'd get it now that the war is over, but it wasn't then. Even Trump didn't do that.
BSDobelix · 7h ago
>If that’s what happens when you trust the government then sign me up!
They haven't passed this yet, because every time people make noise and write their representatives. It's "clickbait" like this that makes any sort of privacy still possible.
westpfelia · 10h ago
Sure, but this is the same thing as saying "America is going to paint all birds orange" just because one person in the Iowa General House Assembly said we should do it.
Awareness is good but there is a fine line between awareness of specific politicians that suck and just misrepresenting the facts.
xinayder · 9h ago
What is misrepresented?
It's not "only Denmark". There are just a handful of countries in the EU opposing Chat Control, not because they care about privacy.
jb1991 · 10h ago
OK, I’ll bite. What reason would there be to paint every bird orange?
thyristan · 9h ago
Making the surveilance drones (they aren't really birds) more obvious and more conforming to the prison states of america branding. ;)
squigz · 10h ago
Easier hunting.
westpfelia · 9h ago
There isnt. Its a crazy example of what is happening here.
To use a real world example take this "EU deal" that Trump did. Everyone is talking like its already taken effect. But the reality is the EU just handshake agreed to this, but at the end of the day all of the member states have to rattify it. And if states dont or if there are arguements made the whole thing gets tossed.
I just wish people would say that they dont understand how the EU works. At some point some Dutch mayor is going to say that the inernet should be free, and "tech journalists" are going to write articles talking about how all EU citizens will have Fibre cables connected to them at all times.
pakitan · 9h ago
You picked a really bad time to defend a "politicians will eventually do what is best for us" position, given that such a law just came into effect in UK. And I think it's you who don't understand how the EU works. It's the biggest countries that must agree to something. Then they coerce/convince the rest. At best, the smaller countries can put on some kind of resistance until they extract some minor exception. This isn't "some Dutch mayor proposes free Internet". This is a relentless onslaught on encryption and privacy. And it's already in effect in other countries where someone at sometime also said "nah, don't worry, they just messing with us, it's not gonna pass".
emptysongglass · 9h ago
Sometimes I think the HN contingent just willfully buries its head in the sand on issues of the EU, because they prefer to think of the EU as some idealist version of whatever they've lost as leftists in the US.
What this person is writing is correct. The reality of EU politics is anything but democratic. The EU is crowned by an unelected commission that does not serve the interests of the governed.
roenxi · 8h ago
It seems reasonable to theorise it is actually a timezone-dependent effect and there is probably a slightly weird sample of English-speaking tech-focused Europeans who spend a lot of their day checking social media. When the US is up and about the tone shifts.
inglor_cz · 9h ago
The EU is quite good at cultivating a benign, environment-friendly, happy family image. I think it is a deliberate contrast to the "gung-ho" American world presence.
The background is pretty machiavellistic, though. There is a lot of money and influence to be managed. It is no secret that Ursula von der Leyen got her first mandate basically from Merkel, a reward for being her loyal subordinate for years.
saubeidl · 9h ago
The EU commission is appointed by elected governments, with one level of indirection.
It is thus as democratically legitimized as any ministerial role in any government, or as the US presidency.
Please do not spread disinformation.
thyristan · 8h ago
The commission is appointed in back-room deals by "elected" governments which are in turn often only indirectly appointed by parliaments. From your nickname I do infer you are from Germany, where ministers are not elected and the chancellor is not elected by the voters. Instead the chancellor is elected by the Bundestag, which was elected by the voters, but only after the usual back-room deals of forming a coalition. So there is no actual voter control on who becomes chancellor, as evidenced by several "grand" coalitions that always had Merkel as chancellor. Ministers are then not even elected by parliament, they are simply appointed by the chancellor. So not elected in any sense of the word, not even indirectly.
The only elected body in the EU is the EU parliament which has practically no powers when compared to the commission. It can only vote on what the commission proposes, it cannot make its own proposals. It cannot overrule the commission. And the commission can make rules and regulations of its own, without involving the parliament. The most the parliament can do is hold up the process a little.
The EU is not democratic by any sensible measure. "But there is an election somewhere in the process" doesn't make a democracy. Many dictatorships, communist regimes and even monarchies do have an election somewhere in the process. The emperor has no clothes, and the EU isn't democratic. Any timid initiative to make it so has died ages ago. The last straw was the trumped up non-election of von-der-Leyen. Actually, the parliament should have filled her job with its candidate, as was promised before the election. After election day, that promise which was intended to introduce at least a whiff of democratic accountability, was instantly forgotten. von der Leyen was instated instead of the parliaments candidate by a back-room deal.
andrepd · 8h ago
Everything you say here is correct. Democracy is not a binary where if you have an election no matter how indirect then it's a "democracy™".
The EU is governed by backroom deals and is extremely opaque. Adding to everything you said: there is no accountability, there is little presence of EU matters in newspapers, EU leaders hardly even attempt to communicate with their people (practically only von der Leyen or António Costa make public speeches).
Just compare: you surely know the names of all or almost all ministers of your country. Do you know the names of even 2 out of the 27 commissioners? Scrutiny of their doings and the laws that are proposed appear in news regularly. Does such scrutiny exist of EU institutions?
It's not a democracy.
saubeidl · 6h ago
If you don't know about EU commissioners or EU matters, then that is purely up to you.
Matter of fact, you're commenting on a news article about EU happenings right now.
If one is only the slightest bit informed, one has probably heard of Kaja Kallas, the foreign affairs commissioner or Maroš Šefčovič, the trade comissioner.
These are not some big secret names, but public figures with well-articulated positions that regularly hold press conferences.
saubeidl · 8h ago
Is the US democratic by any sensible nature? Their president, too, is appointed by electors.
Is there any democratic power by your standards? You are moving the goal posts so far I don't think anything fits your narrow definition.
geertj · 8h ago
> Their president, too, is appointed by electors.
While there have been a tiny numbers of faithless electors in the past, they have never influenced the outcome of a presidential election. Furthermore, about 80% of electors are from states that have laws that require their electors to vote for the candidate who wins the state's popular vote.
saubeidl · 7h ago
Nonetheless, they are who are elected, not the president. The president is then appointed by said electors.
thyristan · 8h ago
Switzerland is certainly democratic, because voters can directly vote for laws. Some countries and states do have provisions to that effect, but with more restrictions and less often used.
The US is actually more democratic than e.g. Germany, because the president is elected by the people (though indirectly), not by parliament. Therefore a political oligarchy could be prevented, because the majority in parliament and the president can check on each other, and the president is more accountable to the voters than to parliament.
Generally there is a sliding scale of course, but the less directly officials are elected, the less democratic a country is. A common example would be a soviet (engl. "council") republic, which isn't considered democratic at all, even though it has tons of elections: Each factory/town/village elects a local workers's council, which in turn elects a county council, which elects a regional council, which elects a state council, which elects a national council, which elects the council of ministers, which elects the chairman. Tons of filters that make absolutely certain that the will of the party and state always supercedes the will of the people.
josefx · 4h ago
> The US is actually more democratic than e.g. Germany, because the president is elected by the people
The German president is mainly a figurehead with limited power. The office was stripped down after WWII.
The real power lies with the ministers, who can issue absolute orders that have to be obeyed without question. One of many results is that German prosecutors cannot be trusted with issuing EU wide arrest warrants and had the ability stripped from them the moment it was challenged in court.
andrepd · 8h ago
That's just ridiculous. The US president is directly elected by the people, modulo the weirdness of state-level FPTP. Flawed as the electoral college is, there's no comparison whatsoever.
saubeidl · 7h ago
The electoral college is directly elected, the president is appointed. It is the same level of indirection.
andrepd · 7h ago
The electoral college is a rubber stamp of the popular vote (per state). The commission is selected by the member-states governments with no electoral input. You cannot be making this argument in good faith...
saubeidl · 6h ago
The member-states governments are elected by popular vote, per state, just as electors are. It is the same level of indirection, whichever way you try to reframe it.
thyristan · 6h ago
Wrong. Only a few member state governments are elected. The rest is appointed. Stop spreading lies.
saubeidl · 6h ago
It's a big claim to say somebody is spreading lies. I would say it would require at least a bit of evidence.
andrepd · 2h ago
There's no way you're seriously making this argument. I don't know what else to say except repeat myself.
The US electoral college is an historical artifact that simply rubber stamps the votes of the States. The member states' heads of government make the decision themselves! The equivalent would be the electoral college simply voting for the president themselves.
Jesus christ.
saubeidl · 2h ago
> The equivalent would be the electoral college simply voting for the president themselves.
That is... exactly what they are doing?
emptysongglass · 9h ago
It is not disinformation. The Commission is unelected by the people. I specifically called out that the Commission does not serve the interests of the governed. That is a correct statement.
What's more the Commission is more than one person, unlike the US presidency.
saubeidl · 8h ago
Again, the commission is appointed by elected officials.
Do you call ministers in your country unelected? Would you call the US president unelected?
I agree the Comission doesn't serve the interests of the governed, but that's because the people keep voting against their own interests and vote in right-wing governments, which in turn appoints a right-wing commission, which then does the right-wing thing of selling out its people.
It is not a structural EU fault, it is the electorate that's to blame.
vladvasiliu · 8h ago
> Do you call ministers in your country unelected?
Don't know about emptysongglass's country, but in France, ministers are absolutely unelected. The president is directly elected, who then appoints the prime minister, who then "proposes" the other ministers of his government. There is no strict rule by which the prime minister is chosen, only a "habit" to choose from the "winning camp", which was not respected by Macron these last two times. There's also no rule for how the ministers are picked. As you can imagine, this is largely backroom deals.
The last two prime ministers have all been deemed unsatisfactory by the parties with the most votes in the last legislative elections and by those who voted for them (people voted directly for their representatives in the lower chamber of parliament). These prime ministers were from parties that scored lower in the elections.
inglor_cz · 9h ago
You are spreading some serious disinformation about how the EU works.
Once such EU-wide regulations are fully passed (incl. the EP), the countries have to implement them in their law. Sure, they can drag their feet, or there actually might be a real showdown, for example, if the German Constitutional Court says that this is against the Grundgesetz and that it does not recognize supremacy of EU law over itself / the German Constitution. If the same happens in Poland, there will be extra drama added.
But at the same time, at least half of the EU, countries with negligible tech sector, will happily pass that legislation without any significant friction, because a) think of the children, b) monitoring opposition and dissent, yay!, c) we have to, because Brussels said so, d) the lawmakers know shit about encryption and tech and they will be exempt from monitoring anyway, so encryption is something that is only used by criminals and terrorists and if you have nothing to hide etc. etc.
At which point you have the surveillance infrastructure installed and in operation across half the continent, and with elections changing governments, it will spread.
