[HN Gopher] Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanni...
___________________________________________________________________
Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat
Control [pdf]
Author : greyface-
Score : 491 points
Date : 2025-10-03 16:44 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (signal.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (signal.org)
| NoiseBert69 wrote:
| I wouldn't expect much from this government.
|
| The CDU is legendary known for its umpteenth attempt to introduce
| illegal data retention (condemned by Germany's highest court).
|
| The SPD - which is also part of the ruling coalition - is a flag
| in the wind as it has proven since coming to power. They will do
| anything to stay in power.
|
| Deep down, Client Side Scanning that's what both want.
| IlikeKitties wrote:
| > Deep down, Client Side Scanning that's what both want.
|
| Let's be absolutely real the CDU wants complete government
| access to all private communications on demand with essentially
| endless retention. They just aren't allowed yet.
| nosianu wrote:
| Funny thing is, the last few times some guy attacked people,
| a few days later we could read or hear in the news updates
| that that person had already been known to be violent, and
| quite a few times we also learned that they were supposed to
| have been deported.
|
| Information does not seem to be the bottleneck at all! (Too)
| Many times, when we read about the person responsible for
| some sudden attack, everything needed to prevent that attack
| had already been known well before the attack. It's just that
| the authorities didn't do anything.
|
| Sure, one may say there are too many people fitting the
| criteria and we cannot do anything with so many potential
| suspects, most of whom have not actually done anything. But
| more information won't help in these many cases at all.
|
| Examples (German) - all reputable sources, mostly local
| public broadcasting (ARD) and one law publisher:
|
| https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/festnahme-solingen-
| syrer-10...
|
| https://www.swr.de/swraktuell/baden-wuerttemberg/faq-
| syrisch...
|
| https://rsw.beck.de/aktuell/daily/meldung/detail/messerangri.
| ..
|
| https://www.ndr.de/nachrichten/niedersachsen/braunschweig_ha.
| ..
|
| https://www.ndr.de/nachrichten/mecklenburg-
| vorpommern/Tatver... (2nd to last paragraph, he had attacked
| people the month before already)
| IlikeKitties wrote:
| Don't fall for the meme that this is to protect "the
| people". There's a literally 1984 Quote about it:
|
| > "The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are
| not interested in the good of others; we are interested
| solely in power. Not wealth or luxury or long life or
| happiness: only power, pure power"
| okanat wrote:
| They have the crosshairs on preparing the government and law
| for the AfD take over for the second trial of 1933. Just like
| the useless Bundestag of Weimar, they would like to leave as
| many mines and holes in the democratic institutions so their
| true self can show how perfect a racist government feels.
| NoiseBert69 wrote:
| Same toxic soup (high levels of social discontent,
| inflation, poor job market, constant stream of doom news)
| as back then.
|
| Only thing the AFD has to to is to keep their feet still
| and wait. The ruling parties will do the rest.
| GLdRH wrote:
| What? Are you saying that the CDU is secretly working for
| the AfD?
|
| First time I heard that, what bubble are you from?
| Asmod4n wrote:
| There isn't much difference between our current
| Chancellor and a AfD member of Parlament.
| IlikeKitties wrote:
| As much as Mr Merz and his politics disgust me, he's not
| an AfD member of parlament and that comparison is not
| okay.
| okanat wrote:
| CDU doesn't need to secretly work with AfD. Many of CDU's
| members and its current administration have similar
| opinion of non-ethnically-Germanic residents with AfD.
| Merz has shown that he is willing to work with AfD before
| the election on those areas.
|
| Being incompetent and shortsighted is enough. Being
| blinded with the idea that Germans will keep electing
| them and choosing them for power feeds their
| incompetence. They want extreme powers now. They don't
| think the extreme powers they give to the various
| organizations will be used against democratic society.
| This is just the repeat of Weimar republic.
|
| Meanwhile they are filling Germans with hate against
| minorities and benefactors of the social system which
| legitimizes AfD. They also keep doing nothing (which is
| their core-competence really). They fix no parts of the
| broken system. This legitimizes AfD even more.
| bluebarbet wrote:
| A nice example of unfalsifiable conspiracism and self-
| fulfilling cynicism rolled into one.
| nickslaughter02 wrote:
| Take a guess from which political party is Zensursula.
