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Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat Control [pdf]

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Re: Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat Control [pdf]

#111

Post by varispeed »

quotemstr wrote: post #30

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"

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.

Re: Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat Control [pdf]

#112

Post by zamadatix »

varispeed wrote: post #111
quotemstr wrote: post #30

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"

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 t…

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.

Re: Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat Control [pdf]

#115

Post by kwar13 »

layer8 wrote: post #40
quotemstr wrote: post #30

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"

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.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children

Re: Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat Control [pdf]

#116

Post by varispeed »

zamadatix wrote: post #112
varispeed wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 t…

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.

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.

Re: Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat Control [pdf]

#117

Post by jMyles »

permo-w wrote: post #108
jMyles wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

one nitpick: CSAM isn't likely to be text that can be plaintext, is it? surely it would be image and/or video?

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.

Re: Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat Control [pdf]

#118

Post by thaumasiotes »

thadt wrote: post #42
kekqqq wrote: post #4

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.

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.

> 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.

Re: Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat Control [pdf]

#119

Post by martin-t »

varispeed wrote: post #111
quotemstr wrote: post #30

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"

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 t…

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.

Re: Germany must stand firmly against client-side scanning in Chat Control [pdf]

#120

Post by aniviacat »

ls612 wrote: post #73
oytis wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought Apple already voluntary implemented it on their devices?

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 thi…

Are they really? I'd be surprised if a substantial portion of WhatsApp users even know what end-to-end encryption is.
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