Our main protection used to be that small countries like Slovenia or Malta don't have the weight to push Apple or Google to introduce deliberate holes in their software.
If the European Commission joins the push, that is a completely different pressure.
richrichardsson · 9h ago
> I just wish people would say that they dont understand how the EU works.
Just look at the Brexit vote for an example of how little people understand the EU and how it works.
RealCodingOtaku · 8h ago
People said the same thing about the UKs Online Safety Act when it was proposed. If these articles do not warn us to take action and spread more awareness on what's going on, we would just be stepping closer to the dystopian future faster.
HPsquared · 9h ago
It's a stochastic process with a ratchet. Eventually it'll pass in a moment of temporary fervour.
ozgrakkurt · 8h ago
Curious if there is any push on the other direction
throw_a_grenade · 8h ago
European courts, of course: ECJ (so hated by UK), ECHR, and a handful of others judiciary and non-judiciary bodies.
sunshine-o · 8h ago
It is a bit like asking a girl to show you her private parts for years until she has a moment of weakness. That would make you a real creep.
The EU parliament is fake, and the unelected commission has become a pathetic clown show.
Their latest VP addition, Antonio Costa, had to be removed from office in Portugal because he was too corrupt. But good enough for leadership of the EU commission.
They had a violent rhetoric, prolonged artificially to this day the Ukraine war and watched the population being slaughtered without sending any troops.
So instead of loosing a few territory, the Ukrainian population is now dead demographically. If you prolong enough a war and the population is wreaked, the war is lost. This is what happened in WWI.
Just in the last few days they managed to be humiliated by both the US and China. China went so far to park them in a bus, arrive with no welcoming and have a walk of shame with in silence on a faded carpet.
The EU was about democracy, peace and prosperity. Today it is is pursuing the opposite objectives.
Downvote me if you want, I care more about staying alive than any internet karma points.
ManBeardPc · 9h ago
There are constant attempts to undermine our rights. Every state has their political figures that try to push things like that and they would have succeeded (more) if there wasn't so much public backlash. They continue to try though. What you are describing is a good example of the preparedness paradox.
FerretFred · 9h ago
I'm sure this is what they said about the UK Inline Safety Act (2023) but guess what, it's here, and live.
emptysongglass · 9h ago
And it's a slippery slope. The UK already damned itself with the Investigatory Powers Act of 2016 that allowed for Technical Capability Notices to be served in secret to any organization they desired to backdoor.
raverbashing · 8h ago
Wow I didn't know the UK cared so much about inline functions /s
Do you know what's even funnier with the UK? Parliament has most of the power
harvey9 · 7h ago
No, that law was about inline roller skates safety. Knee pads and crash helmets.
FerretFred · 7h ago
Bl*dy autocorrect!
Ironically, my commandline skills may yet save me :)
EtienneK · 9h ago
The day we stop making noise is the day they will pass this.
pieter_mj · 2h ago
This time it will pass while we're making noise. I've done so for a long time, now it's different.
pieter_mj · 2h ago
This time it is happening. Global geopolitical forces are coalescing.
sim7c00 · 7h ago
they never really needed it because their allies already got all the data but with UK out of the EU and US proving less reliable / more volatile ally its more important for them to have their own source of intel.
though, because lawful intercept is also a thing in EU, its stupid to assume they do not already have access if they want it.
despite not having 'dragnet' surveillance , they have effective and deep targeted surveillance and laws that allow them to do that fairly freely.... (most countries are more strict with their own citizens, but then its handy to have allies to do it for u -_-... wonderful world!)
max_ · 10h ago
Promoting awareness of an upcoming scam is good.
It keeps us aware of how stupid the powers that be are.
rvnx · 10h ago
Normalizing it and saying it is a mundane topic 30 years is actually helping these powers to install it, like getting tired over time and ending just accepting it. The reaction should be much stronger from the tech companies but the tech companies are actually supporters of it, just so they can continue hoarding money while violating other laws.
-> Discord/Google/Meta/etc are already scanning the private chats for pictures, and they didn't wait for a law.
To fix pedophiles, supporters of terrorism and gang members, there is a more radical solution: fund justice and police so dangerous people can be put in jail (or kill them if that's something you think is right).
Once this is done, there is no need anymore to monitor conversations outside of current scope.
Though, justice is not fair in practice, so there will be collateral innocent victims (like with privacy invasion) :/
freilanzer · 10h ago
So, let's not talk about it, so that people are informed.
pluto_modadic · 8h ago
same logic as "fixing the clocks wasn't that big of a problem, the world didn't set on fire", well yeah because we warned you and fixed it. This is also the logic behind the no-win scenario of IT/security budgets:
things are working: why do we pay so much for IT/security or XYZ tool, we don't need it.
things are on fire: we pay so much money for IT/security or XYZ tool and it didn't help us
ekianjo · 10h ago
it only needs to pass once. if you keep trying it will.
andrepd · 8h ago
Exactly. The European """Parliament""" does not have the power to propose new laws, so if it passes once, it cannot repeal it of its own initiative. So much for democracy.
FirmwareBurner · 10h ago
"You need to be lucky every time to stop us, but we only need to be lucky once"
grues-dinner · 9h ago
Ironic that this was said by the IRA to the Conservatives in the UK, after they narrowly missed bombing Thatcher. Maybe they learned from it, since that strategy is how they eventually got the OSA pushed through.
constantcrying · 4h ago
>Until member states start actually backing this these articles are nothing but click bait.
As the article states "According to the former MEP for the German Pirate Party, Patrick Breyer, Denmark crucially needs to manage to convince Germany of its proposed text. The new government has not yet taken a position at the time of writing."
And since the current German government is bound to take the most idiotic and destructive path it is basically assured.
inglor_cz · 10h ago
"not one freak from Denmark putting this forward where it will die"
Not true. The truth is that Chat Control has returned several times already and the majority of the EU states were actually always for, but a blocking minority has been reached each time - barely so.
Worryingly, one of the blocking minority countries used to be Germany, where privacy-minded smaller parties (Greens, FDP) are no longer in government. The new government hasn't declared its position yet. If it switches to yes, then the remnants of our privacy are kaput just like that, and the only hope will be in the ECHR, or possibly (sigh) in Trump's tech bros angrily vetoing it from abroad.
So, no one freak from Denmark, but a concerted, repeated effort.
There is an even worse set of measures in the phase of preparation, ProtectEU, which would mandate backdoors in everything under the pain of prison for vendors, introduce mandatory data retention and ban non-logging VPNs.
Fuck, I don't want to live in a China with a blue flag instead of red. This is absolutely dystopian.
Don't downplay the danger. Don't spread disinformation. This isn't a random shot from a random weirdo in Denmark. This is a seriously driven EU-wide attempt to destroy meaningful encryption with a lot of proponents and backers. And the current EC chair, Ursula von der Leyen, has a history of promoting such measures, that is why Germans call her Zensursula.
emptysongglass · 9h ago
And from a Dane here, it's far from isolated to one Danish freak: the majority of parties support Chat Control.
inglor_cz · 9h ago
I generally love Denmark from all my heart, but this is one big exception. Like wtf, vikings.
arghwhat · 8h ago
As a Dane, we're sorry - democracy is imperfect and it seems that being a politician requires technological incompetence and immunity to silly things like numbers and facts. :(
squigz · 9h ago
Can you link to some info on what countries voted for or against previous attempts at this?
inglor_cz · 9h ago
This guy has been doing a lot of lifting on the fight against Chat Control:
> Fuck, I don't want to live in a China with a blue flag instead of red. This is absolutely dystopian.
I think it's too late. People already showed they'd loudly support this if propagandized enough like during COVID times where the most draconian and anti constitutional of policies were enacted, literally following and lobbied by China.
Unless people recognize that they did a terrible thing in supporting covid policies instead of burying their head under the sand or persisting in the ridiculous propaganda about anti-vaxxers and disinformation, they're always going to be easily manipulated. The same goes for the "let's invade new country because 'dictator/terrorism/grave threat to our western way of life'".
Are we the baddies is a rethorical question at this point.
KolyaKornelius · 9h ago
I don't see what Covid has to do with this. Covid prevention measures were always meant to be temporal and they all were taken back.
teddyh · 9h ago
It’s not the crime, it’s the cover-up.
faku812 · 7h ago
Temporal? Tell that to people who were coerced into getting vaccinated and are now suffering permanent side effects.
isaacremuant · 4h ago
Hahahahah. The new Normal was always meant to be temporal? You know some of us absolutely paid attention, right? You know many things absolutely remained, right?
Also, anti constitutional and anti human rights is wrong no matter if it's temporal or not.
But hey, you supported it, now deal with the fallout. Temporary like the war on terror. Give me a break.
akk0 · 8h ago
I don't think this kind of discourse helps and I don't agree with the point. I am vehemently against chat control, but at least in my country (Netherlands) I saw nothing beyond the pale re: covid measures given the situation. I also don't see how those measures, regardless of whether you agree with them, reflect on chat control, as I'm not aware of any covid measures targeting encryption, nor of any EU-level measures you might be referring to here. Maybe you care to elucidate? Regardless by equating the two I think you alienate people, because as far as I can tell most people are still broadly understanding of COVID measures taken and the core demographic that's not is also generally in favor of Chat Control.
inglor_cz · 9h ago
This seems to be done in a completely different way. Instead of a loud propaganda push, the proponents seem to want to avoid drawing attention to the proposals. Most of the big media is either completely silent about that, or only mentions those proposals shortly on the bottom of the page. Which indicates that they haven't received any instructions to push it visibly.
And I think this is partially caused by fear of possible backlash.
hnpolicestate · 6h ago
Good. Remind them of digital health passports. They screamed for it. They deserve chat monitoring.
kubb · 10h ago
People should learn about crying wolf, but they never do.
eitland · 9h ago
Crying wolf implies there is no wolf.
Here the wolf is clearly visible.
bryanrasmussen · 9h ago
crying wolf implies there is a wolf, but is not actually a danger at the moment, this is how the boy who cries wolf ends up getting eaten at the end.
kubb · 9h ago
The wolf are the nefarious powers trying to read your DMs.
When they really come, people won’t bother reading the news.
an_ko · 10h ago
Why does this stupid idea have to be killed so many times? Being watched constantly means living in fear, but seeing it almost become legally mandated practice over and over again is itself a form of living in fear. I'm so tired.
EagnaIonat · 9h ago
It was more misunderstood than stupid.
Ironically when Apple introduced their solution it was actually better than what we have now. It was interesting to watch people lose their minds because they didn't understand how the current or proposed system worked.
Current system everything can be decrypted on the cloud and is scanned for CSAM by all ISPs/service providers.
Apple wanted the device to scan for CSAM and if it got flagged, it allowed the file to be decrypted on the cloud for a human to check it (again, what happens now).