| pantalaimon wrote:
| SPD has been firmly pro surveillance since Schily
| linohh wrote:
| That is not correct. There is quite some opposition to this
| BS within the party. Just look at the SPD associated net
| policy think tank D64, we absolutely oppose this kind of
| legislative turd.
| kekqqq wrote:
| No one should remove from us the right to privacy in chat rooms.
| Otherwise, PGP might become cool again, or I bet that there will
| be new ways to chat without mass surveillance.
| bigyabai wrote:
| > Otherwise, PGP might become cool
|
| People need convenient access to PGP. If their App Store
| removes all PGP apps then they might have to upload their
| privatekey to a PWA. And then _no one 's_ any better off.
|
| If the everyman is forced to choose between being surveilled or
| using PGP, I reckon I know what he'd choose regardless.
| reorder9695 wrote:
| There's no reason email clients can't make PGP keys easy,
| proton actually makes it quite easy to add a PGP key for an
| email address.
| dwedge wrote:
| Does Proton allow you to use any email client? Last I
| checked IMAP and SMTP is disabled and you're captive in
| their webmail or official client unless you pay for their
| bridge software.
|
| Which makes this post ironic https://proton.me/blog/what-
| is-an-email-client
| cwbriscoe wrote:
| I use Thunderbird to access my Proton Mail. They have an
| app called Proton Mail Bridge that allows you to access
| it via IMAP or SMTP.
|
| https://proton.me/mail/bridge
|
| Edit: Missed the paid part in you message. Yeah, I have a
| paid account.
| Telemakhos wrote:
| Nobody ever talks about S/MIME, but it's the corporate
| version of PGP/GPG for mail. Apple made it dead easy to use
| S/MIME encryption. Most vendors do, because it's still a
| requirement for some government purchasing (DoD is moving
| away from it). I was honestly and pleasantly surprised how
| easy it was to use S/MIME with the built-in mail programs
| on macOS and iOS/iPadOS, and I'm a bit surprised that Apple
| didn't just automate an S/MIME key for every iCloud mail
| user.
| whatshisface wrote:
| What's the new standard that the DoD requires for secure
| communication with contractors?
| roywiggins wrote:
| There's no reason Chat Control can't mandate scanning in
| email apps, either.
| mr_mitm wrote:
| And what's stopping the government from forcing proton to
| hand over private keys or else?
| udev4096 wrote:
| https://autocrypt.org
| thadt wrote:
| How would PGP help in the long run? If client side scanning is
| mandated for _everything_ then the natural place for it to wind
| up is in the OS. Once your OS is scanning all the things, your
| privacy is finished - pretty good or otherwise.
| layer8 wrote:
| You can run the forbidden Linux software on legacy hardware.
|
| Of course, all new hardware will have hardcoded firmware
| scanning the DRM'd keyboard controller.
| ForceOfEntropy wrote:
| In that case you could an Arduino, Raspberry Pi, or similar
| to write and convert the message. The converted msg can then
| be sent over USB, wifi, etc to the computer
| roywiggins wrote:
| Right, and then Chat Control looks at the encrypted text
| and goes "oh huh this looks encrypted and suspicious, let's
| put this user on a list for closer inspection" or
| eventually just refuses to let you send the message at all.
| Steganography is _hard_ and it will be very difficult to
| hide _that_ you 're sending encrypted messages.
| mr_mitm wrote:
| But how do we then protect our messages to less tech savvy
| people? Encryption must be effortless and usable by the
| masses, or it will be almost pointless.
| 0cf8612b2e1e wrote:
| Microsoft has been pushing Recall for a while now. Clearly
| they will make it a cornerstone feature, potentially without
| the ability to opt out.
| nextos wrote:
| In fact, proprietary OSes already phone home so often it's
| just mind blowing. On the mobile camp, only GrapheneOS and
| niche Linux distributions like SailfishOS are quiet if you
| inspect network traffic. The tools for client-side scanning
| are there, it's quite easy to implement total control.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > If client side scanning is mandated for everything then the
| natural place for it to wind up is in the OS. Once your OS is
| scanning all the things, your privacy is finished - pretty
| good or otherwise.
|
| An air gap can solve that problem:
|
| 1. Create an illegal message on a machine with no internet.
