[HN Gopher] The disguised return of EU Chat Control
___________________________________________________________________
The disguised return of EU Chat Control
https://www.patrick-breyer.de/en/chat-control-2-0-through-th...
Author : egorfine
Score : 412 points
Date : 2025-11-14 17:54 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (reclaimthenet.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (reclaimthenet.org)
| nowaymo6237 wrote:
| Privacy needs codified! The illusion of safety is not worth it
| for the fascist regime who turn keys it into a panopticon.
| PeterStuer wrote:
| Eternal vigilance is needed to stop this. Good luck! It will take
| just one (manufactured) crisis.
| ryandrake wrote:
| We have to win every time. They only have to win once and it's
| game over.
| ambicapter wrote:
| Why can't we put up legislation to repeal over and over until
| it is repealed?
| PeterStuer wrote:
| "Over and over" is the hint.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| Power/wealth asymmetries. The incumbent organizations are
| powerful, have many resources and actively work to prevent
| other organizations from achieving the same level if
| competency.
| dymk wrote:
| Because legislation like this is a ratchet.
| pembrook wrote:
| The number of laws/rules added vs. removed in any given
| year is like 100:1.
|
| New rules lead to profitable business opportunities (and
| future lobbies), incumbents get to entrench their positions
| using the new rules, and people get stockholm syndrome and
| just end up accepting the new normal.
|
| Modern representative democracy is Parkinson's law at work.
| Government is the purest form of bureaucracy and monopoly.
| Thus, it finds ways to grow itself every year regardless of
| what happens.
| zelphirkalt wrote:
| There is also an alternative, which is the way problems with
| governments used to get solved in the past. Not that we should
| aim for that to be necessary, but it often seems that our
| politicians are hellbend on getting there quickly. I guess it's
| all "to hell with the consequences!" for them.
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| Previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45908672
| api wrote:
| They will keep trying until some version of it passes.
| Humorist2290 wrote:
| (6) Online child sexual abuse frequently involves the misuse of
| information society services offered in the Union by providers
| established in third countries. In order to ensure the
| effectiveness of the rules laid down in this Regulation and a
| level playing field within the internal market, those rules
| should apply to all providers, irrespective of their place of
| establishment or residence, that offer services in the Union, as
| evidenced by a substantial connection to the Union.
|
| The article links to the text of the revised proposal. It reads
| like they're openly planning to push it again, and soon, and
| worldwide. The UK and EU seem to be setting aside their
| differences at least.
| josteink wrote:
| So they're asking American companies to repeal the first
| amendment rights of American citizens on all websites
| accessible in the EU.
|
| How this not a declaration of war?
| progval wrote:
| Neither the EU nor American companies are Congress, so they
| are not bound by the 1st amendment.
| petcat wrote:
| "First Amendment Rights" only applies to the State, not
| private companies.
|
| For example, Hacker News has no obligation to preserve your
| "First Amendment Rights" on this website. They are free to
| mute you, ban you, or even just surreptitiously change what
| you say without you knowing.
| josteink wrote:
| That's just semantics.
|
| If a website which otherwise wouldn't censor you begins to
| censor you because of threats from foreign nations, that's
| a foreign nation pressuring an American company into
| suppressing rights of American citizens.
|
| That's a foreign nation imposing on your rights. In the
| past that used to require an invasion, so it was a bit more
| obvious what was happening, but the result is still the
| same.
|
| Yes it's through a website, which is owned by a company,
| which technically speaking owes you nothing.
|
| In the digital age though, where are you going to use your
| speech, if not on a website?
|
| What you (and others) are doing is trying to reduce the
| significance of a major transgression over a minor
| technicality. Way to miss the forest for trees.
|
| The EU can stuff it on this one. And I supported (still
| support!) the GDPR.
| petcat wrote:
| Semantics are important when talking about matters of
| law. Very important, in fact.
| josteink wrote:
| So you're just going to accept a digital invasion
| happening and not care, because of some semantics and
| details somewhere in a document which was penned 200
| years prior to the internet being invented?
|
| I don't know about you, but to me that seems kind of
| naive and short sighted.
| rstat1 wrote:
| You can still care about forthcoming invasions of one's
| privacy and while still understanding that the 1st
| Amendment to the US Constitution is only intended to
| prevent state and federal governments from censoring you.
| Not corporations.
|
| Semantics are very important when it comes to legal
| matters.
| macintux wrote:
| You can object to the "digital invasion", but using the
| phrase "freedom of speech" as some sort of magical shield
| is pointless.
|
| > Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment
| of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or
| abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the
| right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to
| petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
|
| The U.S. federal or state governments, courtesy of that
| amendment, have very limited authority to control your
| speech. That's where the legal authority ends.
| shkkmo wrote:
| > That's where the legal authority ends.
|
| So you see no problem with using jurisdiction washing
| like Five Eyes to remove our rights?
|
| If we don't tolerate a government we elect abridging our
| freedom of speech, why would we accept a foreign
| government doing that?
|
| When foreign governments try to force conpanies to
| abridge free speech by Americans on American soil, that
| is an attack on something that we deem important enough
| to have enshrined in our constitution.
| ghurtado wrote:
| > accept a digital invasion
|
| It looks like the possibilities are endless once you
| throw semantics out of the window, so I could see why
| you're so fond of doing so.
| ghurtado wrote:
| Semantics are literally the only reason we write laws
| down and argue endlessly about exactly which words to use
|
| Outside of law, I have never once heard "that's just
| semantics" in a context that made sense, or said by an
| intelligent person. Not once. Maybe it turns out
| semantics are never "just semantics", and instead it's
| something that always matters.
| saubeidl wrote:
| It isn't your right to comment on somebody else's
| website. Your argument makes no sense.
| eptcyka wrote:
| I was under the impression that the strong and independent
| Americans had thicker skin than this.
| sitzkrieg wrote:
| luckily, this is a sample size of one (1)
| latchup wrote:
| I am going to assume your question is genuine and not
| rethorical hyperbole.
|
| Every sovereign nation has legal supremacy over its own
| territory. Any company doing business in the EU, no matter
| its origin, must follow EU laws _inside the EU_. However,
| these laws do not apply anywhere else (unless specified by
| some sort of treaty), so they are not forced to comply with
| them in the US when dealing with US customers.
|
| If they still abide by EU law elsewhere, that is their
| choice, just like you can just choose to abide by Chinese law
| in the US -- so long as it does not conflict with US law. If
| these rules do conflict with the first amendment, enforcing
| them in the US is simply not legal, and it's up to the
| company to figure out how to resolve this. In the worst case,
| they will have to give up business in the EU, or in this
| case, prohibit chat between US and EU customers, segregating
| their platform.
| SunshineTheCat wrote:
| I mean this (mostly) as a joke, however, I kinda wish US
| businesses would just firewall off the EU at this point
| (yes, I know this would mean losing some
| customers/marketshare and thus would never happen).
|
| But the near daily proposals getting tossed out in their
| desperate attempt to turn their countries into daycare
| centers is just annoying to people trying to build things
| for other adults.
| ghurtado wrote:
| People like you are the reason Americans are viewed as
| "Murica Hurr Durr!" idiots the world over.
|
| Which isn't fair, because most of us are definitely not like
| you.
| layer8 wrote:
| > worldwide
|
| Laws targeting service providers usually always apply to all
| providers providing services in the respective jurisdiction. It
| would be unusual if it was any different.