If it didn't get flagged then it stayed encrypted on the cloud and no one could look at it. This not only was a better protection for your data, it has a massive reduction in server costs.
CSAM is also a list of hashes for some of the worst CP video/images out there. It doesn't read anything, just hash matching.
The chance of mismatch is so incredibly small to be almost non-existent.
Even so the current CSAM guidelines require a human to review the results and require multiple hits before you are even flagged. Again this is what is happening now.
Personally I'm against having any agency the ability to read private messages, while at the same time I fully agree with what CSAM is trying to do.
Realistically if countries want to read encrypted messages, they can already do so. Some do too. The fact that the EU is debating it is a good thing.
4bpp · 8h ago
So what would stop the list of hashes from being extended with hashes of copyrighted media, evidence of corruption (labelled slander or an invasion of the perpetrator's privacy) or evidence of the preceding abuses of the system themselves?
Once you have an established mechanism for "fighting crime", "don't use it to fight that type of crime" is not a position that has any chance of prevailing in the political landscape - see also all the cases of national security wiretaps being used against petty druggies.
DoctorOW · 7h ago
Hashes don't really work that way. They don't actually give any high level of a photo's contents. You can't ask a hash to find all photos of a certain document or a meeting or anything like that. They really only detect exact copies, which makes them somewhat useful only for the most basic of copyright infringement (i.e. proving someone has a copy)
4bpp · 6h ago
As far as I remember, Apple's proposal was to involve https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perceptual_hashing which is meant to sidestep this exact problem - and either way, your objection would be equally applicable to CSAM. There is no mechanism that works better for it than for copyright enforcement.
thefz · 4h ago
> Ironically when Apple introduced their solution it was actually better than what we have now. It was interesting to watch people lose their minds because they didn't understand how the current or proposed system worked.
What, the cloud scanning of user photos was a good idea for you? The private companyt deciding what is good or bad idea? The automated surveillance that could lead to people wrongfully accused idea?
> f it didn't get flagged then it stayed encrypted on the cloud and no one could look at it.
If Apple can decrypt your data when they find a match, they can decrypt ALL your data. Who says it will be used for good? Do you trust a private company this much?
wobfan · 9h ago
> Realistically if countries want to read encrypted messages, they can already do so.
How? Are you implying adynchronous and synchronous encryption is broken? Because last time I checked since Snowden our encryption is basically the one single thing in the whole concept of the internet that has been done very right, with forward secrecy and long term security in mind. AFAIK there are no signs that someone or something has been able to break it.
Also, the solutions you present do imply that someone already has the private key to decrypt. Sure, they'll say they'll just decrypt if your a bad person, but the definition of a bad person changes from government to government (see USA), and from CEO to CEO. Encryption should and mostly is built on zero trust and it only works with zero trust. Scanning, and risking the privacy of billions and billions of messages by having the key to read them because there have been some bad actors is fighting a fly with a bazooka. Which sounds funny overkill, but, fun fact, it also just doesn't work. It destroys a lot, and gains nothing.
I don't have a better solution for the problem. But this solution is definitely the wrong one.
_Algernon_ · 9h ago
>How?
A couple of guys with 5$ wrenches can be pretty effective at extracting cryptographic secrets.
inglor_cz · 9h ago
Not on scale, though. Plus, this leaves some quite visible traces and leads to backlash.
That is like saying that Guantanamo can defeat religious terrorism. In individual cases, yes, on the whole, absolutely not.
wobfan · 8h ago
I mean yeah, why break crypto when you can break kneecaps?
isodev · 8h ago
> Realistically if countries want to read encrypted messages, they can already do so. Some do too. The fact that the EU is debating it is a good thing.
I agree that the discussion is evolving the bill every time and there are always good amounts of feedback and comments.
It’s a bit annoying when tech websites don’t always update themselves with the latest changes, just labelling it ChatControl doesn’t mean it’s the same policy that was discussed 5 years ago. It makes for good click bait titles, but the technical nuances are missing.
For example, one would be interested to read a comparison between the “privacy” of a tool matching photos against a database of signatures vs. say Apple’s performative privacy in the Photos app or the iCloud + chatGPT/Apple Intelligence mix.
crinkly · 9h ago
The problem with the CSAM detection is that it can be used for adversarial purposes as well. For example if someone decides an image is politically inconvenient and pressures it to be blocked by hash, then Apple may have to comply or remove themselves from an entire market. Building the mechanism to do that is not acceptable in a civilised society.
And of course does this really solve the real problem of child exploitation? No it doesn't. It allows performative folk working for NGOs to feel like they've done something while children are still being abused and it is being covered up or not even investigated as is so common today.
Improving policing and investigatory standards is where this should stop. We already have RIPA.
All this does is create the expectation that a surveillance dragnet is acceptable. It is not.
fwn · 7h ago
> CSAM is also a list of hashes for some of the worst CP video/images out there. It doesn't read anything, just hash matching.
The list presumably contains CSAM hashes. However, it could also include hashes for other types of content.
AFAIK the specific scope at any point in time is not something that can be fully evaluated by independent third parties, and there is no obvious reason why this list could not be extended to cover different types of content in the future.
Once it is in place, why not search for documents that are known to facilitate terrorism? What about human trafficking? Drug trafficking? Antisemitic memes spring to mind. Or maybe memes critical of some government, a war, etc.
This is because, despite the CSAM framing, it is essentially a censorship/surveillance infrastructure. One that is neutral with regard to content.
ghusto · 6h ago
Almost as if there should be a rule that disallows introducing the same proposal multiple times under different names.
raron · 5h ago
AFAIK there is a rule like that, but it needs that the proposal was voted down. Chatcontrol was never voted on by the EP. They bring it up every half a year and it would not be voted on until they can be sure it would pass.
amelius · 10h ago
Open source will find a way around it; there's no reason to be afraid. Unless one day their spyware is installed at the hardware level but that would be the equivalent of raiding our homes, so that's not very likely.
ekianjo · 10h ago
open source wont save you. if they make encryption without backdoor illegal they will just throw you in jail
ghusto · 6h ago
They will once they catch you doing it, yes. The people who this _won't_ stop however, are criminals.
morkalork · 3h ago
Seeing that carve out for Google with non-licensed androids being banned from the age verification app., it looks like there's going to be a heavy swing towards trusted devices and apps. in general. Perhaps untrusted ones will be blocked from carrier networks. And then what? You'll be able to have phones with your own custom apps/chat installed that's useless, or phones that are useful but you're stuck with only official, compromised apps.
wobfan · 9h ago
It'll definitely save the criminals.
Selling drugs on the Internet is also illegal. Selling them in real life too. How many people are doing it still? Doesn't seem very effective, this solution.
Many OSS developers live in Europe and the logical next step will be throwing them in jail for production of illegal software.
mvdwoord · 10h ago
Maybe they can lead by example and show us the chats from Ursula first...
Orange1688 · 10h ago
Better still, the chats between Danish PM Mette Frederiksen and other members of government concerning the (possibly illegal) culling of all mink in Denmark. The chats were coincidentally deleted for security reasons as the press were catching on - security reasons that apparently do not apply to regular people simply texting their dad, girlfriend or anyone
arghwhat · 8h ago
I mean, it's not like you, your dad, girlfriend or anyone would be planning to perform possibly illegal culling of some species, now would you...???
There's lots of little privileges like this that only seem to apply to politicians. Like, lifelong retirement after just one year of work in parliament and government provided tax-free apartments in central Copenhagen.
The argument for the latter is that it is needed for them to be near the work, but if a private company provides the same to their employees the employee will be taxed by its full value.
Granted, it's less corruption than other places, but definitely still corruption.
collyw · 9h ago
Incredible how many politicians whatsapp messages disappeared after the so called pandemic.
tobyhinloopen · 10h ago
I just don't get it - criminals will just continue to use "real" encryption. Why are some of these people so obsessed with reading everyone's chats?
jeroenhd · 10h ago
By banning real encryption, the police can arrest anyone using chat apps they can't control. Them not being able to spy on you automatically makes you guilty.
Also something something children something terrorism something something safety, whatever makes the uninformed public feel like this is something that'll benefit them.
chedabob · 10h ago
The criminals will just use something that hides in plain sight.
I think it was Encrochat devices that booted into a fairly vanilla looking OS, and there was another platform where it was hidden in something like a calculator app.
pjerem · 9h ago
You mean, EncroChat, the company that was infiltrated by cops which led to 4500 arrests ?
> a Dutch organized crime gang was involved and financed the developers.
I mean, maybe that has something to do with it?
thyristan · 9h ago
It isn't about criminals. It is about population control. Keeping the plebs in their place, lest they vote unsavoury opposition parties, or get ideas about real democratic participation.
PeterStuer · 10h ago
It is not about "the criminals", it is about control. They want you to self-censor "wrongthink" in any space.
The rise of totalitairianism in the EU is very real.
geertj · 9h ago
Yes, 100%. I grew up in Europe, and have been in the US for the last 10+ years, with all of my family still in Europe. I think this gives me reasonable feel for the "situation on the ground."
The best way I can describe my social circles in the US and EU is that in the US, we still have "principled freedom", where there (still) is a majority of people that understand the original ideas of the founding fathers, and can imagine that things could theoretically be different (the word used for this is "tyranny", which sounded super weird when I first came here).
In EU, I see a total disconnect with any foundational principles or values. Worse is that the population would 100% disagree with you on this, but when you probe "what are these values and why are they there," you get mostly circular reasoning based on some neo-liberal viewpoints. Furthermore, people just can't imagine ever losing their freedoms. This makes Europe essentially like the frog in the pot on the stove. If you mention the word "tyranny" to Europeans, they basically think you're a crackpot.
I have seen things change a teeny bit with the war in Ukraine, where folks get at least somewhat concerned, but the concerns are still about an external boogyman. Nowhere is there any realization that big government, with a lot of unelected bureaucrats, typically becomes the enemy of the people because "power corrupts."
saubeidl · 9h ago
I feel like this is an absurd position to take when people are literally being snatched off the street and being sent to torture camps in the US.
The tyranny is much closer there than in the EU.
geertj · 8h ago
> I feel like this is an absurd position to take when people are literally being snatched off the street and being sent to torture camps in the US.
That is of course a gross misrepresentation of what is happening (and I'm being charitable here).
Tade0 · 7h ago
Then what is happening? Pretty sure we have documented cases of American citizens being arrested without a case.
geertj · 7h ago
The max that is happening here, assuming the poster is referring to the current administration's policy to remove undocumented aliens from the country, is that some operational mistakes unfortunately will be made since an estimated 10 million people entered the country illegally in the last four years.