|
| 2. Encrypt the message.
|
| 3. Copy the encrypted message over to a machine that does
| have internet.
|
| 4. Send it.
| sudahtigabulan wrote:
| Tinfoil Chat does that (and more).
|
| https://github.com/maqp/tfc
| mr_mitm wrote:
| PGP will never ever see mass adoption. It's too complicated and
| nothing will fix that. If chat control succeeds, a handful of
| nerds might be able to protect their comms, but mass encryption
| as we have it today will be dead. I like how nobody can read my
| chats with my mom or my landlord and would prefer it stays that
| way. The average user simply does not care enough to jump
| through a single additional hoop.
| lukan wrote:
| "or I bet that there will be new ways to chat without mass
| surveillance."
|
| In a way I am fatalistic about it now/see the good in the bad.
| If this really comes one day, it will be a great push for
| decentraliced anonymous communication networks again.
| killparty wrote:
| Handle jetzt: https://chat-kontrolle.eu/index.php/2025/10/02/der-
| kampf-geg...
|
| Info: https://netzpolitik.org/2025/eu-ueberwachungsplaene-die-
| chat... "Wichtige Stimmen wie Amnesty International, Reporter
| ohne Grenzen und der Chaos Computer Club appellieren eindringlich
| an die Bundesregierung, die Chatkontrolle zu verhindern. Sie
| warnen vor einem Angriff auf die Pressefreiheit, einem IT-
| Sicherheitsalptraum und einer Gefahr fur die Demokratie."
| jhoho wrote:
| https://fightchatcontrol.eu/
| dinoqqq wrote:
| Politicians to reach out to in Germany, with a template email:
|
| poststelle@bmi.bund.de, poststelle@bmjv.bund.de,
| info@bmds.bund.de, baerbel.bas@bundestag.de,
| lars.klingbeil@bundestag.de, friedrich.merz@bundestag.de,
| landesleitung@csu-bayern.de, fraktion@cducsu.de,
| matthias.miersch@bundestag.de, sebastian.fiedler@bundestag.de,
| alexander.throm@bundestag.de, johannes.schaetzl@bundestag.de,
| ralph.brinkhaus@bundestag.de
|
| Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren,
|
| ich wende mich heute an Sie, um meine grosse Sorge uber die
| geplante Einfuhrung der sogenannten ,,Chatkontrolle"
| auszudrucken.
|
| Die flachendeckende Uberwachung privater Kommunikation stellt
| einen massiven Eingriff in unsere Grundrechte dar. Sie
| gefahrdet die Privatsphare aller Burgerinnen und Burger und
| untergrabt zentrale Prinzipien eines demokratischen
| Rechtsstaates. Der Schutz der Vertraulichkeit von Kommunikation
| ist ein unverzichtbarer Bestandteil unserer freiheitlichen
| Gesellschaft.
|
| Zudem zeigen zahlreiche Expertinnen und Experten auf, dass das
| flachendeckende Scannen privater Nachrichten zur Bekampfung von
| Kindesmissbrauchsdarstellungen nicht wirksam ist. Stattdessen
| schwacht eine solche Massnahme die Sicherheit digitaler
| Kommunikation insgesamt und schafft gefahrliche
| Uberwachungsinfrastrukturen, die leicht missbraucht werden
| konnen.
|
| Ich bitte Sie daher eindringlich, sich bei der entsprechenden
| Abstimmung klar gegen die Einfuhrung der Chatkontrolle
| auszusprechen und sich fur den Schutz der Burgerrechte und der
| Privatsphare einzusetzen.
|
| Mit freundlichen Grussen
| afh1 wrote:
| lol
| guywithahat wrote:
| > Under the guise of protecting children, the latest Chat Control
| proposals would require mass scanning of every message, photo,
| and video on a person's device, assessing these via a government-
| mandated database or AI model to determine whether they are
| permissible content or not.
|
| This is pretty terrifying, although not unexpected. Given
| Germany's aggressive crackdown on speech I wouldn't feel too
| optimistic. If the BKA is going to launch criminal investigations
| for calling overweight politicians fat, they're probably not
| going to protect any rights to private conversation.
|
| The lack of free speech laws in Europe is becoming a serious
| issue
| IlikeKitties wrote:
| German speaking here: People here in Germany do not want to
| think about just how bad our constitution really is designed.