| btown wrote:
| From https://docs.reclaimthenet.org/council-presidency-lewp-
| csa-r... pp 35:
|
| (f) 'relevant information society services' means all of the
| following services: (i) a hosting service; (ii) an
| interpersonal communications service; (iii) a software
| applications store; (iv) an internet access service; (v) online
| search engines.
|
| And via https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
| content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELE... pp 8:
|
| (2) 'internet access service' means a publicly available
| electronic communications service that provides access to the
| internet, and thereby connectivity to virtually all end points
| of the internet, irrespective of the network technology and
| terminal equipment used
|
| ===
|
| Calling it Chat Control is itself an understatement, one that
| evokes "well I'm not putting anything sensitive on WhatsApp"
| sentiments - and that's incredibly dangerous.
|
| This bill may very well be read to impose mandatory global
| backdoors on VPNs, public cloud providers, and even your home
| router or your laptop network card!
|
| (Not a lawyer, this is not legal advice. But it doesn't take a
| lawyer to see how broadly scoped this is.)
| chimeracoder wrote:
| > (6) Online child sexual abuse frequently involves the misuse
| of information society services offered in the Union by
| providers established in third countries.
|
| It's quite wild to see child sexual abuse continue to be cited
| as a justification for far-reaching, privacy-invading
| proposals, allegedly to empower government actors to combat
| child sexual abuse.
|
| Meanwhile, we have copious and ever-increasing evidence of
| actual child sexual abuse being perpetrated by people with the
| most power in these very institutions, and they generally face
| few (if any) consequences.
| andybak wrote:
| This is an asymmetric conflict. The factions who want this to
| pass have more resources, time and background influence and can
| keep pushing this until they get lucky.
|
| And once in place repealing it will be tremendously difficult.
|
| How does society resolve this kind of abuse of the democratic
| process? It is a dynamic that is repeated in many areas.
| frogperson wrote:
| We stop allowing the rich to become so rich. Billionares are
| not compatible with democracy or the greater good.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| What happens when you get what you want, and rather than
| magically solving every problem confronting society, it
| doesn't solve anything at all, and in fact creates several
| more problems, as generally happens when such ideas are put
| into practice?
|
| What's plan B? Lower the threshold to a million dollars?
| snek_case wrote:
| Also how do you avoid billionaires _worldwide_? Not
| everyone lives under your government. Even if you could,
| how do you know for a fact that some people don 't secretly
| control hidden assets? Is Xi openly a billionaire? China is
| a "communist" country on paper. How does he hold so much
| power?
|
| The sad reality is that the world has a nonzero percentage
| of power-hungry narcissists. We need governments that are
| more democratic and robust. We all know that the current
| government processes are broken and corrupted.
| iovrthoughtthis wrote:
| We iterate.
| tock wrote:
| > as generally happens when such ideas are put into
| practice
|
| Is this true? Lots of countries with high living standards
| have high taxes. It doesn't need to solve every problem but
| it does help solve the problem of one unelected person
| holding too much power and influence.
|
| > What's plan B? Lower the threshold to a million dollars?
|
| 1B = 1000M. I think thats high enough. Don't see why you
| need to make it 1000x smaller to try and make a point.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| _It doesn 't need to solve every problem but it does help
| solve the problem of one unelected person holding too
| much power and influence._
|
| It does? Really?
|
| What _are_ they teaching kids in school these days?
| According to the books I studied, nominally-egalitarian
| leaders racked up an eight-digit body count in the 20th
| century alone.
| criley2 wrote:
| Taxes are ~irrelevant to billionaires. When you say "you
| can't be a billionaire" what you're saying is "you cannot
| own any significant amount of a large business" because
| billionaires aren't liquid, their status is based on
| their assets and primarily their shares in large
| businesses.
|
| I agree that wealth inequality is horrible and taxes on
| the wealthy should be much higher. But if someone owns
| 10% of a trillion dollar company, that's $100B in shares.
| They can sell off 900M$ worth of shares and "not be a
| billionaire" in terms of income and money (and thus
| taxation). So what do you do?
|
| - Seize control of their shares and thus their control
| over private industry
|
| - Or, accept that billionaires exist
|
| This is basically the core fight between capitalism
| (private ownership of the means of production) and
| communism (government control of the means of
| production).
|
| Most people hate the idea of billionaires, but people
| generally also hate a centrally planned government where
| the government owns a controlling stake in all businesses
| preventing any insider from having any real control.
| afarah1 wrote:
| This seems to be more about political power and government
| overreach than money. The narrative seems to be focused
| solely on concentration of the later, lately.
| dymk wrote:
| Money is political power. A billionaire can afford to lobby
| and "donate" as much as they want.
| catlikesshrimp wrote:
| I expect economical and political power to get along well.
| You normally acquire both organically; except in some
| cases, suddently acquiring much of one will buy some of the
| other.
|
| TLDR: Billionaires hold political power.
| eptcyka wrote:
| Billionaires inherently get political power. When they're
| more socially adept than Musk, they can even have the power
| without having the plebs notice.
| lazide wrote:
| Yup, going full autist in public is a good way to get the
| public angry at you and try to find a way to make your
| life more difficult.
| hn_acc1 wrote:
| You mean, going full asshole. Not all autists are
| assholes.
| lazide wrote:
| The issue isn't that he was being an asshole - plenty of
| politicians can be assholes and be cheered for it.
|
| He was being straightforward, direct, matter of fact,
| technical, and an asshole.
|
| You gotta lube up the plebes, or they get butthurt, and
| that is what is causing the issue.
| samdoesnothing wrote:
| You see this happening a lot where criticisms of capitalism
| gets laundered in with criticisms of political power as a
| means to deflect.
| impossiblefork wrote:
| It's too bad we can't withdraw our votes for a politician
| continuously, with the politician having to leave office if
| the vote changes enough.
|
| I'm not sure it can be solved without everybody writing down
| their vote, but this would be one way that would make pushing
| through unpopular policies, whether because of changing
| opinions, mismatches where politicians misrepresent their
| plans or corruption, much more difficult.
| layer8 wrote:
| That would just strengthen the incentives for continual
| populism and propaganda.
| thewebguyd wrote:
| If not continuously, there needs to be mechanisms to recall
| a politician (or an entire government), and re-hold
| elections for both failing to govern and failing to
| represent the interests of the people over the interest of
| billionaires.
|
| To use the recent US shutdown as an example. Passing a
| budget is like one of the basic requirements of governing.
| If the current government cannot accomplish that, it should
| immediately dissolve and elections be held. Every single
| position in power at the time, gone, the whole thing gets
| re-elected because they have proven that the current group
| cannot adequately govern.
|
| The ability to recall needs to work similarly. Vote should
| be able to be initiated by the people at anytime, and a
| successful vote means the government dissolves and new
| elections are held.
|
| We could also have a "cooling off" period after a piece of
| legislation (like chat control) fails. It failed the first
| time, it should not be able to be immediately reintroduced
| whether in the same or a different form. There should be
| some sort of cooling off period where that piece of
| legislation (or its goals) cannot be reintroduced for x
| number of years.
| thesuitonym wrote:
| These are good ideas, but they do have some pretty big
| sticking points. The ability to trigger a re-election has
| the same problems we're trying to avoid in the larger
| thread: If a bad actor (say a business) wants a
| politician out, they can just continually issue recall
| votes until they wear out the population and get lucky.