It is my hope and belief that any such mistakes would be swiftly corrected, and that the undocumented people that are impacted by this policy are treated with dignity and respect, while still encouraging legal immigration into this country. Furthermore I would expect that the odds of a US citizen or otherwise legal resident to be arrested and deported to be virtually zero.
saubeidl · 6h ago
First they came for the illegal immigrants and I did not speak out, because I was not an illegal immigrant.
Then they came for the legal immigrants they didn't like and I did not speak out, because I was not a legal immigrant. [0]
Then they came for their political enemies [1] and I did not speak up, because I was not their political enemy.
Then they came for me - and there was noone left to speak for me.
If you'd stop the ad-hominems and suggestions of malice you'd more effectively make your case.
I'm not going to play this game of me investing my time in random links posted to this discussion, but as a once time exception:
- The first link claims a man got detained where ICE thought he had a fake ID but where he was actually a citizen. From the article: "It is not clear where the construction is located and efforts to find contact information for Venegas were not successful. Efforts to reach ICE representatives for comment were not immediately successful." So we have an unsubstantiated claim in an online publication. Is it true? Maybe. If it is, then the worst claimed here is that someone one detained. Not even arrested, let alone anything worse than that. This certainly does not rise to the claims you're making. If the article is true, this is likely an operational mistake that was corrected soon afterwards.
- The second link claims that the mosquitoes in a new temporary detention facility amount to torture. Do I like the optics of the facility? No. Do I want people in detention to get treated with dignity? Of course. The claim of torture is quite extraordinary though. If the facility is not up to standards, I have trust in the system that it will get closed.
saubeidl · 6h ago
Regarding the first point, you are leaning heavily on euphemisms ("detained") to make your case.
Regarding the second point, you purposefully picked the least offensive part (the mosquitoes, as opposed to the starvation, the sleep deprivation, the quarters tigher than in concentration camps), to misrepresent what is happening here.
It is exactly behavioral patterns like these that make it hard to assume good faith argument.
geertj · 5h ago
This will be my last reply in this thread. We're not going to agree and you keep implying bad faith. I'll reply to one last factual point, and forgo replying to the continued implication of bad faith.
> Regarding the first point, you are leaning heavily on euphemisms ("detained") to make your case.
No, "detained" is a precise legal term that is used in the article in the intended legal way. It's a step prior to arrest, where an officer has stopped you for some probably cause. When detained, you are not allowed to leave, while the officer checks what's going on. The result can be that you are free to go, or that things escalate to an arrest (you are taken in custody).
saubeidl · 5h ago
"Detained" is also the term the Nazis used for people they put into concentration camps.
edejong · 10h ago
Crowd control, psyops, trend analysis. EU is quickly becoming authoritarian and the change is instigated by the sitting parties.
energy123 · 10h ago
The steel-man case could be:
> This will catch the x% of lone wolf terrorists who are too mentally unwell to use encryption and too unwell to hide their intentions.
> Without this, the relative increase in terrorism will cause strongmen to get elected who will just enact even more severe surveillance, among many other bad things.
> So it's not a choice between surveillance and no surveillance. It's a choice between relative levels of badness.
> This will also catch real criminals by listening to their close family members who have worse OPSEC than the criminals.
realusername · 9h ago
Don't know about other countries but in France most of the terrorist attacks have been coordinated using plain unencrypted sms.
The criminals aren't the masterminds people portrait in the movies.
tobyhinloopen · 5h ago
The criminals that are caught, maybe (:
How about the criminals that are not yet caught
realusername · 4h ago
I don't have an example of a terrorist attack where the terrorists managed to get away with it without getting caught. It's not the 80s anymore, it's very hard to hide somewhere without any trace of some sort.
cpa · 9h ago
It really depends on the "use case." Regulators are primarily concerned about grooming, which involves criminals using apps that teenagers frequent.
Also, criminals usually have poor operational security—far from perfect. The seriousness of the offense isn't related to the quality of their opsec.
Regulators and law enforcement are generally rational. They may be short-sighted, but they often have reasonable explanations for things you might dismiss as stupid.
That sucks, CSAM sucks, emotional regulation sucks, and as a society, we don't know how to manage allowing kids online. In fact we don't even know, what we'd like. From a political/policy standpoint, that's the challenge of the next 20 years.
Tade0 · 7h ago
That's trying to find a technical solution to a problem that is not technical.
The sad truth is that law enforcement doesn't have the resources to go after a huge chunk of the cases - particularly before anything serious happens.
For this reason giving them even more power won't markedly increase prevention, but will introduce more cases of people abusing said power. Ultimately the government is run by people, and people are fallible:
They don't seem at all bothered about it in the UK, they try to cover it up.
john_the_writer · 9h ago
As a parent, I can tell you it's insanely easy to manage allowing kids online. Don't.. or 100% supervised. Done
cpa · 7h ago
And if you tell people that quitting smoking, drinking, and walking 10,000 steps a day would make them healthier, that’s true, but it’s not helpful on a national scale—especially for issues where the cost is not only borne by the individual but also by the rest of society.
bornfreddy · 8h ago
This works - until they grow up. Will you filter the world for them when they are adults too? Your role, as a parent, is to prepare them for independent life, life without you. How will you do that if you never give them the reins?
dmpk2k · 6h ago
They get the reigns when they're an adult. The prior poster did mention supervision.
Pedro_Ribeiro · 8h ago
Clearly by installing a wrongthink iron dome around the world!
closewith · 10h ago
When real encryption is illegal, it will be easier to roll them up.
> Why are some of these people so obsessed with reading everyone's chats?
Having worked with some of the people in law enforcement heavily pushing this, it generally does come from child safety concerns and the overwhelming amount of CSAM sent via encrypted means.
Personally, I don't believe that it will ever be restricted to serious crimes and the potential for abuse is infinite, so I don't believe it is justifiable, but child sexual abuse is a real and enormous problem that causes untold harm and suffering, so we have to find a balance.
mordae · 10h ago
I am willing to increase funding for undercover operatives who infiltrate CSAM smuggling rings and bust them. But nobody asked for this. They always say it is impossible without breaking encryption.
jesterson · 9h ago
Easy - you can scan and ban political dissent. This is the only reason the scumbags are pushing it hard.
I wonder if anyone believes those measure are actually against childporn.
isaacremuant · 9h ago
Because total surveillance increases the power of the state which can then use it to suppress threats to its power, including effective political dissent. It's not new. It happens everytime if you follow history but people have been conditioned to think skepticism, unless is against "trump bad", is absolutely a conspiracy theory.
The important thing also is that this total massive invasion of privacy won't be for all. You don't get gov transparency but the opposite. The asymmetry of information only increases that power to oppress.
sunshine-o · 7h ago
I was reflecting on the whole chat apps and protocols the other day and felt we might just have trapped ourselves artificially.
If I want to casually keep in touch with a friend, I am supposed to have the following options:
- SMS/RCS: no need for an app but is controlled
- WhatsApp: no good to many reasons
- Signal: how can you believe it is not controlled once it becomes the mandatory app in the US Gov.
- Matrix: great but you need to self host a server, create accounts, etc.
- SimpleX: very interesting, but centralised and I feel it might just be the next Signal. Might be a solution since you can exit at some point by self hosting a server and I guess have alternative implementations.
- Delta chat: great but I guess email fall into the mass surveillance target.
Now most people do not have crazy security requirements and just want to be able to send a simple text message to a friend and be notified instantly without participating in mass surveillance. So why even using a formal Chat app that will be target by a regulation like Chat Control or kicked out of the App store?
Something like Gotify [0] or ntfy [1] are almost enough for most users. It has the whole free from Google and Apple push notification system figured out. You would just need to modify a bit the app to exchange keys with a QR code for individual topics (that you would use as contact or groups).
In a way we just need MQTT servers, a client with reliable push notifications and a manual key exchange mechanism. That would be really hard for govs to target.
> - Signal: how can you believe it is not controlled once it becomes the mandatory app in the US Gov.
cryptography?
pimterry · 6h ago
> In a way we just need MQTT servers, a client with reliable push notifications and a manual key exchange mechanism. That would be really hard for govs to target.
Go even further: Meshtastic (https://meshtastic.org/). P2P E2EE texting, primarily via LoRa mesh (a mesh of long-range low-bandwidth direct radio connections) plus MQTT backup, with surprisingly nice UX even for non-techies. You can message people directly, or create encrypted groups too.
In effect, you broadcast your message (encrypted) via LoRa (travels a couple of kilometers through apartment blocks in a big city, or up to hundreds of kilometers in open countryside with line-of-sight), and then anybody else with meshtastic rebroadcasts it, up to 3 hops by default. Works OK for local chat through normal nodes, or really well if somebody within a few kilometers has a router on a roof/big hill nearby (map of opted-into-mapping public nodes: https://meshmap.net/ - IME that's about 10% of actual nodes). Optionally uses MQTT when there's any kind of internet connection available so you can chat long-range too (there's a public MQTT server available, or you can run your own) although that's not really the main use case.
No paid intermediaries or services involved, doesn't require a cell plan or internet or anything, even if the whole world collapses, you just keep on texting (for as long as you have battery).
Requires either a tiny radio gateway (e.g. https://lilygo.cc/products/t-echo-meshtastic) that you connect through with your phone via BT, or you can get a standalone device (https://lilygo.cc/products/t-deck-plus-1) but <$100 in either case. Low-bandwidth though: only text & GPS, no pictures or audio. And obviously, this is pretty deep in the weird nerd shit so it might be a hard sell for your grandparents, and by its nature it's mostly useful for the local area chat anyway. Perfect for trips to low connectivity zones though (hiking, skiing, etc).
sunshine-o · 5h ago
Agree I love those LoRa devices & Meshtastic, but it requires your contacts to invest and carry additional hardware.
Now the most exiting project in that space IMHO is Reticulum because you can transparently mix transports: any radio (incl LoRa), TCP, UDP, etc. [0]
Their Sideband app [1] is not as polished as Meshtastic but you can start over the standard Internet, or I2P, yggdrasil and slowly introduce LoRa among your group of friends over time and if necessary.
> - Signal: how can you believe it is not controlled once it becomes the mandatory app in the US Gov.
Isn't this a good sign? When the US Gov has enough trust to use it internally and officials are already using it for their communications, would this not mean that the service is truly encrypted.
They could have some sort of switch for it, but the frontend is open-source and that's where the encryption happens.
Grumbledour · 4h ago
It's quite interesting, that while this topic comes up from time to time (it has been going on a long time after all already), people on here seem to seldom talk about the organizations that lobby for this proposal for years, with big ties to the US and intelligence agencies. So this is by no means just an European phenomenon but there seems to be a much bigger agenda behind it all.
Now, at the moment, I don't have a good english language source, but I am sure someone else could provide one?
Here is a german language one[0], from netzpolitik.org, who follow chat control for years now an have many articles going in depth about this. I am sure you could use translation software to read it until someone provides a better source. (And if you have not heard of this, you should!)