| We only get free speech lte, There's no fruit of the poisonous
| tree doctrine leading to constant prosecutorial overreach and
| illegal searches[0] that are later ruled illegal but with on
| effect and our public prosecutors are so much lacking in
| independence that they aren't allowed to issue european arrest
| warrants [1]. But I've heard people tell me with complete
| conviction how great our constitution is. I can't even bother
| arguing about it anymore.
|
| [0] And they brag about it on 60 minutes
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bMzFDpfDwc [1]
| https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/201...
| lawn wrote:
| > People here in Germany do not want to think about just how
| bad our constitution really is designed.
|
| I think that's exactly the same as in the US.
| AAAAaccountAAAA wrote:
| I don't think those issues are necessarily interconnected. If I
| have understood it correctly, many Germans view both hateful
| propaganda and surveillance as tools of dictators.
|
| Surveillance of private communications obviously has a chilling
| effect on free speech as well, but freedom from surveillance
| does not imply a freedom to openly spread hate speech in
| public.
| AlexandrB wrote:
| Platforms like Signal don't really allow one to spread
| something "in public" since it's mostly 1-on-1 or small group
| chat. I know similar products like Telegram do have wider-
| range features though. Moreover, the concept of "hate speech"
| is fuzzy in a way that's easy to abuse.
|
| At the end of the day, if someone makes a racist joke with
| their friend in a one-on-one chat app I would say that's
| neither hate speech, nor the public distribution of said
| speech, but I don't think Chat Control makes this
| distinction.
| udev4096 wrote:
| How would chat control even work, with federated and
| decentralized networks? This is the reason you should not use
| signal. Moxie wants everyone to be in a closed loop, tightly
| controlled by his decisions. Matrix ftw!
| keanb wrote:
| You make those networks illegal to use. Just using them would
| be illegal, regardless of the contents of your communications.
| munchlax wrote:
| In the end it's saying you can learn all the math you want
| except certain formulas. Just not those.
|
| Good luck with that
| roywiggins wrote:
| You're welcome to run any algorithm you want with paper and
| pencil, but you might not be able to run them on your
| devices that are allowed to talk to cellular networks.
|
| Communications that _look_ encrypted can also be
| straightforwardly flagged and logged for a closer look,
| perhaps keeping a closer watch on any cleartext messages,
| metadata that invariably leaks, etc
| mtlmtlmtlmtl wrote:
| Yes, because criminals and pedophiles care deeply about
| following laws. They would _never_ even think of using a
| piece of software if it was illegal, right?
| supriyo-biswas wrote:
| Pursue criminal action against the people making apps or
| providing servers for decentralized/federated networks.
| enmyj wrote:
| Moxie hasn't worked at Signal for a while now
| ratelimitsteve wrote:
| don't forget that you're dealing with the state so "we'll
| kidnap and/or murder you" is a legitimate option as a response
| to undesired behavior. at least, they think it's legitimate,
| and they think that thinking otherwise is undesirable behavior,
| which leads to a bit of a catch 182...
| poly2it wrote:
| I wouldn't trust Matrix for my personal security:
|
| https://soatok.blog/2024/08/14/security-issues-in-matrixs-ol...
|
| https://web.archive.org/web/20240606031827/https://gist.gith...
| tiku wrote:
| I wonder if we can make a chat app that doesn't use encryption
| but hides your messages inside random words. The solution should
| be saved locally on your device.
| byteknight wrote:
| Encryption is defined as "the process of converting information
| or data into a code, especially to prevent unauthorized
| access."
|
| What you describe is the same thing just not cryptographic.
| markild wrote:
| Specifically, steganography:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steganography
| nixass wrote:
| Let's invent it and name it Enogma. For the fun sake
| bigyabai wrote:
| > The solution should be saved locally on your device.
|
| Installed as a signed app...?
| Trasmatta wrote:
| That's just an insecure form of encryption
| cesarb wrote:
| > I wonder if we can make a chat app that doesn't use
| encryption but hides your messages inside random words.
|
| This technique is called "chaffing and winnowing":
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaffing_and_winnowing
| Zigurd wrote:
| There isn't a technology solution for this. The solution is to
| realize the value Switzerland lost with Proton moving out of
| Switzerland, and what Germany could lose if Wire had to make a
| similar decision regarding their home in Germany. There's
| considerable value to having real effective security. These
| nations stand to lose that value.