| Unfortunately, I think the only solution here is exactly
| what we have: Politicians have to be re-elected every
| couple of years.
|
| The cooling off period also has problems, because
| sometimes a piece of legislation is a good idea, but has
| a major flaw that causes people to vote against it. What
| happens when people want a law passed, but not in the
| form it's presented in?
| zelphirkalt wrote:
| Re-election every couple of years does not solve the
| issues, as demonstrated by most elected governments
| around the world. People are too lazy, uninformed,
| stupid, to vote for their own good, and will be made to
| vote against their own interest, time and time again. As
| societies we are mostly not ready mentally to vote
| properly. This is in the interest of the people in power.
| Have stupid and confused subjects, so that you can rally
| them for whatever cause you need them to rally for.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > Passing a budget is like one of the basic requirements
| of governing. If the current government cannot accomplish
| that, it should immediately dissolve and elections be
| held.
|
| It's important to note that this is a basic principle,
| almost _the_ basic principle, of English-style
| parliamentary democracy. You have a monarch who makes
| decisions (through their chosen government, ever since
| the English cut off a few heads), and the rest of the
| Parliament (a bunch of nobles, clergy, and eventually
| representatives of commoners) is there to withdraw
| financing from that government when they disapprove.
|
| > We could also have a "cooling off" period after a piece
| of legislation (like chat control) fails.
|
| We usually do, it is called a "session." The problem is
| the inability to pass negative legislation (which also
| has a pretty long history) i.e. we will _not_ do a thing.
| Deliberative assemblies explicitly frown on negative
| legislation, and instead say that purpose is served
| simply by not doing the thing.
|
| The problem is that individual rights are provided by
| negative legislation _against the government_ : think the
| US Bill of Rights. Instead, we have systems where
| exclusively positive legislation is passed by majorities,
| and repealing that legislation takes _supermajorities_.
| The only pragmatic way to create new rights becomes to
| challenge legislation in courts, and get a decision by
| opinionated, appointed judges that X piece of legislation
| is superseded by Y piece of legislation for unconvincing
| reason Z, and this new "right" is about as stable as the
| current lineup of the sitting justices.
|
| What we need is to pretend like "democracy" is a
| meaningful word rather than an empty chant, or more often
| simply a euphemism for the US, Anglosphere, Western and
| Central Europe, and whoever they currently approve of.
| Democracy is rule by the ruled, and the exact processes
| by which the decisions are made _define_ the degree of
| democracy. Somehow, elites have decided that process is
| the _least_ important part of democracy, and the most
| important part is that elites get their preferred
| outcomes. Anything else is "populism."*
|
| Decisionmaking processes in "democracies" need to be
| examined, _justified,_ and codified. The EU needs either
| to cede a lot more leverage to its individual members
| (and make that stupid currency a European bancor, rather
| than a German weapon) OR become more directly responsive
| to European _individuals._ If you 're not serving the
| individual states, and you're not serving the individual
| citizens, you're _exclusively_ serving elites.
|
| * A term made into meaningless invective by elites who
| hated https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Populist_Party_(Unite
| d_States), a party who believed in things that were good.
| dspillett wrote:
| _> It 's too bad we can't withdraw our votes for a
| politician continuously, with the politician having to
| leave office if the vote changes enough._
|
| I think that would empower ill-conceived (and/or ill-
| willed) populist & short term movements, with everyone in
| constant fear of being "un-vote bombed" by armies of easily
| led, and likely make the lobbying problem worse.
| zelphirkalt wrote:
| I have had this idea for a long time: An online realtime
| voting platform, where you can change your mind about
| policies at any time, and what the people want needs to be
| implemented. And of course all issues and policies must be
| put on the platform for people to vote on.
|
| Of course initially we would have to learn, that changing
| our minds too often will lead to things not getting done at
| all. And it is doubtful, that a lot of people are even
| capable of becoming informed and reflecting beings, not to
| be swayed by a hip populist radical, and thus causing shit
| to happen. Also the sheer number of issues and policies
| would be so many, that most people couldn't make up their
| mind on everything. But that's OK, since people can raise
| awareness and simply vote later, when they became aware.
| Another issue would be what the choices are that people
| have on the platform. How to give all relevant opinions as
| choices? How to know what is relevant? Or can voters apply
| for adding a new opinion? But then who grants the right to
| add a choice? How to prevent spam?
|
| So there certainly are huge issues with the idea. But
| maybe, over time, we would develop into politically
| reasonable societies and politicians would have to fear the
| opinion of the people, because one scandal uncovered, and
| they could end up kicked out tomorrow. Maybe it could also
| better designed, so that there is some minimum time between
| being able to change ones stance about something. Or some
| maximum of policies one can have an opinion about per day.
|
| Even initially to have such a platform without real
| political consequences of voting, would be super
| interesting, because you could lookup what the current
| opinions of the people are.
| hcurtiss wrote:
| It seems more likely to me this is being pressed by
| intelligence agencies than billionaires. Billionaires have
| secrets too.
| imglorp wrote:
| The States are learning the hard way that the disproportionate
| accumulation of wealth is an irresistible force which will
| eventually erode all checks and balances, corrupt all systems,
| and ultimately capture the entire government. We we were doing
| mostly okay with "constrained capitalism" but as soon as we let
| our guard down, money flooded into politics and that was the
| end of restraint.
| samdoesnothing wrote:
| Chat Control isn't something being pushed in the States
| though, so your criticism just seems like you're taking a
| random shot at the USA rather than accepting the
| uncomfortable truth that the EU is becoming increasingly
| authoritarian.
| imglorp wrote:
| No, I was directly responding to parent:
|
| > How does society resolve this kind of abuse of the
| democratic process? It is a dynamic that is repeated in
| many areas.
|
| Relating our experience in the US, we planned for exactly
| this, it went okay for a while, until it didn't. The answer
| to parent is "do this but a little better" :-)
| HPsquared wrote:
| Constitutions are a pretty common way to say "no to this kind
| of thing".
| yoz-y wrote:
| Indeed. It seems that the only way out is to elect a
| government that would have that on their program. Dubious
| that this will happen.
| xxs wrote:
| Governments don't change constitutions pretty much
| anywhere. More also constitution changes are notoriously
| hard from requiring 75% of parliament votes, to 66% in two
| consecutive parliament assemblies (need to pass an
| election), and all versions in-between (or not having a
| codified constitution).
| dspillett wrote:
| _> Governments don 't change constitutions pretty much
| anywhere._
|
| They do sometimes manage to just ignore parts that they
| don't like sometimes, at least temporarily, as the recent
| and continuing mess in the DPR-US illustrates.
| egorfine wrote:
| Constitutions have a lot of "except in cases prescribed by
| the law" exceptions which makes it possible to pass into law
| all kinds of abuses.
| wartywhoa23 wrote:
| > How does society resolve this kind of abuse of the democratic
| process?
|
| Other than hoping for a large meteorite or the second coming to
| end this misery, or stirring up the bloodbath a la Nepal -
| then, by recognizing the power of large numbers of people doing
| little things, like sabotaging the system at the personal
| level. But that implies unity, and unity and mutual support
| have been deliberately annihilated in this society for too
| long. Thus, this outcome is even less probable than the first
| two.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| I'm downvoting you because complaining against downvotes like
| this is against site guidelines. Your comment would have a
| better foundation if that part was omitted.
| wartywhoa23 wrote:
| Now that's some recursive self-fulfilling prophecy, my
| friend! But thanks for chiming in.