And while someone already linked to patrick breyers website[1] which has a good overview, I do so again so maybe more people will see it.
This thing is not new, but it is also not easily ignored and everyone should be informed whats going on here. They will try to pass this again and again since they have done for years now and it's mostly been close calls until now.
it seems it is the general Zeitgeist in Europe.
Also in Switzerland and generally erosions of Privacy laws all across the continent. The governments are scared of insurgencies from the right, from the left, from immigrants, from foreign nations.
Paranoia and fear are quite prominent.
andriamanitra · 9h ago
It's always a minority pushing the weakening of encryption, which is why the proposals have never made it very far. What separates Europe from the US is that our political system is way more diverse and involves many more political groups (some of which have extreme opinions). This naturally means more diverse proposals, and lower chance of a given proposal becoming a reality. Especially so when compared to the US where it seems one person with the support of one political party can seemingly implement any crazy policy they think of on a whim.
I think it's probably a good thing to explore a wider range of ideas, even if many of the ideas suck and end up being scrapped.
inglor_cz · 9h ago
A minority may be pushing, but a majority is for.
If you look at actual history of Chat Control: it always had majority support, and it was always a blocking minority that stopped it.
VikingMiner · 7h ago
The irony is that they cannot deal with an insurgency if it was organised offline or via secure messaging platforms. They simply don't have the man power to deal with it. At the moment only a few people realise this, if that changes and any insurgent activity actually do halfway decent OPSEC they are finished.
clarionbell · 10h ago
The way you described it, Europe sounds almost like Imperium from 40k.
freilanzer · 10h ago
If only.
rckt · 10h ago
With this topic constantly emerging from the authorities, it feels like in the end they will succeed. Money and power always win, to some extent. At least on the official level. But this will lead to those who don't agree to form their own places to communicate securely. The people in power obviously don't want THEIR chats to be scanned, so there will be a safe haven. Just like with tax evaders. But I guess those who care about privacy and security will be considered as potential criminals.
ricardobeat · 9h ago
Misleading clickbait in that headline. There will be a deliberation on the proposal, scheduled for October, they even acknowledge this in the article.
Dev6345789 · 9h ago
The problem is that citizens cannot start referendums, and MPs cannot propose laws to prohibit these privacy violations. So the commission will bring this up again and again and again, until it eventually passes.
Roark66 · 6h ago
My country for sure will veto it. Last time when they tried it there were massive demonstrations. While the current gov is led by someone that for sure has no backbone to stand up to his good friends in the EU People's party(the name says it all). It is also a minority one that is held up by a coalition that will break instantly if they tried to push this through.
vaylian · 6h ago
Which country is that, if you don't mind sharing. Are there some articles about the demonstrations that you can share?
IlikeKitties · 10h ago
> Fast-forward to February 2025, Poland tried to find a better compromise by making the scanning of encrypted chats voluntary instead of mandatory and classified as "prevention."
Okay hear me out, for public or semi public chats, having a tool to force content scans to prevent people randomly posting csam into the channel might be an idea worth considering. Ask any Matrix Admin about that issue...
squigz · 10h ago
You know, I've been on the Internet 20+ years and have been to some shady corners of it... but nowhere seems to have such a CSAM problem as Matrix and its friends apparently do. Why would that be?
jeroenhd · 10h ago
I've seen it on the fediverse. Thanks to fediverse servers copying images to a local cache the moment something gets posted, hundreds or even thousands of servers started mirroring child porn because one dickhead liked to see the world burn.
My guess is that the source of the problem is that you can easily sign up for a service if it doesn't validate your phone number like every other messenger with a decent following does. If XMPP gained popularity again outside of corporate networks that use it without knowing, we'd also see it there, probably.
Matrix also seems to have gathered a following in the particularly unsavoury parts of a few *chan websites which probably doesn't help.
squigz · 9h ago
> My guess is that the source of the problem is that you can easily sign up for a service if it doesn't validate your phone number like every other messenger with a decent following does.
This is still relatively new and it's not as ubiquitous as say email verification. So I don't see that as being a primary cause of whatever the underlying issue is. Not to mention, I have to imagine it's never been easier to acquire phone numbers to abuse.
> but nowhere seems to have such a CSAM problem as Matrix
Well Tor, i2p, freenet etc. are mostly csam anyway
qwertox · 5h ago
I've believed for a long time that if they want to do this shit, they should do it first on the civil servants, politicians included. They, their spouses and their kids. For a timespan of 5 years.
And allow any citizen to try to hack their 100% secure backdoors without any fear of consequences.
It after 5 years everything is OK, that is, no data has been leaked, no information access abuse has occurred, the test group has not been affected psychologically in a negative way by this potential surveillance, they should present the results, including how many criminals and deranged people have been caught and imprisoned through the direct help of this technology.
Then set it up for a direct vote by the people.
Else they should just fuck off with their ideas.
44za12 · 10h ago
Honestly, the fact that “scan everyone’s encrypted messages” keeps coming back like a bad sequel says a lot about how governments see privacy, as a speed bump, not a right. Every time this proposal pops up, it’s wrapped in “think of the children” language, but the end result is always the same: less security for everyone, more power for people who already have too much. At some point, you have to wonder if the real goal is to make everyone so paranoid they just stop communicating altogether. Here’s hoping enough people still care to push back—otherwise, we’ll all be talking in code again, and not the fun kind.
Kim_Bruning · 9h ago
Maybe constitutional amendments in the member states/ ECHR amendment might help? Article 8 [1] goes some of the way , but has some clear weaknesses.
We do have a right to secrecy of correspondence in most member nations, it's kind of silly that we don't have a strict equivalent for phones or computers yet, despite the fact that most people hardly send letters anymore.
In some member state secrecy of correspondence also covers phone calls and any other communication. So the rules are already there. It is just that totalitarians do not want to respect them.
ingohelpinger · 9h ago
the fact these eurocrats come back over and over, even though its clear the majority is against it, just proves that it doesn't matter what the bulk of the population wants. funny how this works.
lifeinthevoid · 9h ago
I don't know how it will go in practice, but next to the obvious mass surveillance by the EU itself, the EU also has a couple of Russian vasal states in its ranks. Great idea you guys!
Havoc · 8h ago
> The Danish Parliament has not yet disclosed the contents of the new compromises.
This combination of mass surveillance and secrecy is downright toxic
mortarion · 10h ago
Nothing will come of this. Germany, for some reason, really doesn't like the idea of monitoring citizens messages.
Anything that eventually passes will be extremely toothless.
freilanzer · 10h ago
German politicians love surveillance. I guarantee the CDU and AfD would immediately support this.
collyw · 9h ago
The AfD would support it? They seem like one of the more freedom focused parties in Germany.
fwn · 7h ago
The AfD came out against chat control in a 2023 press release via one of their MPs. Their 2025 platform reads well at first glance (against surveillance, pro open source, against censorship, in favor of individual data sovereignty), but it is relatively vague and feels a bit buzzwordy.
In addition to that, the AfD is not known for being predictable.
The party lacks a strong institutional core. It is shaped by competing factions, with a weak internal agenda-setting process and a tendency to align with whatever the decision maker closest to making a statement currently perceives as fitting their brand. Positions often shift as a result.
For example, they made a strong commitment to protecting cash, then later pushed for a mandatory payment card system for refugees, explicitly to tighten financial control over that group. In practice, that dramatically helps to normalize financial control through payment systems.
So, TL;DR: no one really knows. They’re inconsistent and hard to forecast.
lifestyleguru · 9h ago
They equally don't like their private messages being scanned as they like to peek at others'. Personally don't look at mine but my job is looking at yours, nothing personal.
dinfinity · 10h ago
I am ambivalent about news like this.
On one hand it is a terrible proposal that deserves exposure to generate pushback.
On the other hand it is still just a proposal, of which there are many (stupid ones) which never see the light of day. This still needs to pass the European Parliament (which is generally opposed to this, not in the least because it is very unpopular under EU citizens). Even then the chances of it surviving a challenge in the courts (of which there will be many) are tiny.
procaryote · 10h ago
If you don't fight proposals because they're "just proposals" you pretty much give up
dinfinity · 8h ago
False. If the Commission accepts it, there is still time and room to fight it. Furthermore, your logic would also apply if some random person on the street proposed this.
My point is that legislation can exist in a variety of stages. In the extreme case where we get stressed and angry at every proposal that any politician comes up with, we waste our energy instead of letting the specific systems introduced and thought up to mitigate issues with such proposals do the job efficiently.
Said otherwise: In some cases it effectively becomes crying wolf and makes people numb to and averse to hearing about it. As said, though: I am ambivalent towards news like this. In some cases we need to 'tell, tell, tell' to get the point through. It's a fine line, I think.
zelphirkalt · 10h ago
Only needs to succeed once. It only takes some incapable judges, who don't have any idea how encryption works, and of those I am certain there are many. Once such a thing gets through, it would take time to be reversed, if at all possible.
Whoever puts forth such ideas should be the first to show all their private communication. It shouldn't just be for the common citizens. How quickly the idea would be dropped ...
john_the_writer · 8h ago
I've often countered the "if you've got nothing to hide" by taking out a bit of paper, and asking for their social and email passwords. "nothing to hide."
sharpshadow · 9h ago
Scanning revealed there is potentially forbidden material on your phone what then?
iwontberude · 10h ago
No thanks
jeffhuys · 10h ago
I mean, you can say that, but the unelected will decide for us.
Oh when it was just for "easier international trade". What a good one.
iwontberude · 10h ago
We will just keep not using platforms they control and moving whenever they do.
saubeidl · 10h ago
While I also strongly disagree with this plan, everyone involved is elected.
The whole "unelected" angle is europhobic propaganda.
collyw · 9h ago
How do I vote Ursula out?
saubeidl · 9h ago
By voting out the conservative governments that appointed her - the same way you vote the US president out by voting out the electors that appointed him.
asyx · 10h ago
They are not unelected. They might be appointed but the parliament is elected and can block this. Go vote in EU elections. A parliament that is not full of conservatives can block this.
raron · 4h ago
> Go vote in EU elections.
EP elections can be fairly useless, because you don't vote for parties of the EP, just some local parties who may all sit in the side of the EP you don't like.
PeterStuer · 10h ago
The EU is not some US from 30 years ago. It is not "conservatives" that push these totalitarian proposals over here. Look at the DSA voting record.
Digital Services Act is totalitarian? The one that specifically doesn't do anything to anyone that has under 10% of all EU citizens as monthly active users?
I swear this website never ceases to amaze me.