| throw_a_grenade wrote:
| I'm sorry to pick non-technical details, but this PDF is typeset
| on ,,Letter" paper, which is immediately noticeable (different
| aspect ratio). Normally it's on ,,yeah, whatever" level, but
| since this paper (sic) aims to influence European policy, now
| this detail is actually important.
|
| This whole piece reeks ,,I'm an 1) outsider that 2) couldn't be
| bothered to get to know local culture so 3) probably has no stake
| in the affair" and as such is liable to get dismissed after only
| cursory glance. We know every single enumerated point above is
| false, but it doesn't matter. That every single word written on
| the page is right nd warranted, doesn't matter. @Meredith and
| anyone else writing papers aimed at EU, would you kindly please
| switch to A4 before exporting the PDF.
| layer8 wrote:
| The letter also says "October 3, 2025" instead of "3 October
| 2025". ;)
|
| (https://commission.europa.eu/system/files/2023-11/styleguide..
| .)
|
| But anyway, if they truly wanted to address the letter to
| Germans, they should be providing a German-language version in
| the first place.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| It's a malicious attack, right now thousands of printers around
| Brussels are stuck with the message "PC Load Letter".
| nisten wrote:
| I think a good way to shame politicians that push this type of
| erosion of civil liberties is to label it at gestapoware.
| Netcob wrote:
| For some more recent crimes against society and humanity, I'd
| also compare it to Stasi. Plenty of people alive today who
| lived with that.
|
| Around 1 in 30 people was secretly telling on their neighbors.
| After unification, it was presented as a dark chapter in German
| history that had finally come to an end. People would get to
| look into their own "file" to see what and how much had been
| written about their daily activities. I was a bit young at the
| time, but I do remember frequent discussions on TV about how to
| move on from this, and how to make sure it doesn't happen
| again.
|
| And now we're talking about reading everyone's private messages
| on a scale that would be the Stasi's wet dream.
|
| I wonder - if the Stasi had been presented as a legitimate way
| to fight CSAM - would that have been okay?
| 1718627440 wrote:
| They did say these protesting on the street are outlaws who
| also rape and kill the little children.
| petre wrote:
| Unsurprisingly the Stasi and Gestapo types always say
| things like that.
| beezlewax wrote:
| The Stasi while more recent and more correct a name to use
| here are still something not everyone knows about to the same
| extent as the gestapo.
| volkl48 wrote:
| In Germany they certainly do.
| detaro wrote:
| indeed. Gestapo is "a long time ago", Stasi is something
| half the country at least knows people personally
| affected by.
| clickety_clack wrote:
| Stasi works better if this is a purely German question, but
| this is an international issue. Gestapoware is way more
| obvious than Stasiware for people outside Germany, while
| both surely resonate inside the country.
| some_random wrote:
| The trouble is that the Stasi are not seen in as negative of
| a light as the Gestapo.
| godelski wrote:
| In Germany?
|
| I'm not German but the German people I do know don't see
| them positively. But could be selection bias
| lukan wrote:
| Only some rare soviet nostalgy people will see them as
| something positive. But there are indeed not considered
| as bad as Gestapo and I tend to agree.
| hommelix wrote:
| Stasiware is more appropriate. Stasi (Staatssicherheit) was the
| administration in charge of spying each citizen of east
| Germany. It runs until 1989. So more people remember the
| opening of the archives in the 1990ies.
| bikson wrote:
| Stasiware. I like that.
| weinzierl wrote:
| Besides that this is likely a criminal offense in Germany[1] we
| tried it 16 years ago with _" Zensursula"_ and you can see how
| that turned out.
|
| [1] SS86a StGB _" Use of symbols of unconstitutional
| organizations"_ applies also to words, not just symbols in the
| strict sense. It is also enforced in broad coarse strokes for
| example on the usage of the swastika inside a red prohibition
| circle (the one with a diagonal bar).
|
| EDIT: Looking back at my comment, I realize it might come
| across as too negative. If you think shaming politicians is the
| right way to protest this, go for it.
|
| I just believe convincing politicians that the spirit they
| summon may easily slip from their control and turn against them
| is a more likely successful angle.