| stackedinserter wrote:
| Agree completely. We're like sheep that are cluelessly
| watching other sheep being slaughtered.
| enricotr wrote:
| This.
| the_mitsuhiko wrote:
| > How does society resolve this kind of abuse of the democratic
| process? It is a dynamic that is repeated in many areas.
|
| A lot of society wants this. A lot of parents are asking for
| this.
| soulofmischief wrote:
| That doesn't mean anything, because they're not necessarily
| educated on the topic, and yet are making decisions that
| affect everyone.
|
| When it's so cheap to enact mass propaganda, selective
| omission and manufactured intent, it becomes impossible to
| just say, "well, the people want it." Their decision making
| process is compromised by the same people pushing these
| policies through.
|
| Democracy is indeed broken, and we have to take that
| seriously if we're going to fix it.
| dns_snek wrote:
| Please quantify "a lot". What percentage of the population
| wants all private communication between adults to be
| monitored and censored by a government agency? Can we put it
| to a vote - right after publicly discussing (debunking) all
| of the false beliefs that its proponents have?
| the_mitsuhiko wrote:
| The question that is at the core is "police can wire tap
| calls but they cannot wire tap chats. Should this change?"
| The details are not all that important to people.
| dns_snek wrote:
| Legal interception requires a court order, Chat control
| is mass surveillance.
|
| Trying to build support for mass surveillance by
| misrepresenting it as targeted tool with checks and
| balances is exactly the kind of bad faith discourse I'm
| talking about.
| alex1138 wrote:
| This is true and yet we managed to kick SOPA to the curb (one
| of Aaron Swartz's finest hours)
| echelon_musk wrote:
| That was more than a decade ago. Think how many normies have
| come online since then that have only ever used a smartphone.
| Sadly the average computer literacy of those times are gone.
| tharne wrote:
| > Think how many normies have come online since then that
| have only ever used a smartphone. Sadly the average
| computer literacy of those times are gone.
|
| I remember a few years ago, being shocked to see that over
| 50% of applicants for a software engineering role applied
| directly from their smartphones. So it's not even just
| normies who see their phone as "the computer".
| egorfine wrote:
| Did you notice that SOPA reappears every couple of years
| since then?
| whitehexagon wrote:
| >How does society resolve this kind of abuse of the democratic
| process?
|
| Swiss style democracy with public referendums?
| egorfine wrote:
| "Think of the children" buys a lot of votes of common people.
| iso1631 wrote:
| plebiscite -> populism -> bad outcomes
|
| People are not able to be experts in everything they are
| asked to vote on, thats why we delegate it, just like people
| delegate their healthcare, plumbing, flying to a holiday
| destination, growing food, etc.
|
| People en-mass are just as easy to manipulate as elected
| members, if not easier.
| HeinzStuckeIt wrote:
| Can you point to examples of bad outcomes in Switzerland's
| referendums? I mean unequivocal examples, of the sort that
| would convince everyone here that that model is undesirable
| as a whole.
| latchup wrote:
| How about that time in 2020 the Swiss voted in favor of
| an immigration restriction proposal that was so
| fundamentally incompatible with existing EU treaties, the
| government was forced to bullshit their way out of
| implementing entirely because doing so would have
| basically ended Switzerland as a nation? This is the
| kinda thing that _really_ cannot happen in a working
| system. The only reason the government is not sued into
| following through is because the courts have conspired
| with other branches to shut down any attempt at doing so.
| Real democratic.
|
| Generally speaking, people are stupid. Really REALLY
| f-cking stupid. Giving the average Joe this kind of
| unmoderated power in a modern world that almost entirely
| eludes his understanding is no different from handing him
| a loaded gun; eventually, someone will get hurt real bad.
| As someone living in Switzerland, the main reason things
| are as stable as they are is because:
|
| * Changing anything significant requires a referendum,
| which is a huge pain in the ass. So politicians just
| kinda _avoid_ important changes that require referenda,
| finding other ways to enrich themselves and leaving
| society stagnating. This means that actually important
| changes come about very slowly or not at all. Read up on
| how long it took for women 's suffrage to become
| universal - and the outright threats of internal military
| action the federal government resorted to...
|
| * Whether the Swiss like it or not, Switzerland is mostly
| a loud, spoilt economic annex of the EU. It will remain
| stable for as long as the EU is, and well off for as long
| as the EU wants to be seen as a peaceful and magnanimous
| partner in international relations. After all, "bullying"
| tiny and surrounded Switzerland into agreeing to anything
| - which the Swiss will cry about at any opportunity you
| give them - is a bad look.
|
| So yeah, Swiss direct democracy is not all it's made out
| to be, and really not all that great up close. Admirers
| remind me a lot of Weaboos, strangely shortsighted in
| their admiration of a system they know little about.
| stackedinserter wrote:
| > How does society resolve this kind of abuse of the democratic
| process?
|
| By choosing "people-vs-individual-politician" fight over
| "people-vs-government-system". Like, literally, make
| politicians personally responsible for this bs.
| blibble wrote:
| > And once in place repealing it will be tremendously
| difficult.
|
| as in: not possible
|
| the EU parliament can't legislate to remove it, at least not
| without permission from the two organs (commission, council)
| that keep pushing this
|
| EU parliament is the only legislature in the world that needs
| permission to legislate
| iso1631 wrote:
| On paper the UK house of commons can pass a bill. In reality
| bills are driven by the executive. The same executive that
| (until brexit) drove the bills via appointing the EU
| commissioner and being the EU council.
|
| The reason that EU Parliament can't pass bills is because
| constituent governments don't want to lose power to
| parliament.
| Muromec wrote:
| >EU parliament is the only legislature in the world that
| needs permission to legislate
|
| It makes sense, because EU _law_ is mostly technical stuff
| that commission has to draft and all the national governments
| have to agree to.
|
| With the commission being elected by the parliament itself
| and vote of no confidence being a thing, it's not like the
| parliament doesn't have power -- the power is intentionally
| nerfed to not overreach where national governments don't want
| it to.
| Lutzb wrote:
| The people that push this agenda reside on secrecy. We need to
| expose the people involved and let the press do their jobs.
| okokwhatever wrote:
| Which press? The same that keeps this war in the shadows?
| wartywhoa23 wrote:
| Agree, but it's rather "expose the people involved and DON'T
| let their pocket press puppets do their jobs!"
| nom wrote:
| It's just Ashton Kutcher trying to save our children.
| Kim_Bruning wrote:
| For one, we can try to get laws passed that point in the
| opposite direction: explicitly ban the things being proposed
| here as broadly as possible.
| SilverElfin wrote:
| I've seen this strategy many times in the US. For example, in
| blue states they will repeatedly propose the same gun control
| laws that restrict the rights of law abiding citizens and
| violate the constitution, which guarantees a right to own
| firearms. Each time such a law is proposed, people have to show
| up to hearings, submit comments, pressure legislators, protest,
| and all of that. Those laws may then be pulled back, but the
| same laws will get brought up every single legislative season,
| and citizens who have other responsibilities in life have to
| give up time and money repeatedly to fight for their
| constitutional rights.
|
| I'm sure there are other examples of such legal abuse of
| different political biases - I'm just using this as an example
| because there is such a long history of it. Eventually,
| legislators will pass whatever they want anyways. And then your
| recourse to regain rights is to go through an expensive years-
| long legal battle that ultimately requires the Supreme Court to
| take the case. This type of "attack" is a serious flaw in many
| modern democracies.
