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Chat Control Must Be Stopped

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Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#101

Post by Tade0 »

jonaharagon wrote: post #63
zmmmmm wrote: post #57

Of all the arguments presented I'm surprised to see absent the one that seems most obvious to me: encryption is just math, there's no way to actually ban it. If criminals think their conversations are going to be detected they aren't going to just say "oh well let's not crime now". They are going to simply spin up their own e2e encrypted channels. The software is nearly trivial, the technical barriers are very low -…

> They start outlawing encryption altogether? This is the direction places like the UK have gone in, yes. Can't decrypt something? Then we assume it is illegal content.

Steganography it is then. Can't assume something is illegal, if it's hidden.

Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#102

Post by bojo »

deadbabe wrote: post #87

Sometimes I think if this stuff ever got really bad, abandoning smart phones altogether wouldn’t be so bad. I’m already taking most photos with a dedicated digital camera and they are so much better than phone captured images. I hate social media these days and am waiting to give myself a reason to delete all the apps and my accounts entirely. The internet is a shithole, most my search is done through LLMs and my int…

This was my thought as well. Back to dumb devices and call it a day.

Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#103

Post by mr90210 »

HPsquared wrote: post #52
CGMthrowaway wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wonder why there has been such silence on this Yes, I would think that if there were any real journalism left, they would be all over this. For the sake of their profession, and the protection of their sources.

Maybe it's safer not to say anything.

Safer for whom?

Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#104

Post by bigfishrunning »

Humorist2290 wrote: post #10

> Chat Control would make it mandatory for all service providers (text messaging, email, social media, cloud storage, hosting services, etc.) to scan all communications and all files (including end-to-end encrypted ones), in order to supposedly detect whatever the government deems "abusive material." I wonder why there has been such silence on this, with the exception of a handful of well written blog posts. The scop…

"including end-to-end encrypted ones"

How? If they're end-to-end encrypted, they really can't be monitored unless there's a flaw in the encryption system. Don't trust messages to systems that aren't auditable.

Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#105

Post by didibus »

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #23

As many, many critics have pointed out, the EU claiming to defend human rights, protect free speech, and respect personal privacy, is demonstrably nothing more than a fictional moral high ground. Russia and China are in your face and obvious about where they stand, and don't mind being a boolean of true. The EU just prefers some subtlety with more politically correct and polite wording, and prefers a float of 0.92. P…

I think the issue is that the EU believes to do these things above corruption. In a sense, if you think you are upholding human rights, free speech, and personal privacy, you don't think it is required to offer people ways to hide from the government.

The government thinks the rule of law itself is good enough. Even if they are aware of your speech and it criticizes or shock or whatever the currently elected, they believe nothing could be done against you because the rule of law would protect your right to do so.

Therefore they assume if you have to be secret about it, you must be doing something illegal, otherwise they don't see why you would worry about the government being able to know you are doing it, since they could not do anything against you.

Here for example, they assume that it would only be used to catch and prevent CSAM, which is illegal. But that it would never be abused to prevent legitimate legal free speech, or that it would be done in a way that your privacy is respected because the rule of law won't allow other use of "snooping", etc.

And to be honest, I don't know if they are completely wrong or right. It's a different perspective, one that relates to "gun control" as well.

In the US, people have zero trust of government, and feel like at any point they need to be armed and have the means to hide, escape, and rebel against it. That means secure communication channels, bearing arms, etc.

In the EU, generally people assume that the systems in place will protect the institutions and upheld the rule of law, constitutions, democratic freedoms, etc. And people trust the system in place, so they don't see why individual citizens should be allowed to have weapons, places to hide, etc., and see that more in practice as something that enables crime.

Generally, the counter argument to the American stance is that the power imbalance is too big anyways, it's the system that must be protected and needs to be trusted, if the system becomes corrupt, no amount of civilian weapon and hiding places could match the power the state has, so it's a futile attempt that just ends up benefiting criminals.

Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#106

Post by Terr_ »

bigfishrunning wrote: post #104
Humorist2290 wrote: post #10

> Chat Control would make it mandatory for all service providers (text messaging, email, social media, cloud storage, hosting services, etc.) to scan all communications and all files (including end-to-end encrypted ones), in order to supposedly detect whatever the government deems "abusive material." I wonder why there has been such silence on this, with the exception of a handful of well written blog posts. The scop…

"including end-to-end encrypted ones" How? If they're end-to-end encrypted, they really can't be monitored unless there's a flaw in the encryption system. Don't trust messages to systems that aren't auditable.

Most likely the service-provided will have simply a copy of the key. Encryption without protection.

Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#107

Post by thw_9a83c »

eigenspace wrote: post #99
thw_9a83c wrote: post #94

As both an EU citizen and a computer programmer, I applaud this article, and I generally agree with its sentiment. But let's be realistic. Chat control is going to happen sooner or later. This is a Hacker News forum. The audience here is very knowledgeable about computer science and fully aware of how technologically impractical the idea of fighting CSAM in this way is. But the general public is somewhere else entire…

I dont think it should be taken as a given that it'll happen. While this may be something the public is generally in favour of or ambivalent towards, there's a LOT of EU countries and MEPs that are not at all in favour of this, and already a few EU countries whose courts have ruled that this would violate their constitutions. While its certainly possible it'll happen, it's far from certain. It can be stopped. Of all…

I know there are some countries that are surprisingly sane in this respect, and Germany is one of them. Also, the EU parliament is probably still mostly against it, too. So it will certainly be some time before this happens. However, we should never underestimate the "salami" method, this matter will certainly go through.

Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#108

Post by hackinthebochs »

isaacremuant wrote: post #68

This is 1984 installing a camera in your room to monitor your private conversations and criminalize them. That's it. It means that the government asserts the right to bug all your conversations. They've already assured the right to put you in prison for dissenting with the government on policy and you have little to no recourse. Now it's this. You loved this during covid, you'll love this now, "or else". Signed, your…

You're right. I've been comparing it to 1984 all this time, when in fact it literally is 1984 just with modern technology. It's interesting how the story 1984 strikes a chord in many people, but something like Chat Control just seems normal. I guess having a camera in your house feels more invasive on a visceral level, despite the fact that we're now putting our whole lives on our phones and online services.

Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#109

Post by shiandow »

bigfishrunning wrote: post #104
Humorist2290 wrote: post #10

> Chat Control would make it mandatory for all service providers (text messaging, email, social media, cloud storage, hosting services, etc.) to scan all communications and all files (including end-to-end encrypted ones), in order to supposedly detect whatever the government deems "abusive material." I wonder why there has been such silence on this, with the exception of a handful of well written blog posts. The scop…

"including end-to-end encrypted ones" How? If they're end-to-end encrypted, they really can't be monitored unless there's a flaw in the encryption system. Don't trust messages to systems that aren't auditable.

You will be forced to run surveillance on yourself on your own device.

No you will not have freedom to choose how to use your own property.

Re: Chat Control Must Be Stopped

#110

Post by petertodd »

bigfishrunning wrote: post #104
Humorist2290 wrote: post #10

> Chat Control would make it mandatory for all service providers (text messaging, email, social media, cloud storage, hosting services, etc.) to scan all communications and all files (including end-to-end encrypted ones), in order to supposedly detect whatever the government deems "abusive material." I wonder why there has been such silence on this, with the exception of a handful of well written blog posts. The scop…

"including end-to-end encrypted ones" How? If they're end-to-end encrypted, they really can't be monitored unless there's a flaw in the encryption system. Don't trust messages to systems that aren't auditable.

Chat control will require client-side AI scanning of all messages, bypassing end-to-end encryption. Since the AI will be an unauditable blackbox, it will make it effectively illegal to have secure end-to-end encryption.

Yes, it is that fascist.

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