| raffael_de wrote:
| This or SS90a ... anyway, better keep your bathrobe in reach
| in case they come visit you at dawn.
| luxuryballs wrote:
| this is an objectively funny headline with how it so nimbly jumps
| from political to technical, "we must stand in a united front
| against client-side (software feature)" lol
| quotemstr wrote:
| I've been wondering how Chat Control's proponents settled on such
| a comically villainous name for their project. They didn't even
| bother being Orwellian. Skeletor could have have come up with
| "Chat Control"
| nickslaughter02 wrote:
| The name was coined by a former MEP Patrick Breyer, one of the
| most important opponent of the law. EU's other proposal for
| mandating backdoors into devices is however from a group
| officially called "EU Going Dark" tho (you thought Chat Control
| was the only thing coming?).
|
| https://netzpolitik.org/2024/going-dark-eu-states-push-for-a...
| quotemstr wrote:
| That makes more sense
| layer8 wrote:
| It's the critics who named it Chat Control. The official name
| is Regulation to Prevent and Combat Child Sexual Abuse (Child
| Sexual Abuse Regulation, or CSAR). Let's hope there will be
| enough Brutuses.
| ktallett wrote:
| The next official name will be to prevent and combat
| terrorism, then the next proposal after that will be to
| prevent and combat child sexual abuse again, then the one
| after that will be to prevent and combat terrorism, then the
| one after that will be to prevent and combat child sexual
| abuse again..... and well you get the gist of that.
| kwar13 wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children
| varispeed wrote:
| If terrorism is defined as using violence or threats to
| intimidate a population for political or ideological ends, then
| "Chat Control" qualifies in substance.
|
| Violence doesn't have to leave blood. Psychological and
| coercive violence is recognised in domestic law (see coercive
| control offences) and by the WHO. It causes measurable harm to
| bodies and minds.
|
| The aim is intimidation. The whole purpose is to make people
| too scared to speak freely. That is intimidation of a
| population, by design.
|
| It is ideological. The ideology is mass control - keeping
| people compliant by stripping them of private spaces to think,
| talk, and dissent.
|
| The only reason it's not "terrorism" on paper is because states
| write definitions that exempt themselves. But in plain terms,
| the act is indistinguishable in effect from terrorism:
| deliberate fear, coercion, and the destruction of free will.
|
| You can argue legality if you like, but the substance matches
| the textbook definition.
|
| These people should be arrested.
| zamadatix wrote:
| The actual proposal is named (the predictably bland)
| "Regulation to Prevent and Combat Child Sexual Abuse". It's
| critics who like to call it "Chat Control", and I don't think
| we want to be arresting them over that.
| varispeed wrote:
| That's nothing new. See: "Law on the Restoration of the
| Professional Civil Service" (1933, Nazi Germany) - bland
| wording, but it was the law that purged Jews and political
| opponents from public life. But it is actually on brand -
| terrorist organisations use do-gooding labels in order to
| draw support while pushing coercion.
| martin-t wrote:
| The state is the single moat prolific user of violence by
| far. If it wants to claim violence is wrong, its first step
| needs to be to dismantle itself.
|
| Of course, violence is not always wrong. Violence is a tool,
| whether it's good or bad depends against whom you use it.
|
| One man's terrorist of another man's freedom fighter.
|
| The people in positions of power (both politicians and owners
| of large tech companies) have been waging a global war on
| violence and Chat Control is just one part of it.
| varispeed wrote:
| Exactly - the state is the main user of violence, which is
| why it hides its violence in bland packaging. Call it
| 'security', 'safety', or 'child protection', but the effect
| is the same: coercion by fear.
|
| 'One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter'
| misses the point here: the methods define terrorism, not
| the branding. When the state uses psychological violence to
| intimidate citizens into silence, it is engaging in the
| very thing it condemns. Chat Control is just the polished,
| bureaucratic face of terror.
| nickslaughter02 wrote:
| I think many outside of EU dismiss this as an EU only thing and
| don't think much about it.
|
| 1. Have you ever texted someone from EU? You are now chat
| controlled too.
|
| 2. EU is pumping billions to foreign countries to promote EU
| values. How long until they condition this "help" with chat
| control?
