German government comes out against Chat Control • Hacker News Board

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#211

Post by awesome_dude » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 1:23 AM UTC

awesome_dude wrote: post #140

seabass-labrax wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure that's relevant to Chat Control. What's at stake here is not a definition of 'acceptable communication' in public, but the possibility of all private communication being scanned. That's not to say that private communication can't already be illegal; mere 'conspiracy' is a crime in many places. Yet the level of surveillance that would be enabled by legislation like Chat Control is greater than any other i…

My comment is 100% relevant to the comment I was replying to. (Sometimes I do wish people who down vote were forced to comment why they were making such erroneous decisions)

And again with the passive aggressive "downvote because you have no ability to explain your disagreement"

Edit: To anyone reading and thinking of joining in to any of the discussions, the message is clear - Facebook or Reddit level of inanity is all you will find here.

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#212

Post by regularjack » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 1:40 AM UTC

ZeroConcerns wrote: post #3

OK, really hot take here: -ChatControl, as it is currently defined, is not going to happen, because it's absolutely stupid and would make impossible, amongst other things, online banking -Yet, there is a growing and legitimate demand for lawful interception of 'chat' services. I mean, "sure, your bank account got emptied, but we can't look into that because it happened via Signal" just isn't a good look -So, somethin…

Nothing has to give. Police did their work fine for centuries, they can continue doing it without mass surveillance.

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#213

Post by aleph_minus_one » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 1:42 AM UTC

uniqueuid wrote: post #132

hackandthink wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a lot of censorship in Germany. People do not care. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_Germany https://www.lto.de/recht/hintergruende/h/russia-today-verbot...

Nitpick: 1. Censorship in German constitutional law is only defined as the state pre-screening before publication. That's a very narrow area and rarely applies. Most people from an US legal tradition will consider censorship to include other things such as mandating removal of certain content after the fact, but that's different legal branches with different mechanisms (i.e. libel). 2. What Schulz is talking about in…

> Most people from an US legal tradition will consider censorship to include other things such as mandating removal of certain content after the fact

Such as removals because of copyright claims?

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#214

Post by adastra22 » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 1:45 AM UTC

zaphar wrote: post #116

peterlk wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because, similar to the US, they have authoritarian tendencies - strong nationalism and anti-immigration. How are you going to round up the bad people if you don't have surveillance everywhere?

I am unclear on how strong nationalism is an authoritarian signal. Can you go into more detail there?

Do you know the history of nationalism in Europe, and Germany in particular? Hint: it’s the “Na” part of “Nazi.”

You are getting downvoted because this pretty basic stuff. Either you’re part of today’s lucky 10k, or your post reads very much like far-right Gish galloping.

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#215

Post by dinkumthinkum » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 1:56 AM UTC

layer8 wrote: post #79

TylerLives wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are they pushing for it?

No, they position themselves against it, because they have a narrative similar to the (former) “deep state” narrative in the US, but you can be assured that they will reverse course as soon as they can afford it.

Who is the "far right" in Germany? Is it just anyone you disagree with? And, if it is the AfD being "far right" ... ok :/

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#216

Post by coderenegade » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 2:00 AM UTC

tvier wrote: post #174

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first one is bad indeed, but what's so "authoritarian" about the rest? > https://www.bundestag.de/webarchiv/textarchiv/2018/kw08-de-v... Other European countries like Switzerland, also banned full face veils(burqas) in public. Try entering a bank, city hall, school, etc with a balaclava, ski mask or motorcycle helmet see how that goes. > https://dserver.bundestag.de/btd/19/304/1930412.pdf Allowing the surveillanc…

Controlling how people dress sounds pretty authoritarian to me. The fact that it's currently not acceptable to enter a bank with a covered face would indicate a law banning it in all public locations is not needed. Taking rights away from people labelled as terrorists is a pretty standard way for governments to control viewpoints. It gives them the power to add any group they don't like to a list, and deport/imprison…

To play devil's advocate, isn't it illegal wear a swastika in Germany? How is wearing a burqa, a symbol of female oppression any different?

Freedom of religion only goes so far, because the culture of the host country takes precedence. To take it to the extreme, if there were a religion where part of standard practice involved assaulting women and children, we would obviously limit those practices.

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#217

Post by dinkumthinkum » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 2:05 AM UTC

peterlk wrote: post #109

zaphar wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not familiar with the far right in Germany. Why should we be assured that they will reverse course as soon as they can afford it?

Because, similar to the US, they have authoritarian tendencies - strong nationalism and anti-immigration. How are you going to round up the bad people if you don't have surveillance everywhere?

Authoritarian? You're saying this because of immigration; this comes from a position that is basically open borders. It is an interesting double standard. The people that hold this position would not consider non-Western countries that don't want to have open borders or have dramatic demographic shifts in their population and culture to be "authoritarian." This whole notion of "rounding up the bad people" is just infantile leftist stuff. How do you have a sovereign country if you are not able to have a policy that prevents unfettered 'immigration' or unable to deport those that immigrated contrary to law?

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#218

Post by pabs3 » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 2:06 AM UTC

ZeroConcerns wrote: post #3

OK, really hot take here: -ChatControl, as it is currently defined, is not going to happen, because it's absolutely stupid and would make impossible, amongst other things, online banking -Yet, there is a growing and legitimate demand for lawful interception of 'chat' services. I mean, "sure, your bank account got emptied, but we can't look into that because it happened via Signal" just isn't a good look -So, somethin…

Lawful intercept equipment is often targeted by criminals and nation states, the entire concept is extremely dangerous.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_global_telecommunications... https://unshakled.org/salt-typhoon-the-unintended-consequenc... https://group2000.com/articles/a-wake-up-call-for-securing-l...

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#219

Post by LargoLasskhyfv » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 2:10 AM UTC

In my eyes this is just a technicality.

"Mit der CDU/CSU wird es keine anlasslose Chatkontrolle geben, wie sie von einigen Staaten in der EU gefordert wird."

Anlass is cause/reason here, so keine anlasslose literally translated means: not without cause/reason.

What about "reasonable causes", and the infrastructure enabling those? Be it legal/bureaucratic/technical? IMO it's already in place, mostly, and got abused many times, already.

This is just "weasel wording", changing nothing for so called "lawful interception".

If you got flagged by some algorithm somewhere, or got reported by someone behind your back, there will be Anlass!

Automagically...

Because neither the algorithms, nor the organizations handling the flagging, enabling the reporting are transparent.

They are unaccountable (to the public/affected) black boxes by design, be it for economic, organizational, or political reasons.

Inevitably leading to kafkaesque absurdities like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trial

Re: German government comes out against Chat Control

#220

Post by dinkumthinkum » Wed, Oct 08, 2025, 2:11 AM UTC

adastra22 wrote: post #214

zaphar wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am unclear on how strong nationalism is an authoritarian signal. Can you go into more detail there?

Do you know the history of nationalism in Europe, and Germany in particular? Hint: it’s the “Na” part of “Nazi.” You are getting downvoted because this pretty basic stuff. Either you’re part of today’s lucky 10k, or your post reads very much like far-right Gish galloping.

I don't know. It seems like from what you saying that you and honestly an enormous amount of people need to actually learn about 20th century European history and WWII. People are throwing around these terms of NAZI and Gestapo and all of this and I think they have no idea what they mean. The left is not against authoritarian. The left does not even want to really eliminate the police. They just want to be the ones to decide who are the thought-criminals and what to do with them. Also, that is not what Gish galloping. I don't know what is happening here.