|
| I think the fix is to have _personal_ consequences for
| legislators, judges, etc that make bad decisions that violate
| the constitutional rights or fundamental rights of citizens.
| The idea that people are immune from consequence just because
| they're serving in an official capacity is insane. This
| shouldn't be the case for anyone serving in political office or
| other public roles - as in, you shouldn't get immunity whether
| you are a lawmaker or policeman or teacher or whatever else.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| > How does society resolve this kind of abuse of the democratic
| process?
|
| You need a means for citizens to hold the powers that be
| accountable. Unfortunately, the EU is largely designed without
| such a mechanism, as its initial scope and ambition was much
| smaller than the superstate it is growing into it wasn't deemed
| necessary.
|
| Every branch except for the European Parliament risks
| consequences only if they fuck up so badly that the majority of
| EU citizens in their home countries (or in some cases, _the
| majority of_ member states) deem their actions so reprehensible
| that they consider punishing the EU more important than
| electing their own national government, since it 's effectively
| the same vote.
|
| This is technically still a means of accountability, but it's
| not really a threat in practice.
| pokot0 wrote:
| Honestly I think privacy is lost. Regardless of what side you
| were (big fan of privacy here) I feel we have nothing to do but
| move on and think how to live in a world without privacy.
|
| I never wanted privacy anyway: I wanted no discrimination,
| inclusion, healthy democracy, etc, etc.
|
| Privacy has always been a tool for me.
|
| At this point, selective privacy like we are experiencing today
| (we cannot know what's in the epstein files, but google can send
| a drone and look into my backyard) serves none of the things I am
| interested in!
| whatshisface wrote:
| The basic structure of your argument is equivalent to, "I've
| given up on being allowed to leave my house, I just want to go
| to the places I need to go."
| binary132 wrote:
| what a ludicrously insane take. how can you not believe in
| privacy? do you think what you do in your home should be
| private, or do you think it's fine for someone to put cameras
| in there? If you do, please feel free to invite them to do so;
| do not feel free to invite them to put cameras in my home.
| iso1631 wrote:
| Whether you or I want it or not is irrelevant
|
| Over the last 5000 years it's been very rare for plebs to
| have any privacy. For a brief period from ww2 through to the
| early 21st century power shifted to the plebs, but since the
| 1980s that power has shifted back to the feudal barons, and
| our rights will eventually regress.
|
| But the SP500 will be at record highs so everyone will be
| told they should be happy.
| g-b-r wrote:
| What??
|
| For 5000 years there were no surveillance cameras or ways
| to surveil communications! (other than the little that was
| said by mail)
| binary132 wrote:
| What I'm taking issue with is that you said you never
| really cared about privacy. I care about my family's
| privacy. I'm not asking you to care about yours. I'm sorry
| you've given up on something that wasn't important to you
| anyway, or whatever.
| pokot0 wrote:
| I think you misunderstood him for me. Regardless, giving
| up is not something I mentioned. You guys just inferred
| it. I just feel we need to approach the battle very
| differently. What we have been doing it's not working.
| pokot0 wrote:
| Privacy for me is not that important. I have nothing to hide,
| nothing I am ashamed of. For me it's more of a way of
| protecting from abuse that a need of its own. I realize it's
| just me and I do advocate for privacy, but if you look
| around: we lost. Our data is everywhere and there are no
| consequences whatsoever. PS: I did mention in my original
| comment that Google and many others already send drones with
| cameras to spy on your backyard and that is considered
| "fine". I am not inviting them to come to your house; they
| are already doing it. Just check Google Maps.
| binary132 wrote:
| what is it they're so concerned about people talking about these
| days exactly anyway?
| FranzFerdiNaN wrote:
| Gotta make sure you aren't saying the wrong things, like
| criticising rich and powerful people.
| binary132 wrote:
| people have been doing that for a long time, but the level of
| urgency from the system hasn't been at this level.
| AngryData wrote:
| Yeah but was it to the same extent? People are regularly
| posting guillotines these days and our economic outlooks
| for much of the world, and especially the US, is not all
| roses and sunshine.
| sph wrote:
| It's because they have finally found the perfect trojan
| horse--"think of the children!"--in a time when people are
| too busy entertaining themselves to death.
|
| This is their best chance for them to enact mass
| surveillance, before the hoi polloi crack and finally get
| out of their couches.
| Muromec wrote:
| The urgency comes from having the actual war on the East
| side of the EU and whatever the hell is happening down
| South with refugees and what not. Then in the EU proper --
| sabotage acts, ammunition dumps being blown up, cabels cut
| and drones flying above the military bases hosting nuclear
| fucking warheads, Chinese and r===an spyies in the
| parliament, armed nazis in the military, etc, etc.
|
| The shit has hit the fan about a decade ago already and not
| calming down at all, but intelligence gathering capability
| of secret services of all EU countries are being
| continiously degraded, because everything is E2E by default
| and money flows are obscured too.
|
| Nobody likes to see shit being on fire and having all the
| dashboards down.
|
| Another happening happens, the services are asked why they
| didn't prevent it or report it being likely -- what do they
| answer? "We can't read the damn messages, so we can't know
| if there is a cell that plans to do it again".
| wartywhoa23 wrote:
| That they're so damn tired being milked and oppressed by the
| organized crime groups calling themselves governments, maybe?
| HeinzStuckeIt wrote:
| That strain of libertarian rhetoric is overwhelmingly
| encountered on American-dominated fora. I won't say it
| doesn't exist in Europe, since Europeans can pick up on
| American internet culture, too, but it is too marginal in
| Europe to affect politics much. There is no significant
| libertarian party in the EU. Some of the far-right parties
| stoking and benefiting from popular discontent even promise
| to uphold the welfare state, but simply deny it to
| immigrants.
| sph wrote:
| Are you aware that anti-big-government and pro-privacy
| political philosophy is not limited to (the joke that is)
| American right-libertarianism?
| HeinzStuckeIt wrote:
| Not as a major political force to which Denmark's Chat
| Control could be responding as the OP claims. Moreover,
| expressions like "milked and oppressed" ring American
| libertarianism to the ears of this European poster who is
| familiar with long years of European cypherpunk activism.
| sph wrote:
| Cypherpunk activism is closer to anarchist ideals, and
| criticism of the State and its coercive power is central
| to its ethos. Yes, citizens are being milked and
| oppressed against a state and a political caste that has
| grown too powerful.
|
| American right-libertarianism is a joke that originally
| started as an anarchist branch and has degenerated into
| getting in bed with the state to further its selfish
| ideals. Criticism of the state has nothing to do with
| those posers, as their goal is solely to become the state
| (i.e. the oppressor), rather than truly pursue the ideal
| of a free society.
| pcrh wrote:
| Half of Europe has living memories of oppressive
| governments, from fascism in Franco's Spain to communism in
| East Europe.
| Muromec wrote:
| The usual stuff.
|
| - members of opposition of the wrong kind (as defined by
| incumbent);
|
| - journalists investigating the government;
|
| (if the incumbent is brazen enough, those above can be _and
| already are_ selectively targeted with paid exploits)
|
| - political opponents of the wrong kind (aka the extrimists,
| which kinda overlaps with #1);
|
| - actual enemy combatants (aka the terrorists), spys and
| traitors;
|
| - organized crime of the day with unwarranted delusions of
| grandeur (R. Taghi, his antics and aspirations to kill the
| Dutch PM);
|
| - immigrants and immigrants to be of the wrong kind and people
| who smuggle them;
| Havoc wrote:
| Dystopian BS. It's unfortunate that we've got people in society
| that are keen on mass surveillance
| sMarsIntruder wrote:
| This Chat Control 2.0 nonsense has to be killed off once for all.