| AAAAaccountAAAA wrote:
| It's definitely not an EU only thing. China, Russia and such
| have been doing this for years. There have been attempts to
| introduce it in US (EARN IT Act) as well, and the current
| regime there might very well end up doing that. Australia has
| also been pretty authoritarian what it comes to this kind of
| things.
| nickslaughter02 wrote:
| I don't understand your response and the downvotes. I'm
| saying Chat Control will spread to other countries. I'm aware
| of attempts from other countries. Add France and Sweden to
| your list.
| irusensei wrote:
| Here on orange reddit you always get downvotes if you say
| anything but praises about candy colored EU paradise. What
| you should do is to say the illuminated MPs are being
| misled in their incessant quest for good.
| AAAAaccountAAAA wrote:
| I primarily meant that I haven't really encountered the
| belief that it was somehow EU specific
| rlpb wrote:
| How does this fit with Apple's pushback against the UK
| government's encryption backdoor efforts against them? Why aren't
| Apple also pushing back against this EU initiative?
| oytis wrote:
| I thought Apple already voluntary implemented it on their
| devices?
| ls612 wrote:
| Apple briefly proposed something similar but then reversed
| course pretty quickly and has unequivocally stated that it
| was a poorly thought out idea when they proposed it.
|
| I'd have to assume that Apple and WhatsApp are taking a more
| behind the scenes approach on this and that they too would
| leave the EU if it came to it. Both of their messenger brands
| are so fundamentally tied to E2EE that its hard to imagine
| them thinking its worth it to stay and break their
| encryption.
| nickslaughter02 wrote:
| Apple has sold out their Chinese users. Why would it not do
| the same for EU?
|
| https://www.reuters.com/article/technology/apple-moves-to-
| st...
| dvngnt_ wrote:
| China market is much more lucrative and harder to enter
| aniviacat wrote:
| Are they really? I'd be surprised if a substantial portion
| of WhatsApp users even know what end-to-end encryption is.
| encom wrote:
| Assume the worst. Everything Apple does is proprietary and
| closed, so you can never be sure. You paid for the device,
| but it's not yours.
| natch wrote:
| "Apple cannot access your data."
| natch wrote:
| The quiet part:
|
| "But selected agencies and partners in certain unspecified
| countries can."
| jMyles wrote:
| It's great that signal / open whisper engage in the political
| situation and the pressure on these states.
|
| We also need to be sure that signal / open whisper / matrix /
| telegram / everybody continues to make end-to-end encryption
| available regardless of what politicians say.
|
| Math is bigger than human affairs. There is no shame in breaking
| laws that prohibit math.
| roywiggins wrote:
| Chat Control doesn't prohibit you from using whatever
| encryption you want, it mandates that your phone snitch on any
| plaintext that it has access to.
| jMyles wrote:
| Yeah, I see this argument all over HN. And in a sense it's
| true that the affront here isn't against math per se, but
| against general purpose computing.
|
| But ultimately, the right to general purpose computing (ie,
| the right to run a program that doesn't snitch the plaintext)
| is the same as the right to engage in the underlying
| mathematics.
|
| I think it's a distinction without a meaningful difference.
| permo-w wrote:
| one nitpick:
|
| CSAM isn't likely to be text that can be plaintext, is it?
| surely it would be image and/or video?
| jMyles wrote:
| I have always used the word "plaintext" to mean content
| that has not been subject to encryption or hashing,
| whether it is text, arbitrary bytes (including multimedia
| formats), or even abstract ideas which can be somehow
| subject to a cipher.
|
| But these terms are certainly used different in different
| situations by different people. But yeah, images and/or
| video can still be "the plaintext" in the parlance to
| which I'm accustomed.
| yupyupyups wrote:
| A beautifully written message. Thank you to Meredith Whittaker
| and the Signal team for this.
| pndy wrote:
| No, not only Germany should stand firmly against this bullshit
| Brussels tries to push but ALL member states should be.
| Especially the former soviet republics and other countries of the
| Eastern Bloc which during communistic times ran censorship
| offices and security services against their citizens.
|
| Ideas like this shows that there's a power within EU structures
| that works against us, the citizens.
| kwar13 wrote:
| Signal is doing phenomenal work here. They could've sold out long
| ago. I highly encourage anyone to donate whatever they can.
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