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The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

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Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#221

Post by Grumbledour »

It's quite interesting, that while this topic comes up from time to time (it has been going on a long time after all already), people on here seem to seldom talk about the organizations that lobby for this proposal for years, with big ties to the US and intelligence agencies. So this is by no means just an European phenomenon but there seems to be a much bigger agenda behind it all.

Now, at the moment, I don't have a good english language source, but I am sure someone else could provide one?

Here is a german language one[0], from netzpolitik.org, who follow chat control for years now an have many articles going in depth about this. I am sure you could use translation software to read it until someone provides a better source. (And if you have not heard of this, you should!)

And while someone already linked to patrick breyers website[1] which has a good overview, I do so again so maybe more people will see it. This thing is not new, but it is also not easily ignored and everyone should be informed whats going on here. They will try to pass this again and again since they have done for years now and it's mostly been close calls until now.

[0] https://netzpolitik.org/2023/anlasslose-massenueberwachung-r...

[1] https://www.patrick-breyer.de/en/posts/chat-control/

Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#222

Post by morkalork »

ghusto wrote: post #194
ekianjo wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

open source wont save you. if they make encryption without backdoor illegal they will just throw you in jail

They will once they catch you doing it, yes. The people who this _won't_ stop however, are criminals.

Seeing that carve out for Google with non-licensed androids being banned from the age verification app., it looks like there's going to be a heavy swing towards trusted devices and apps. in general. Perhaps untrusted ones will be blocked from carrier networks. And then what? You'll be able to have phones with your own custom apps/chat installed that's useless, or phones that are useful but you're stuck with only official, compromised apps.

Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#223

Post by pieter_mj »

westpfelia wrote: post #14

"the EU wants to scan your messages" implies its every member state and not one freak from Denmark putting this forward where it will die. The EU has always been 90 days from passing mass surveliance for the last decade. Until member states start actually backing this these articles are nothing but click bait.

This time it is happening. Global geopolitical forces are coalescing.

Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#224

Post by pieter_mj »

EtienneK wrote: post #97
westpfelia wrote: post #14

"the EU wants to scan your messages" implies its every member state and not one freak from Denmark putting this forward where it will die. The EU has always been 90 days from passing mass surveliance for the last decade. Until member states start actually backing this these articles are nothing but click bait.

The day we stop making noise is the day they will pass this.

This time it will pass while we're making noise. I've done so for a long time, now it's different.

Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#225

Post by andrepd »

saubeidl wrote: post #184
andrepd wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The electoral college is a rubber stamp of the popular vote (per state). The commission is selected by the member-states governments with no electoral input. You cannot be making this argument in good faith...

The member-states governments are elected by popular vote, per state, just as electors are. It is the same level of indirection, whichever way you try to reframe it.

There's no way you're seriously making this argument. I don't know what else to say except repeat myself.

The US electoral college is an historical artifact that simply rubber stamps the votes of the States. The member states' heads of government make the decision themselves! The equivalent would be the electoral college simply voting for the president themselves.

Jesus christ.

Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#226

Post by saubeidl »

andrepd wrote: post #225
saubeidl wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The member-states governments are elected by popular vote, per state, just as electors are. It is the same level of indirection, whichever way you try to reframe it.

There's no way you're seriously making this argument. I don't know what else to say except repeat myself. The US electoral college is an historical artifact that simply rubber stamps the votes of the States. The member states' heads of government make the decision themselves ! The equivalent would be the electoral college simply voting for the president themselves. Jesus christ.

> The equivalent would be the electoral college simply voting for the president themselves.

That is... exactly what they are doing?

Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#227

Post by jenadine »

john_the_writer wrote: post #124
zelphirkalt wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only needs to succeed once. It only takes some incapable judges, who don't have any idea how encryption works, and of those I am certain there are many. Once such a thing gets through, it would take time to be reversed, if at all possible. Whoever puts forth such ideas should be the first to show all their private communication. It shouldn't just be for the common citizens. How quickly the idea would be dropped ...

I've often countered the "if you've got nothing to hide" by taking out a bit of paper, and asking for their social and email passwords. "nothing to hide."

"I don't trust you, but I trust the police, and the government"

Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#228

Post by t0bia_s »

Roark66 wrote: post #201
hcfman wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately the EU is far from democratic. The people making these decisions are allowed to be anonymous as well.

Not quite, the people making these decisions are all in EU commission and they are there because they were submitted by their national parties. Also there is the EU parliament that contains people that also belong to national parties. If they look like they support a very unpopular decision a big public backlash can definitely make them reconsider. Depending on how secure they are in the national politics. For exampl…

EU commission and they are there because they were submitted by their national parties.

Members of EU commission are nominated by the European Council and elected by the European Parliament. Principle of subsidiary is absolutely abolished and far from direct democracy.

Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#229

Post by rsync »

sunshine-o wrote: post #167

I was reflecting on the whole chat apps and protocols the other day and felt we might just have trapped ourselves artificially. If I want to casually keep in touch with a friend, I am supposed to have the following options: - SMS/RCS: no need for an app but is controlled - WhatsApp: no good to many reasons - Signal: how can you believe it is not controlled once it becomes the mandatory app in the US Gov. - Matrix: gr…

I don't have a need for secure chat at this moment but if I did ...

I would just find a simple SSH application and give it to all of the chat participants.

Then I would establish a 1U server that I own and control, or even a raspi in my own house, and have everyone log in to run some simple (and old) version of 'talk' - presumably one that has a "wall" feature.

Very simple and very low trust.

Further, the exploit(s) required to infiltrate this are extremely valuable and also hyper specific.

I would have to be an extremely valuable and urgent target for any actor to burn an honest-to-god OpenSSH 0day on ... or a remote root FreeBSD exploit of a system running nothing but OpenSSH.

Bonus points if no ports are open and you have to knock ... which suggests a threat model of remote root vuln on a system with no ports open.

FWIW I have no use for such an edifice.

Re: The EU could be scanning your chats by October 2025

#230

Post by rsync »

sunshine-o wrote: post #210
pimterry wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In a way we just need MQTT servers, a client with reliable push notifications and a manual key exchange mechanism. That would be really hard for govs to target. Go even further: Meshtastic ( https://meshtastic.org/ ). P2P E2EE texting, primarily via LoRa mesh (a mesh of long-range low-bandwidth direct radio connections) plus MQTT backup, with surprisingly nice UX even for non-techies. You can message people directl…

Agree I love those LoRa devices & Meshtastic, but it requires your contacts to invest and carry additional hardware. Now the most exiting project in that space IMHO is Reticulum because you can transparently mix transports: any radio (incl LoRa), TCP, UDP, etc. [0] Their Sideband app [1] is not as polished as Meshtastic but you can start over the standard Internet, or I2P, yggdrasil and slowly introduce LoRa among yo…

See my comment above.

SSH into a UNIX host and 'talk'.

KISS.

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