| pcrh wrote:
| The right to privacy is enshrined in the European Convention on
| Human Rights, article 8 [0].
|
| It escapes me how politicians can repeatedly attempt to violate
| this.
|
| [0] https://fra.europa.eu/en/law-reference/european-
| convention-h...
| pfortuny wrote:
| Think of the children.
|
| You want the police to solve crimes, right?
|
| If you are against this it is because you have something to
| hide.
|
| Also it is more than possible that those politicians do not
| agree with that Convention.
| crest wrote:
| Only boring people have nothing to hide.
| ntoskrnl_exe wrote:
| Wow, it's always crazy how the folks who have nothing to hide
| get mad when the lock on the stall door in a public bathroom
| doesn't work...
| sitzkrieg wrote:
| "having something to hide" or defending a human right. who
| cares. easy to tell where this one gets their feed
| 0_gravitas wrote:
| I assumed the post was sarcastic, but Poe's Law I suppose,
| sadly..
| karhuton wrote:
| _"2 There shall be no interference by a public authority with
| the exercise of this right EXCEPT such as is in accordance with
| the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the
| interests of national security, public safety or the economic
| well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or
| crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the
| protection of the rights and freedoms of others."_
|
| Are we reading the same thing?
|
| This linked statement clearly authorizes invasion of privacy by
| public authorities, in the name of any of the very vaguely
| listed reasons - as long as there's some law to allow it.
| pcrh wrote:
| Mass surveillance has already been ruled to be in
| contravention of the Human Rights act:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_8_of_the_European_Conv.
| ..
|
| > _A 2014 report to the UN General Assembly by the United
| Nations ' top official for counter-terrorism and human rights
| condemned mass electronic surveillance as a clear violation
| of core privacy rights guaranteed by multiple treaties and
| conventions and makes a distinction between "targeted
| surveillance" - which "depend[s] upon the existence of prior
| suspicion of the targeted individual or organization" - and
| "mass surveillance", by which "states with high levels of
| Internet penetration can [] gain access to the telephone and
| e-mail content of an effectively unlimited number of users
| and maintain an overview of Internet activity associated with
| particular websites". *Only targeted interception* of traffic
| and location data in order to combat serious crime, including
| terrorism, is justified, according to a decision by the
| European Court of Justice.[23]_
| wmf wrote:
| The loophole there is "targeted" so they'll declare that
| Son of Chat Control is to be targeted.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| Yeah the whole thing is full with these loopholes. Your
| rights are rights only as long as we wish at some point to
| add laws that inhibit them.
| yesco wrote:
| It's weird how "rights" went from "the government can't do
| X to you" to "the government can force private actors to do
| Y (but these rules don't apply to us)."
| realusername wrote:
| It depends the version of the declaration, the french one has
| zero exception listed.
| pcrh wrote:
| It's the same in French (obviously), though equally this
| does not permit mass surveillance:
|
| > _Article 8 de la Convention europeenne de sauvegarde des
| droits de l 'homme et des libertes fondamentales:_
|
| > _Droit au respect de la vie privee et familiale_
|
| > _1. Toute personne a droit au respect de sa vie privee et
| familiale, de son domicile et de sa correspondance._
|
| > _2. Il ne peut y avoir ingerence d 'une autorite publique
| dans l'exercice de ce droit que pour autant que cette
| ingerence est prevue par la loi et qu'elle constitue une
| mesure qui, dans une societe democratique, est necessaire a
| la securite nationale, a la surete publique, au bien-etre
| economique du pays, a la defense de l'ordre et a la
| prevention des infractions penales, a la protection de la
| sante ou de la morale, ou a la protection des droits et
| libertes d'autrui._
|
| --
| Muromec wrote:
| ECHR is a convention with a court hearing the cases, as
| opposed to declarations which is just good vibes PR. Of
| course the actual working instrument has loopholes.
| hunterpayne wrote:
| Is that the same France which arrested the CEO of a E2E
| chat provider (without even trumped up charges) and forced
| them to make backdoors for them?
| Muromec wrote:
| The way it's written and the way ECHR court works, the
| government has to actually argue it's way, not just say
| "national secirity".
|
| ECHR court however can't repeal the law, only fine the
| governmemt for actual violation of convention rights.
| pcrh wrote:
| Is there any mechanism for preventing the introduction of a
| law that violates the ECHR? It would seem obvious that that
| should be the case, no?
| Muromec wrote:
| Not under ECHR, which has twice as much signatories as EU
| has members and the other half is twice less chill
| compared to the EU.
|
| I don't remember whether the EU top court can repeal EU
| laws, but general answer is no. It's politics -- if the
| government is full shitheads that somebody voted for and
| then haven't protested hard enough to boot out -- then
| they can ignore constitution, jail judges, behead
| journalists in a forest and send army to shoot at
| protesters of the wrong kind.
| pcrh wrote:
| Do EU treaties per se contain any language that might be
| relevant to privacy?
|
| It seems axiomatic that legal systems contain provisions
| that prevent their violation. However, democracy requires
| that laws are voted on by elected representatives or
| plebiscites, which can of course mean repealing prior
| laws.
|
| However the EU institutions are not sovereign, which
| might be the loophole here?
|
| Edit: I'm aware that the EU is only afforded
| "competences" given to it by treaties, so perhaps human
| rights don't fall into any of these...?
|
| However, I also wonder if legislation such as Chat
| Control, etc, might fall outside its competences.
|
| In the end, the question is whether there is a legal
| mechanism by which the introduction of laws such as those
| in question here can be prohibited?
| Muromec wrote:
| There is no loophole really, EU can repeal it's own laws
| the same way it passes them -- it needs to get the
| commission, the parliament and enough national
| governments on board.
|
| >Do EU treaties per se contain any language that might be
| relevant to privacy?
|
| Doesn't matter really. No right in any treaty is
| absolute. Not even the right to life itself -- the police
| can and does shoot people and it's legal for them to do
| under specific conditions. And of course the chat control
| law says that whatever it is supposed to be doing should
| be done in the most privacy respecting way possible.
|
| In theory the court (any court really) can weight whether
| the measures are proportionate and whether negative
| obligations (not invade privacy) are in a balance with
| positive obligations (you know -- protective children is
| _also_ important) and whether the balance is appropriate
| of a democratic society.
|
| The problem everybody is trying to not see - there is no
| right to E2E encryption under any law right now. There is
| no right to have a communication channel that government
| _can 't possibly listen to_. It's not a thing. The same
| way there is no right to have your house unsearchable by
| police and your freedom unbound by a court that can jail
| you. There are strict limits when any of those things
| happen, but they do fact happen all the time for good
| reasons and for bad ones too.
|
| Add: if I would attack it from a legal standpoint, I
| would not focus on privacy so much, but rather say that
| creating mass-scaning capability is a threat to the
| democracy itself.
| jayess wrote:
| Good god what a meaningless "right" where all of the
| exceptions eat the rule.
| encom wrote:
| First time?
| Am4TIfIsER0ppos wrote:
| Gotta find those with illegal opinions somehow.