NekkoDroid · 7h ago
Do explain how the DSA is even remotely related to this, I am really interested in the rational behind this entire statement.
saubeidl · 9h ago
The DSA is not totalitarian, has nothing to do with this proposal and is generally a good thing. Please don't muddy the waters.
ath3nd · 7h ago
Good luck, I am using Signal.
julkali · 9h ago
This kind of legislation has been proposed so many times at EU and national level, and will fail like always, at the lates at the European Court of Justice for violating human rights.
The EU has always been 90 days from passing mass surveliance for the last decade. Until member states start actually backing this these articles are nothing but click bait.
So getting upset that people talk about it when it gets tabled once again is illogical and unjustifiable.
If they look like they support a very unpopular decision a big public backlash can definitely make them reconsider. Depending on how secure they are in the national politics.
For example why do you think Denmark is submitting this now? Because the somewhat right wing gov in Poland that vetoed it last time is no longer in power. Instead Mr Europe (Tusk) is the prime minister. If EU beurocracy was embodied in a person it would be him. He was the president of the commission. He was the vice-leader of the EU People's Party - the biggest party in the EU parliament. He had his first political party funded by German SPD in cash... He also lost last parliamentary election in Poland, but still came out on top by making a coalition with three smaller parties (some say one was made exactly for that purpose few years ago). He will for sure do everything in his power to have this passed.
But his government is a minority one, and at least two of these three coalition parties are mainly supported by young people from large cities. And those were the people that undermined it last time by demonstrating (believe it or not the previous mildly right wing gov was not entirely opposed to having more control over people, but they had to quickly change their mind and veto it after mass demonstrations). So I'm hoping there is no chance in hell it'll pass.
Also, if it did, there is no chance it will be signed into the law by the current president or not be deemed unconstitutional by the constitutional Court... The EU and Tusk have claimed the court is "illegitimate" for years, but that is a long story. So in short, pushing this issue despite strong opposition definitely has a potential to blow up Polish politics. No PM leading a minority gov would do something like this intentionally while his party is loosing popular support every month.
The situation here in Denmark is dire: nobody in the Danish media reports on it, so everybody just shrugs. I've gone out of my way to educate my coworkers and most are unaware many members of our parliament want this. The number of parties that support it outnumber those who don't. Writing to our representatives is met with silence.
Everyone looking to Denmark as a model state should beware what happens when you have a population with such high trust in its government: the roots of autocracy are allowed to grow unfettered.
I'm not complaining that much about it -- you have a fantastic social security system, low inequality, high pay and high taxes, leading to a happy and well educated population and great food (no upf!) -- but it is a vision of the 1960s nanny state that really does think it knowd best.
True like not banning bestiality until 2015....
https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-32411241
The Danish national television made a documentary, there's also a short article: https://www.dr.dk/om-dr/programmer-og-koncerter/candy-film-d... you can probably just run it through Google translate. The worst part is that it took like 10 - 11 years to fix.
A lot of the stuff the government registeres about an individual is required to ensure that things runs as smoothly and efficiently as they do, even if Danes will frequently complain that the government is anything but smooth and efficient. There was always an understanding and laws protecting that data from being misused. Those rules have slowly been eroding over the past 20 years or so, by increasingly zealots politicians seeking to be "tough on crime and misuse of government services (i.e. brown people not working and living on social welfare)".
Illegal access to information about citizens are pretty frequent, yet our politicians don't seem to ever wanting to back down from collection and analysing data. They are either not smart enough to see the dangers or they are deliberately attempting to create a surveillance state.
Title tries to scare while content says it's just a topic being reintroduced. If anybody knows EU laws and is aware that to introduce such change all states need to agree... then I just wish DK good luck until it's anyhow confirmed at _all_ not many states do support this.
I come from different EU state and I first time hear this is big topic, seems then it's not such a big topic outside Denmark maybe?
Denmark is currently one of the nicest places you can find in the world. If that’s what happens when you trust the government then sign me up!
PS. I know the situation can quickly deteriorate if you’re not constantly monitoring what the government does and agree with OP on that. Just thought it was incredibly naive to try to make the point that this can lead to an autocracy while showing one of the most well functioning democracies in the world. The USA seems like a much better example, and even then compared to most countries in the world, as you can see by the amount of people trying to move there, it’s still a pretty damn nice place to go.
Like that?
https://cphpost.dk/2024-05-05/news/climate/danish-companies-...
>>Danish companies breach EU law, dump toxic waste into sea – Environment Ministry waves it through
Or that?
https://eos.org/thelandslideblog/nordic-waste-1
>>The Nordic Waste landslide scandal in Denmark
Maybe how about that? (50 years ago)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K--KsfrEhPI
>>How Denmark forced young women in Greenland to get IUDs
And who still take away the babies of Greenlandic mothers in Denmark.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/jun/29/controv...
Awareness is good but there is a fine line between awareness of specific politicians that suck and just misrepresenting the facts.
It's not "only Denmark". There are just a handful of countries in the EU opposing Chat Control, not because they care about privacy.
To use a real world example take this "EU deal" that Trump did. Everyone is talking like its already taken effect. But the reality is the EU just handshake agreed to this, but at the end of the day all of the member states have to rattify it. And if states dont or if there are arguements made the whole thing gets tossed.
I just wish people would say that they dont understand how the EU works. At some point some Dutch mayor is going to say that the inernet should be free, and "tech journalists" are going to write articles talking about how all EU citizens will have Fibre cables connected to them at all times.
What this person is writing is correct. The reality of EU politics is anything but democratic. The EU is crowned by an unelected commission that does not serve the interests of the governed.
The background is pretty machiavellistic, though. There is a lot of money and influence to be managed. It is no secret that Ursula von der Leyen got her first mandate basically from Merkel, a reward for being her loyal subordinate for years.
It is thus as democratically legitimized as any ministerial role in any government, or as the US presidency.
Please do not spread disinformation.
The only elected body in the EU is the EU parliament which has practically no powers when compared to the commission. It can only vote on what the commission proposes, it cannot make its own proposals. It cannot overrule the commission. And the commission can make rules and regulations of its own, without involving the parliament. The most the parliament can do is hold up the process a little.
The EU is not democratic by any sensible measure. "But there is an election somewhere in the process" doesn't make a democracy. Many dictatorships, communist regimes and even monarchies do have an election somewhere in the process. The emperor has no clothes, and the EU isn't democratic. Any timid initiative to make it so has died ages ago. The last straw was the trumped up non-election of von-der-Leyen. Actually, the parliament should have filled her job with its candidate, as was promised before the election. After election day, that promise which was intended to introduce at least a whiff of democratic accountability, was instantly forgotten. von der Leyen was instated instead of the parliaments candidate by a back-room deal.
The EU is governed by backroom deals and is extremely opaque. Adding to everything you said: there is no accountability, there is little presence of EU matters in newspapers, EU leaders hardly even attempt to communicate with their people (practically only von der Leyen or António Costa make public speeches).
Just compare: you surely know the names of all or almost all ministers of your country. Do you know the names of even 2 out of the 27 commissioners? Scrutiny of their doings and the laws that are proposed appear in news regularly. Does such scrutiny exist of EU institutions?
It's not a democracy.
Matter of fact, you're commenting on a news article about EU happenings right now.
If one is only the slightest bit informed, one has probably heard of Kaja Kallas, the foreign affairs commissioner or Maroš Šefčovič, the trade comissioner.
These are not some big secret names, but public figures with well-articulated positions that regularly hold press conferences.
Is there any democratic power by your standards? You are moving the goal posts so far I don't think anything fits your narrow definition.
While there have been a tiny numbers of faithless electors in the past, they have never influenced the outcome of a presidential election. Furthermore, about 80% of electors are from states that have laws that require their electors to vote for the candidate who wins the state's popular vote.
The US is actually more democratic than e.g. Germany, because the president is elected by the people (though indirectly), not by parliament. Therefore a political oligarchy could be prevented, because the majority in parliament and the president can check on each other, and the president is more accountable to the voters than to parliament.
Generally there is a sliding scale of course, but the less directly officials are elected, the less democratic a country is. A common example would be a soviet (engl. "council") republic, which isn't considered democratic at all, even though it has tons of elections: Each factory/town/village elects a local workers's council, which in turn elects a county council, which elects a regional council, which elects a state council, which elects a national council, which elects the council of ministers, which elects the chairman. Tons of filters that make absolutely certain that the will of the party and state always supercedes the will of the people.
The German president is mainly a figurehead with limited power. The office was stripped down after WWII.
The real power lies with the ministers, who can issue absolute orders that have to be obeyed without question. One of many results is that German prosecutors cannot be trusted with issuing EU wide arrest warrants and had the ability stripped from them the moment it was challenged in court.
The US electoral college is an historical artifact that simply rubber stamps the votes of the States. The member states' heads of government make the decision themselves! The equivalent would be the electoral college simply voting for the president themselves.
Jesus christ.
That is... exactly what they are doing?
What's more the Commission is more than one person, unlike the US presidency.
Do you call ministers in your country unelected? Would you call the US president unelected?
I agree the Comission doesn't serve the interests of the governed, but that's because the people keep voting against their own interests and vote in right-wing governments, which in turn appoints a right-wing commission, which then does the right-wing thing of selling out its people.
It is not a structural EU fault, it is the electorate that's to blame.
Don't know about emptysongglass's country, but in France, ministers are absolutely unelected. The president is directly elected, who then appoints the prime minister, who then "proposes" the other ministers of his government. There is no strict rule by which the prime minister is chosen, only a "habit" to choose from the "winning camp", which was not respected by Macron these last two times. There's also no rule for how the ministers are picked. As you can imagine, this is largely backroom deals.
The last two prime ministers have all been deemed unsatisfactory by the parties with the most votes in the last legislative elections and by those who voted for them (people voted directly for their representatives in the lower chamber of parliament). These prime ministers were from parties that scored lower in the elections.
Once such EU-wide regulations are fully passed (incl. the EP), the countries have to implement them in their law. Sure, they can drag their feet, or there actually might be a real showdown, for example, if the German Constitutional Court says that this is against the Grundgesetz and that it does not recognize supremacy of EU law over itself / the German Constitution. If the same happens in Poland, there will be extra drama added.
But at the same time, at least half of the EU, countries with negligible tech sector, will happily pass that legislation without any significant friction, because a) think of the children, b) monitoring opposition and dissent, yay!, c) we have to, because Brussels said so, d) the lawmakers know shit about encryption and tech and they will be exempt from monitoring anyway, so encryption is something that is only used by criminals and terrorists and if you have nothing to hide etc. etc.
At which point you have the surveillance infrastructure installed and in operation across half the continent, and with elections changing governments, it will spread.
Our main protection used to be that small countries like Slovenia or Malta don't have the weight to push Apple or Google to introduce deliberate holes in their software.
If the European Commission joins the push, that is a completely different pressure.
Just look at the Brexit vote for an example of how little people understand the EU and how it works.
