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Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

simplex.chat

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Re: Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

#2
I'm happy to have a discussion about this, but I don't buy that end-to-end encryption will, overall, increase children's safety. I'm happy to see strong evidence one way of the other, but this article is very one-sided.

Child grooming on the internet is a huge problem, and I suspect (again, happy to see evidence against it) it's better to allow scanning of children's communications, rather than ensuring their communication with whoever they are talking to is end-to-end encrypted.

I don't think it's reasonable to make this the parent's responsibility, when basically the whole world is internet connected, and those parents are fighting against multi-billion dollar international corporations, who dedicate huge teams of highly paid people to ensuring children get addicted to their platforms. Looking at the children in my life, it's very hard to keep them off social media, even if you don't give them devices they will just use their friend's, or devices at school.

Re: Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

#3
You cannot say flat-out say that E2E alone must be maintained, you must make it harder for others to reach you, thru something done in-person/screen-only QR-code, Bluetooth'd contact vCard, ..., something that prevents drive-by spammers/perps/malicious actors from randomly attaching to an account.

The key thing is to make distribution of account name harder:

1. Send 256-char hash of your account 2. They tag your hash with a name of their own choice

Disassociative of name to account gets maintained when used with a Signal protocol, which is what Signal app can do.

Again, weak sauce on claiming E2E is alone essential for child's privacy.

Re: Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

#4

I'm happy to have a discussion about this, but I don't buy that end-to-end encryption will, overall, increase children's safety. I'm happy to see strong evidence one way of the other, but this article is very one-sided. Child grooming on the internet is a huge problem, and I suspect (again, happy to see evidence against it) it's better to allow scanning of children's communications, rather than ensuring their communi…

Most of the abuse already happens on "responsible" platforms that provide zero expectation of privacy, like Discord.

Scanners are just not good at finding anyone but second-degree consumers, and that seems to happen more on web forums (and also, focusing attention here doesn't get rid of producers).

Re: Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

#5
post #3

You cannot say flat-out say that E2E alone must be maintained, you must make it harder for others to reach you, thru something done in-person/screen-only QR-code, Bluetooth'd contact vCard, ..., something that prevents drive-by spammers/perps/malicious actors from randomly attaching to an account. The key thing is to make distribution of account name harder: 1. Send 256-char hash of your account 2. They tag your hash…

How do you know what's running on Signal's server?

Sidenote: Signal is based in the USA. They do not have the benefit of the doubt.

Re: Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

#6
I find the argument a bit weak because client side scanning is not the same as creating a central store for all send images. I do indeed find it very concerning that flagged content will eventually be looked at by a human, and said human may be a criminal, or said human and her computers will indeed be the target of hackers looking to extort.

Would be nice if this scenario would first play out for a politician that helped establish Chat Control.

Re: Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

#7

I'm happy to have a discussion about this, but I don't buy that end-to-end encryption will, overall, increase children's safety. I'm happy to see strong evidence one way of the other, but this article is very one-sided. Child grooming on the internet is a huge problem, and I suspect (again, happy to see evidence against it) it's better to allow scanning of children's communications, rather than ensuring their communi…

> those parents are fighting against multi-billion dollar international corporations, who dedicate huge teams of highly paid people to ensuring children get addicted to their platforms

So why not put a stop to this then?

With any luck we'll come to realise that these platforms and the people working on them are the same scum that run the tobacco industry.

Re: Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

#8
post #3

You cannot say flat-out say that E2E alone must be maintained, you must make it harder for others to reach you, thru something done in-person/screen-only QR-code, Bluetooth'd contact vCard, ..., something that prevents drive-by spammers/perps/malicious actors from randomly attaching to an account. The key thing is to make distribution of account name harder: 1. Send 256-char hash of your account 2. They tag your hash…

How do you know what's running on Signal's server? Sidenote: Signal is based in the USA. They do not have the benefit of the doubt.

You have association revealed openly to anyone having access to Signal server by User ID but barely know the name or phone associated with either end, much less ever able to see any actual and readable message content.

Unless it is the end-device being "accessed"/compromised, which any nation-state can do.

Re: Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

#9

I'm happy to have a discussion about this, but I don't buy that end-to-end encryption will, overall, increase children's safety. I'm happy to see strong evidence one way of the other, but this article is very one-sided. Child grooming on the internet is a huge problem, and I suspect (again, happy to see evidence against it) it's better to allow scanning of children's communications, rather than ensuring their communi…

> those parents are fighting against multi-billion dollar international corporations, who dedicate huge teams of highly paid people to ensuring children get addicted to their platforms So why not put a stop to this then? With any luck we'll come to realise that these platforms and the people working on them are the same scum that run the tobacco industry.

I completely agree with you, we will look back on the big social media companies exactly the same way we look at big tobacco, they knew all along the damage they were causing, and spent heroic efforts covering it up to make profits.

Re: Protecting Children's Safety Requires End-to-End Encryption

#10

I'm happy to have a discussion about this, but I don't buy that end-to-end encryption will, overall, increase children's safety. I'm happy to see strong evidence one way of the other, but this article is very one-sided. Child grooming on the internet is a huge problem, and I suspect (again, happy to see evidence against it) it's better to allow scanning of children's communications, rather than ensuring their communi…

It could done though, via in channel-system- analysing communication, communicating to parties outside the black box, without monitoring the conversation otherwise. If the NNaNNy detects inapropriate conversations by parties underage, it calls the police.
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