| layer8 wrote:
| Article on Breyer's own site: https://www.patrick-
| breyer.de/en/chat-control-2-0-through-th...
| dang wrote:
| Thanks, we'll put that in the toptext as well.
| stackedinserter wrote:
| Society can't win this without fighting the personalities who
| drive it. In the end, there's a individual that pushes this, so
| this very person should be targeted personally.
|
| Someone said it's an asymmetric conflict, so we need to pull it
| to our (human-size) level and fight on our chessboard.
| mrtksn wrote:
| Denmark has a month and a half as EU presidency to go. I still
| don't get why they want this to be their legacy so badly.
| throw-qqqqq wrote:
| Denmark mostly has authoritative politicians in government.
| Pragmatic and without ideology. The misguided tools believe
| they are doing us all a big favor.
|
| They handwavingly dismiss all privacy-related criticism with
| "well our experts say something else!" and insist there are no
| privacy issues - but at the same time require exemption for
| their own caste.
| dmix wrote:
| The EU and European parliaments are very much on the
| technocracy side, where they defer to experts and studies for
| everything instead of focusing on the popular interests of
| the public
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technocracy
| squigz wrote:
| Look at America to see what happens when things are decided
| based on the popular interests vs actual data and
| expertise.
| 0dayz wrote:
| One does not take out the other, balance is always the
| best.
| squigz wrote:
| I agree; that's just not the impression I got from GP.
| throw-qqqqq wrote:
| I would not categorize Denmark as particularly
| technocratic, on the contrary. Many politicians here go
| against science and research because "I simply disagree".
|
| Populism largely runs Denmark.
| Y-bar wrote:
| Denmark is a strange nation with regards to liberty and
| personal belongings:
|
| https://euromedmonitor.org/en/article/4963/Denmark:-Exemptin.
| ..
| throw-qqqqq wrote:
| This was done to appease the racist voters, who are
| unfortunately a relatively big factor here.
|
| The law was installed in 2016, (colloquially called
| "Smykkeloven"/The Jewelry Law) after Syrian refugees walked
| up through Europe and Denmark, and a myth arose about super
| rich refugees with bags full of gold.. in 2022 this law had
| been used in 17 instances.
|
| I cannot roll my eyes enough at the policians here.
| eastbound wrote:
| Denmark is pretty famous for the fact that people consider
| themselves pretty centrist and moderate, while the policies
| they implement, each analyzed separately, are the most
| leftist of all the EU on all modern topics (ie not
| classical communism of course - just climate change, women,
| immigration etc). But when you're surrounded with
| likeminded people and little diversity of the press, it
| sounds logical.
| zelphirkalt wrote:
| Presumably someone is paying really well to push this over and
| over again.
| thewebguyd wrote:
| There are monied interests and special interest groups behind
| it. No matter who is at the head, it will continue to be pushed
| by these interests.
|
| Europol, Julie Cordua (CEO of Thorn), Cathal Delaney, former
| Europol who now is on Thorn's board, Alan Parker, billionaire
| and founder of the Oak Foundation that's been bankrolling the
| fake charities lobbying for chat control, Chris Cohn, another
| billionaire and hedge fund manager who has been funding anti-
| encryption lobbying in both the US and the EU, Sarah Gardner,
| former Thorn employee and part of the network of fake charities
| lobbying to ban encryption. SHe also focuses on lobbying in the
| US as well, and Maciej Szpunnar, Polish Advocate General and
| the European court of justice, wants to use chat control for
| prosecuting copyright infringement.
|
| And don't forget Peter Hummelgaard: "We must break with the
| totally erroneous perception that it is everyone's civil
| liberty to communite on encrypted messaging services."
|
| So you have a few billionaires running lobbying organizations
| disguised as fake "for the children" charities that operate in
| both the EU and the US, Europol, and a group of powerful people
| that are fundamentally opposed to privacy.
| phba wrote:
| Adding to that from
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorn_(organization):
|
| > Thorn works with a group of technology partners who serve
| the organization as members of the Technology Task Force. The
| goal of the program includes developing technological
| barriers and initiatives to ensure the safety of children
| online and deter sexual predators on the Internet.
|
| > Various corporate members of the task force include
| Facebook, Google, Irdeto, Microsoft, Mozilla, Palantir,
| Salesforce Foundation, Symantec, and Twitter.
|
| Apparently Thorn scratched that list from their current
| website, but the Wiki page has an archive link.
| thewebguyd wrote:
| Worth noting that Thorn also makes scanning software and
| would stand to profit greatly from chat control.
|
| As with all these types of legislation, always follow the
| money.
| WinstonSmith84 wrote:
| Genuine question: is that Denmark reintroducing this proposal?
| It's not clear when it's mentioned "the EU commission's revised
| proposal..." - and second question, if it's "Denmark", who from
| Denmark has the authority to do so? Any elected Danish member
| from the EU council?
| Muromec wrote:
| EU council works like US senate worked before senators were
| elected. So the right answer for who is Danish PM.
|
| Not to be confused with EU parliament which is elected by
| popular vote and EU comission, which is the executive branch
| of EU and us voted in by Parliament
| shevy-java wrote:
| I remember that back a few weeks ago on reddit, before I left it,
| I warned people about this.
|
| Well - colour me not so surprised. The lobbyists are back at it.
|
| I think we need to permanently crush them now. They attack us
| here. This is a war.
| okokwhatever wrote:
| My Europe doing european stuff...
| xyzal wrote:
| The GDPR, DMA, DSA are good.
| varispeed wrote:
| This is an ongoing terrorist attack and authorities fail to stop
| it. Please report these people to the police as attempted
| terrorist attack. People behind Chat Control should be arrested.
|
| A snippet I posted before:
|
| 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.
| probably_wrong wrote:
| While I agree with the sentiment, I don't think hyperbole is
| the solution.
|
| This legislation, while reprehensible, is not terrorism.
| Defining terrorism is particularly difficult (the UN has been
| trying since the 60s and is trying again this year), but if all
| intimidation for political gains is terrorism then so is every
| other political ad from the last 30 years. Banksy would
| probably argue that regular advertising also qualifies - after
| all, that's what the "F" in "FOMO" stands for and beauty
| products are definitely pushing an ideology.
|
| You don't have to like the official definition of terrorism,
| but that doesn't mean that you alone get to decide what it
| should be.
| varispeed wrote:
| The irony is that we only get stuck in semantic arguments
| because the authorities refuse to treat this as the kind of
| act it actually is. If prosecutors applied their own
| standards consistently, we wouldn't be debating vocabulary on
| a message board.
|
| Germany's criminal code already recognises coercion of a
| population for political ends as a serious offence. If a
| private organisation tried to impose a system that eliminated
| private communication, criminalised encryption defaults, and
| created a permanent climate of fear around ordinary speech,
| they wouldn't get a policy debate. They'd get an arrest
| warrant.
|
| The only thing making this "controversial" is institutional
| hesitation. Everyone knows issuing warrants against EU-level
| actors would cause political embarrassment, so we pretend the
| behaviour is something milder, something safer to
| acknowledge. That gap between what the law says and what the
| state is willing to enforce is exactly where tragedies start.
|
| This isn't about inflating the meaning of terrorism. It's
| about refusing to downgrade coercion just because it comes
| from people in respectable offices. Words shouldn't shrink to
| protect those in power. They should describe what is
| happening.