The EU parliament is fake, and the unelected commission has become a pathetic clown show. Their latest VP addition, Antonio Costa, had to be removed from office in Portugal because he was too corrupt. But good enough for leadership of the EU commission.
They had a violent rhetoric, prolonged artificially to this day the Ukraine war and watched the population being slaughtered without sending any troops. So instead of loosing a few territory, the Ukrainian population is now dead demographically. If you prolong enough a war and the population is wreaked, the war is lost. This is what happened in WWI.
Just in the last few days they managed to be humiliated by both the US and China. China went so far to park them in a bus, arrive with no welcoming and have a walk of shame with in silence on a faded carpet.
The EU was about democracy, peace and prosperity. Today it is is pursuing the opposite objectives.
Downvote me if you want, I care more about staying alive than any internet karma points.
Do you know what's even funnier with the UK? Parliament has most of the power
Ironically, my commandline skills may yet save me :)
though, because lawful intercept is also a thing in EU, its stupid to assume they do not already have access if they want it.
despite not having 'dragnet' surveillance , they have effective and deep targeted surveillance and laws that allow them to do that fairly freely.... (most countries are more strict with their own citizens, but then its handy to have allies to do it for u -_-... wonderful world!)
It keeps us aware of how stupid the powers that be are.
-> Discord/Google/Meta/etc are already scanning the private chats for pictures, and they didn't wait for a law.
To fix pedophiles, supporters of terrorism and gang members, there is a more radical solution: fund justice and police so dangerous people can be put in jail (or kill them if that's something you think is right).
Once this is done, there is no need anymore to monitor conversations outside of current scope.
Though, justice is not fair in practice, so there will be collateral innocent victims (like with privacy invasion) :/
things are working: why do we pay so much for IT/security or XYZ tool, we don't need it.
things are on fire: we pay so much money for IT/security or XYZ tool and it didn't help us
As the article states "According to the former MEP for the German Pirate Party, Patrick Breyer, Denmark crucially needs to manage to convince Germany of its proposed text. The new government has not yet taken a position at the time of writing."
And since the current German government is bound to take the most idiotic and destructive path it is basically assured.
Not true. The truth is that Chat Control has returned several times already and the majority of the EU states were actually always for, but a blocking minority has been reached each time - barely so.
Worryingly, one of the blocking minority countries used to be Germany, where privacy-minded smaller parties (Greens, FDP) are no longer in government. The new government hasn't declared its position yet. If it switches to yes, then the remnants of our privacy are kaput just like that, and the only hope will be in the ECHR, or possibly (sigh) in Trump's tech bros angrily vetoing it from abroad.
So, no one freak from Denmark, but a concerted, repeated effort.
There is an even worse set of measures in the phase of preparation, ProtectEU, which would mandate backdoors in everything under the pain of prison for vendors, introduce mandatory data retention and ban non-logging VPNs.
Fuck, I don't want to live in a China with a blue flag instead of red. This is absolutely dystopian.
Don't downplay the danger. Don't spread disinformation. This isn't a random shot from a random weirdo in Denmark. This is a seriously driven EU-wide attempt to destroy meaningful encryption with a lot of proponents and backers. And the current EC chair, Ursula von der Leyen, has a history of promoting such measures, that is why Germans call her Zensursula.
https://www.patrick-breyer.de/en/
Take a look across his page and his social network media, he had nice maps for each round, so hopefully they are still there.
I think it's too late. People already showed they'd loudly support this if propagandized enough like during COVID times where the most draconian and anti constitutional of policies were enacted, literally following and lobbied by China.
Unless people recognize that they did a terrible thing in supporting covid policies instead of burying their head under the sand or persisting in the ridiculous propaganda about anti-vaxxers and disinformation, they're always going to be easily manipulated. The same goes for the "let's invade new country because 'dictator/terrorism/grave threat to our western way of life'".
Are we the baddies is a rethorical question at this point.
Also, anti constitutional and anti human rights is wrong no matter if it's temporal or not.
But hey, you supported it, now deal with the fallout. Temporary like the war on terror. Give me a break.
And I think this is partially caused by fear of possible backlash.
Here the wolf is clearly visible.
When they really come, people won’t bother reading the news.
Ironically when Apple introduced their solution it was actually better than what we have now. It was interesting to watch people lose their minds because they didn't understand how the current or proposed system worked.
Current system everything can be decrypted on the cloud and is scanned for CSAM by all ISPs/service providers.
Apple wanted the device to scan for CSAM and if it got flagged, it allowed the file to be decrypted on the cloud for a human to check it (again, what happens now).
If it didn't get flagged then it stayed encrypted on the cloud and no one could look at it. This not only was a better protection for your data, it has a massive reduction in server costs.
CSAM is also a list of hashes for some of the worst CP video/images out there. It doesn't read anything, just hash matching.
The chance of mismatch is so incredibly small to be almost non-existent.
Even so the current CSAM guidelines require a human to review the results and require multiple hits before you are even flagged. Again this is what is happening now.
Personally I'm against having any agency the ability to read private messages, while at the same time I fully agree with what CSAM is trying to do.
Realistically if countries want to read encrypted messages, they can already do so. Some do too. The fact that the EU is debating it is a good thing.
Once you have an established mechanism for "fighting crime", "don't use it to fight that type of crime" is not a position that has any chance of prevailing in the political landscape - see also all the cases of national security wiretaps being used against petty druggies.
What, the cloud scanning of user photos was a good idea for you? The private companyt deciding what is good or bad idea? The automated surveillance that could lead to people wrongfully accused idea?
> f it didn't get flagged then it stayed encrypted on the cloud and no one could look at it.
If Apple can decrypt your data when they find a match, they can decrypt ALL your data. Who says it will be used for good? Do you trust a private company this much?
How? Are you implying adynchronous and synchronous encryption is broken? Because last time I checked since Snowden our encryption is basically the one single thing in the whole concept of the internet that has been done very right, with forward secrecy and long term security in mind. AFAIK there are no signs that someone or something has been able to break it.
Also, the solutions you present do imply that someone already has the private key to decrypt. Sure, they'll say they'll just decrypt if your a bad person, but the definition of a bad person changes from government to government (see USA), and from CEO to CEO. Encryption should and mostly is built on zero trust and it only works with zero trust. Scanning, and risking the privacy of billions and billions of messages by having the key to read them because there have been some bad actors is fighting a fly with a bazooka. Which sounds funny overkill, but, fun fact, it also just doesn't work. It destroys a lot, and gains nothing.
I don't have a better solution for the problem. But this solution is definitely the wrong one.
A couple of guys with 5$ wrenches can be pretty effective at extracting cryptographic secrets.
That is like saying that Guantanamo can defeat religious terrorism. In individual cases, yes, on the whole, absolutely not.
I agree that the discussion is evolving the bill every time and there are always good amounts of feedback and comments.
It’s a bit annoying when tech websites don’t always update themselves with the latest changes, just labelling it ChatControl doesn’t mean it’s the same policy that was discussed 5 years ago. It makes for good click bait titles, but the technical nuances are missing.
For example, one would be interested to read a comparison between the “privacy” of a tool matching photos against a database of signatures vs. say Apple’s performative privacy in the Photos app or the iCloud + chatGPT/Apple Intelligence mix.
And of course does this really solve the real problem of child exploitation? No it doesn't. It allows performative folk working for NGOs to feel like they've done something while children are still being abused and it is being covered up or not even investigated as is so common today.
Improving policing and investigatory standards is where this should stop. We already have RIPA.
All this does is create the expectation that a surveillance dragnet is acceptable. It is not.
The list presumably contains CSAM hashes. However, it could also include hashes for other types of content.
AFAIK the specific scope at any point in time is not something that can be fully evaluated by independent third parties, and there is no obvious reason why this list could not be extended to cover different types of content in the future.
Once it is in place, why not search for documents that are known to facilitate terrorism? What about human trafficking? Drug trafficking? Antisemitic memes spring to mind. Or maybe memes critical of some government, a war, etc.
This is because, despite the CSAM framing, it is essentially a censorship/surveillance infrastructure. One that is neutral with regard to content.
Selling drugs on the Internet is also illegal. Selling them in real life too. How many people are doing it still? Doesn't seem very effective, this solution.
There's lots of little privileges like this that only seem to apply to politicians. Like, lifelong retirement after just one year of work in parliament and government provided tax-free apartments in central Copenhagen.
The argument for the latter is that it is needed for them to be near the work, but if a private company provides the same to their employees the employee will be taxed by its full value.
Granted, it's less corruption than other places, but definitely still corruption.
Also something something children something terrorism something something safety, whatever makes the uninformed public feel like this is something that'll benefit them.
I think it was Encrochat devices that booted into a fairly vanilla looking OS, and there was another platform where it was hidden in something like a calculator app.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EncroChat
I mean, maybe that has something to do with it?
The rise of totalitairianism in the EU is very real.
The best way I can describe my social circles in the US and EU is that in the US, we still have "principled freedom", where there (still) is a majority of people that understand the original ideas of the founding fathers, and can imagine that things could theoretically be different (the word used for this is "tyranny", which sounded super weird when I first came here).
In EU, I see a total disconnect with any foundational principles or values. Worse is that the population would 100% disagree with you on this, but when you probe "what are these values and why are they there," you get mostly circular reasoning based on some neo-liberal viewpoints. Furthermore, people just can't imagine ever losing their freedoms. This makes Europe essentially like the frog in the pot on the stove. If you mention the word "tyranny" to Europeans, they basically think you're a crackpot.
I have seen things change a teeny bit with the war in Ukraine, where folks get at least somewhat concerned, but the concerns are still about an external boogyman. Nowhere is there any realization that big government, with a lot of unelected bureaucrats, typically becomes the enemy of the people because "power corrupts."
The tyranny is much closer there than in the EU.
That is of course a gross misrepresentation of what is happening (and I'm being charitable here).
It is my hope and belief that any such mistakes would be swiftly corrected, and that the undocumented people that are impacted by this policy are treated with dignity and respect, while still encouraging legal immigration into this country. Furthermore I would expect that the odds of a US citizen or otherwise legal resident to be arrested and deported to be virtually zero.
Then they came for the legal immigrants they didn't like and I did not speak out, because I was not a legal immigrant. [0]
Then they came for their political enemies [1] and I did not speak up, because I was not their political enemy.
Then they came for me - and there was noone left to speak for me.
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/01/trump-zohran...
[1] https://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/rnc-2016-lock-her-up-...
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Re being dragged off: https://www.al.com/news/mobile/2025/05/alabama-worker-says-i...
Re torture: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/alligator-alcatraz-flor...
I'm not going to play this game of me investing my time in random links posted to this discussion, but as a once time exception:
- The first link claims a man got detained where ICE thought he had a fake ID but where he was actually a citizen. From the article: "It is not clear where the construction is located and efforts to find contact information for Venegas were not successful. Efforts to reach ICE representatives for comment were not immediately successful." So we have an unsubstantiated claim in an online publication. Is it true? Maybe. If it is, then the worst claimed here is that someone one detained. Not even arrested, let alone anything worse than that. This certainly does not rise to the claims you're making. If the article is true, this is likely an operational mistake that was corrected soon afterwards.
- The second link claims that the mosquitoes in a new temporary detention facility amount to torture. Do I like the optics of the facility? No. Do I want people in detention to get treated with dignity? Of course. The claim of torture is quite extraordinary though. If the facility is not up to standards, I have trust in the system that it will get closed.
Regarding the second point, you purposefully picked the least offensive part (the mosquitoes, as opposed to the starvation, the sleep deprivation, the quarters tigher than in concentration camps), to misrepresent what is happening here.
It is exactly behavioral patterns like these that make it hard to assume good faith argument.
> Regarding the first point, you are leaning heavily on euphemisms ("detained") to make your case.
No, "detained" is a precise legal term that is used in the article in the intended legal way. It's a step prior to arrest, where an officer has stopped you for some probably cause. When detained, you are not allowed to leave, while the officer checks what's going on. The result can be that you are free to go, or that things escalate to an arrest (you are taken in custody).
> This will catch the x% of lone wolf terrorists who are too mentally unwell to use encryption and too unwell to hide their intentions.
> Without this, the relative increase in terrorism will cause strongmen to get elected who will just enact even more severe surveillance, among many other bad things.
> So it's not a choice between surveillance and no surveillance. It's a choice between relative levels of badness.
> This will also catch real criminals by listening to their close family members who have worse OPSEC than the criminals.
The criminals aren't the masterminds people portrait in the movies.
How about the criminals that are not yet caught
Also, criminals usually have poor operational security—far from perfect. The seriousness of the offense isn't related to the quality of their opsec.
Regulators and law enforcement are generally rational. They may be short-sighted, but they often have reasonable explanations for things you might dismiss as stupid.
That sucks, CSAM sucks, emotional regulation sucks, and as a society, we don't know how to manage allowing kids online. In fact we don't even know, what we'd like. From a political/policy standpoint, that's the challenge of the next 20 years.
The sad truth is that law enforcement doesn't have the resources to go after a huge chunk of the cases - particularly before anything serious happens.
For this reason giving them even more power won't markedly increase prevention, but will introduce more cases of people abusing said power. Ultimately the government is run by people, and people are fallible:
https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2013/09/loveint-given...
> Why are some of these people so obsessed with reading everyone's chats?
Having worked with some of the people in law enforcement heavily pushing this, it generally does come from child safety concerns and the overwhelming amount of CSAM sent via encrypted means.
Personally, I don't believe that it will ever be restricted to serious crimes and the potential for abuse is infinite, so I don't believe it is justifiable, but child sexual abuse is a real and enormous problem that causes untold harm and suffering, so we have to find a balance.
I wonder if anyone believes those measure are actually against childporn.
The important thing also is that this total massive invasion of privacy won't be for all. You don't get gov transparency but the opposite. The asymmetry of information only increases that power to oppress.
If I want to casually keep in touch with a friend, I am supposed to have the following options:
- SMS/RCS: no need for an app but is controlled
- WhatsApp: no good to many reasons
- Signal: how can you believe it is not controlled once it becomes the mandatory app in the US Gov.
- Matrix: great but you need to self host a server, create accounts, etc.
- SimpleX: very interesting, but centralised and I feel it might just be the next Signal. Might be a solution since you can exit at some point by self hosting a server and I guess have alternative implementations.
- Delta chat: great but I guess email fall into the mass surveillance target.
Now most people do not have crazy security requirements and just want to be able to send a simple text message to a friend and be notified instantly without participating in mass surveillance. So why even using a formal Chat app that will be target by a regulation like Chat Control or kicked out of the App store?
Something like Gotify [0] or ntfy [1] are almost enough for most users. It has the whole free from Google and Apple push notification system figured out. You would just need to modify a bit the app to exchange keys with a QR code for individual topics (that you would use as contact or groups).
In a way we just need MQTT servers, a client with reliable push notifications and a manual key exchange mechanism. That would be really hard for govs to target.
- [0] https://gotify.net/
- [1] https://ntfy.sh/
cryptography?
Go even further: Meshtastic (https://meshtastic.org/). P2P E2EE texting, primarily via LoRa mesh (a mesh of long-range low-bandwidth direct radio connections) plus MQTT backup, with surprisingly nice UX even for non-techies. You can message people directly, or create encrypted groups too.
In effect, you broadcast your message (encrypted) via LoRa (travels a couple of kilometers through apartment blocks in a big city, or up to hundreds of kilometers in open countryside with line-of-sight), and then anybody else with meshtastic rebroadcasts it, up to 3 hops by default. Works OK for local chat through normal nodes, or really well if somebody within a few kilometers has a router on a roof/big hill nearby (map of opted-into-mapping public nodes: https://meshmap.net/ - IME that's about 10% of actual nodes). Optionally uses MQTT when there's any kind of internet connection available so you can chat long-range too (there's a public MQTT server available, or you can run your own) although that's not really the main use case.
No paid intermediaries or services involved, doesn't require a cell plan or internet or anything, even if the whole world collapses, you just keep on texting (for as long as you have battery).
Requires either a tiny radio gateway (e.g. https://lilygo.cc/products/t-echo-meshtastic) that you connect through with your phone via BT, or you can get a standalone device (https://lilygo.cc/products/t-deck-plus-1) but <$100 in either case. Low-bandwidth though: only text & GPS, no pictures or audio. And obviously, this is pretty deep in the weird nerd shit so it might be a hard sell for your grandparents, and by its nature it's mostly useful for the local area chat anyway. Perfect for trips to low connectivity zones though (hiking, skiing, etc).
Now the most exiting project in that space IMHO is Reticulum because you can transparently mix transports: any radio (incl LoRa), TCP, UDP, etc. [0]
Their Sideband app [1] is not as polished as Meshtastic but you can start over the standard Internet, or I2P, yggdrasil and slowly introduce LoRa among your group of friends over time and if necessary.
Their LXMF messaging format is also interesting.
Those people are really doing a fantastic work.
- [0] https://reticulum.network/manual/interfaces.html
- [1] https://github.com/markqvist/Sideband
- [2] https://github.com/markqvist/LXMF
Isn't this a good sign? When the US Gov has enough trust to use it internally and officials are already using it for their communications, would this not mean that the service is truly encrypted.
They could have some sort of switch for it, but the frontend is open-source and that's where the encryption happens.
Now, at the moment, I don't have a good english language source, but I am sure someone else could provide one?
Here is a german language one[0], from netzpolitik.org, who follow chat control for years now an have many articles going in depth about this. I am sure you could use translation software to read it until someone provides a better source. (And if you have not heard of this, you should!)
And while someone already linked to patrick breyers website[1] which has a good overview, I do so again so maybe more people will see it. This thing is not new, but it is also not easily ignored and everyone should be informed whats going on here. They will try to pass this again and again since they have done for years now and it's mostly been close calls until now.
[0] https://netzpolitik.org/2023/anlasslose-massenueberwachung-r...
[1] https://www.patrick-breyer.de/en/posts/chat-control/
I think it's probably a good thing to explore a wider range of ideas, even if many of the ideas suck and end up being scrapped.
If you look at actual history of Chat Control: it always had majority support, and it was always a blocking minority that stopped it.
Okay hear me out, for public or semi public chats, having a tool to force content scans to prevent people randomly posting csam into the channel might be an idea worth considering. Ask any Matrix Admin about that issue...
My guess is that the source of the problem is that you can easily sign up for a service if it doesn't validate your phone number like every other messenger with a decent following does. If XMPP gained popularity again outside of corporate networks that use it without knowing, we'd also see it there, probably.
Matrix also seems to have gathered a following in the particularly unsavoury parts of a few *chan websites which probably doesn't help.
This is still relatively new and it's not as ubiquitous as say email verification. So I don't see that as being a primary cause of whatever the underlying issue is. Not to mention, I have to imagine it's never been easier to acquire phone numbers to abuse.
> but nowhere seems to have such a CSAM problem as Matrix
Well Tor, i2p, freenet etc. are mostly csam anyway
And allow any citizen to try to hack their 100% secure backdoors without any fear of consequences.
It after 5 years everything is OK, that is, no data has been leaked, no information access abuse has occurred, the test group has not been affected psychologically in a negative way by this potential surveillance, they should present the results, including how many criminals and deranged people have been caught and imprisoned through the direct help of this technology.
Then set it up for a direct vote by the people.
Else they should just fuck off with their ideas.
We do have a right to secrecy of correspondence in most member nations, it's kind of silly that we don't have a strict equivalent for phones or computers yet, despite the fact that most people hardly send letters anymore.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_8_of_the_European_Conv...
This combination of mass surveillance and secrecy is downright toxic
Anything that eventually passes will be extremely toothless.
In addition to that, the AfD is not known for being predictable.
The party lacks a strong institutional core. It is shaped by competing factions, with a weak internal agenda-setting process and a tendency to align with whatever the decision maker closest to making a statement currently perceives as fitting their brand. Positions often shift as a result.
For example, they made a strong commitment to protecting cash, then later pushed for a mandatory payment card system for refugees, explicitly to tighten financial control over that group. In practice, that dramatically helps to normalize financial control through payment systems.
So, TL;DR: no one really knows. They’re inconsistent and hard to forecast.
On one hand it is a terrible proposal that deserves exposure to generate pushback.
On the other hand it is still just a proposal, of which there are many (stupid ones) which never see the light of day. This still needs to pass the European Parliament (which is generally opposed to this, not in the least because it is very unpopular under EU citizens). Even then the chances of it surviving a challenge in the courts (of which there will be many) are tiny.
My point is that legislation can exist in a variety of stages. In the extreme case where we get stressed and angry at every proposal that any politician comes up with, we waste our energy instead of letting the specific systems introduced and thought up to mitigate issues with such proposals do the job efficiently.
Said otherwise: In some cases it effectively becomes crying wolf and makes people numb to and averse to hearing about it. As said, though: I am ambivalent towards news like this. In some cases we need to 'tell, tell, tell' to get the point through. It's a fine line, I think.
Whoever puts forth such ideas should be the first to show all their private communication. It shouldn't just be for the common citizens. How quickly the idea would be dropped ...
Oh when it was just for "easier international trade". What a good one.
The whole "unelected" angle is europhobic propaganda.
EP elections can be fairly useless, because you don't vote for parties of the EP, just some local parties who may all sit in the side of the EP you don't like.
Digital Services Act:
https://howtheyvote.eu/votes/139040
I swear this website never ceases to amaze me.