|
| edit: and whilst we are at the semantics - the word
| "terrorism" comes from the French Reign of Terror, where the
| state used fear as an instrument of governance. The original
| meaning was quite literally state-driven intimidation of an
| entire population to enforce ideological conformity.
| maybelsyrup wrote:
| If I'm an EU citizen, who do I call and email to yell at about
| this? I assume my relevant MEP, but anyone else?
| butz wrote:
| https://fightchatcontrol.eu/#contact-tool
| klabb3 wrote:
| This can backfire bigly for the EU. The whole union is sustained
| on shared values and interests. Sneaking in surveillance is
| extremely offputting for the sentiment towards EU in many
| circles. Every member state has plenty of skeptics who want to
| brexit and this is gasoline for them. And rightly so. This isn't
| a fluke from some misinformed non-technical stray politician who
| "wants to save the children" (yes, they exist too), but rather a
| deliberate anti-democratic sabotage of core human rights.
|
| In a nation state, it's easier to pull off authoritarian shifts,
| because citizens will not usually revolt over such things alone.
| But the EU relies on sustained support and a positive image.
| There are already at the very least 10s of thousands EU skeptics
| created from the last wave alone, and probably much much more to
| come.
|
| Zooming out, I think this is the time when the EU is needed the
| most, given the geopolitical developments. Both Russia and China
| are drooling about a scattered Europe consisting of isolated
| small states. That makes it more infuriating. Someone, ideally
| the press, needs to dig into the people behind this and expose
| them.
| ntoskrnl_exe wrote:
| This legislation has a potential to "radicalize" a lot of
| people. I don't agree with many of the decisions by the EU, but
| at the end of the day the pros do outweigh the cons and in a
| hypothetical Brexit-like referendum I wouldn't consider
| agreeing with leaving.
|
| If this passes, however, the pencil in my hand would definitely
| hover above the YES checkbox for a while and, actually, maybe
| even tick it. This alone would be enough of a straw to break
| the camel's back.
| 0dayz wrote:
| Unfortunately I don't think so, it'll be more the writing on
| the wall or the canary ik the coal line but it wont
| radicalize a lot of people I think because this legislation
| won't rock the boat enough unless they fuck it up a la UK age
| verification law.
| nmeofthestate wrote:
| I guessed the term Chat Control had to be made up by opponents of
| the legislation, so searched for the real name. The official name
| of the legislation is: "Proposal for a Regulation of the European
| Parliament and of the Council laying down rules to prevent and
| combat child sexual abuse" (COM/2022/209 FINAL). It is often
| referenced more simply as the "Child Sexual Abuse Regulation"
| (CSA Regulation).
| cheschire wrote:
| Oof good luck trying to convince a popular vote against that.
| MrNeon wrote:
| How Could You Possibly Be Against This?!?!? Regulation
| baal80spam wrote:
| It _will_ eventually pass, it 's EU after all.
| christkv wrote:
| I guess pretty much all of us will become criminals if this
| passes. Have a phone that is running GrapheneOS you are a
| potential criminal. Running linux probably also a potential
| criminal.
| esbranson wrote:
| The "risk-mitigation" loophole in EU Chat Control uses the same
| vague, discretionary language in the Digital Services Act that
| Elon Musk and others warned lets regulators coerce platforms into
| censorship and surveillance.
|
| I think "oops" or "d'oh" are the phrases we're looking for here.
| mk89 wrote:
| Elon Musk said just the truth about EU until now. Why did he do
| that, I don't care, but that's a fact.
|
| Plus, when you see politicians react the way they did, it's
| like a code smell.
| oever wrote:
| The original article says: "The legislative package could be
| greenlit tomorrow in a closed-door EU working group session."
| That was November 12th.
|
| On the 13th, Breyer wrote:
|
| > Yesterday, EU gov'ts rejected changes to mandatory backdoor
| #ChatControl & anonymity-destroying age checks.
|
| https://digitalcourage.social/@echo_pbreyer/1155418089245415...
| isodev wrote:
| Nothing greenlit in a "closed-door EU working group session"
| can become law. These things need to go through all phases of
| legislation including the approval of parliament.
|
| So yes, if you don't like chat control, talk to your MEPs and
| stop voting in populist ministers and council
| members/presidents.
| mk89 wrote:
| It seems it was a matter of time.
|
| Germany first voted against chat control 2.0, then they clarified
| why they were against it, became "undecided". And now "Denmark"
| came out with a (lighter) version "some others" are more willing
| to vote for. [0]
|
| What a joke. In front of our eyes.
|
| Then they wonder why people hate their guts and are becoming
| increasingly violent, euro-skeptical, etc.
|
| [0]: https://euperspectives.eu/2025/09/germany-backtracks-chat/
| hollowturtle wrote:
| > to scan every private message, including those protected by
| end-to-end encryption.
|
| Then it's no end to end, or at least end to end while traveling
| but easily collectible at rest, I mean it already is, who would
| stop meta from collecting messages in clear on the whatsapp ui?
| We should opt for a peer to peer solution or implement one
| Cupprum wrote:
| I sort of hope someone will leak all private information about
| Peter Hummelgaard. He is one of the people behind this proposal,
| just so he would get a taste of his own medicine.
| wmf wrote:
| That would only "prove" that government officials should be
| exempt from government surveillance.
| mszcz wrote:
| Isn't it (ChatControl) also ,,marketed" as ,,safe and
| secure"? If they (politicians) don't have their comms
| backdoored and still get their data stolen, then why would I
| trust them to secure (read ,,safely snoop on") mine or even
| know what they're talking about?
| trallnag wrote:
| This shady approach of trying it again and again is so disgusting
| to me. Just be upfront about. If you will do it anyway at some
| point, just fucking do it. It's not like other countries like
| China that are much further than we are in this regard are in
| constant turmoil over it. I guess we won't be either.
|
| Instead we take a moral high ground over Russia banning and
| blocking what are basically non-compliant messaging platforms and
| pushing Russian citizens to Max, which is controlled by the
| government. All the while these legislations in Europe will lead
| to the same end result.
|
| How am I supposed to to argue against chat control in Russia when
| we are doing it too, just with a different twist.
| amarant wrote:
| Again? Seriously? We shut them down, what, last week? They really
| are going for the activism fatigue approach aren't they?
|
| I wonder if one could train an LLM to automatically protest all
| the new chat-control? This is getting ridiculous.
| tomsmeding wrote:
| > According to Breyer, the existing voluntary system has already
| proven flawed, with German police reporting that roughly half of
| all flagged cases turn out to be irrelevant.
|
| A failure rate of only 50% is _absurdly good_ for a system like
| this. If we have to:
|
| > Imagine your phone scanning every conversation with your
| partner, your daughter, your therapist, and leaking it just
| because the word 'love' or 'meet' appears somewhere.
|
| then apparently either there are so many perpetrators that
| regular conversations with partners etc. are about as common as
| crime, or such regular conversations don't have such a high risk
| of being reported after all.
|
| I don't think chat surveillance is a good idea. But please use
| transparent and open communication. Don't manipulate us just like
| the enemy does.
| periodjet wrote:
| But I was told that the EU was the good guys...
| srcreigh wrote:
| Isn't there precedent for many other governments secretly or
| openly doing exactly this? Snowden etc?
|
| There's an arms race element to this that I don't see people
| discussing.
|
| Do EU citizens have any privacy from US tech? Is there anything
| to protect?
|
| Do we want the USA to have exclusive right to spy on the world?
|
| Is it better to have 1 Big Brother or 10?
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