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EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

cointelegraph.com

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Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#41

Post by snarf21 »

integralid wrote: post #25

I'm against any kind of censorship, chat scanning and privacy violations. Nevertheless: >Telegram founder Pavel Durov warned that France risks societal collapse if it continues down a path of political censorship and regulatory overreach. Durov was arrested in France in August 2024 after being accused of failing to moderate his app to reduce criminality Telegram is the messenger of choice for cybercriminals (not sign…

So there was no crime before Telegram? These kinds of things won't be used to stop malware or cybercrime anyway. They'll be used even more by those in power to subvert. The criminals will just move to another operating scheme.

Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#42

Post by rendaw »

integralid wrote: post #25

I'm against any kind of censorship, chat scanning and privacy violations. Nevertheless: >Telegram founder Pavel Durov warned that France risks societal collapse if it continues down a path of political censorship and regulatory overreach. Durov was arrested in France in August 2024 after being accused of failing to moderate his app to reduce criminality Telegram is the messenger of choice for cybercriminals (not sign…

If it's really illegal stuff, why can't the groups be taken down via legal channels? Providers shouldn't be in charge of doing extra-due-process punishment.

Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#43

Post by progbits »

azmodeus wrote: post #37
sackfield wrote: post #32

This pops up every few years, and I bet once it gets in it never goes away. It seems asymmetric that one side only has to win once to win permanently while the other side has to win constantly. Is there any mechanism to stop this in the EU and make this kind of legislation explicitly barred?

Vote them out and never vote for their parties in your general elections If your Member of European Parliament supports chat control stop voting for their parties and politically support their opposition

Not good enough. They can get in again next election.

Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#44

Post by efitz »

Do citizens in the EU actually want this?

If not, how are EU politicians so disconnected from their citizens? How did this state of affairs come to be? Is it reversible?

In the US, our politicians don’t diverge quite as much, but when they do, the reason is money, and when it gets bad, we throw the bums out and elect populists. It’s not pretty and it’s messy but it self corrects with the next election if it doesn’t work out how people wanted.

Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#45

Post by Y_Y »

sackfield wrote: post #32

This pops up every few years, and I bet once it gets in it never goes away. It seems asymmetric that one side only has to win once to win permanently while the other side has to win constantly. Is there any mechanism to stop this in the EU and make this kind of legislation explicitly barred?

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

Like when the Irish electorate rejected the Lisbon Treaty, and then was then harangued into accepting a reheated version. Opponents of the treaty reasonably asked if it could be best-of-three.

Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#46

Post by hsuduebc2 »

Even though it goes against all my beliefs and values, I still see it primarily as a desperate attempt to gain at least some means of control over encrypted tools — which are, in fact, constantly used for criminal activity. The endlessly recycled “think of the children” argument is laughably pathetic. I don't understand why they don't present the real and much more reasonable justifications — such as terrorism in Europe or the spread of propaganda, which is a genuine issue here. But those reasons likely don’t sell as well with populists.

That said, I wouldn’t be surprised if this turned into a European version of the Patriot Act — where the state takes advantage of the fact that people have become desensitized, and everyone ends up being monitored 24/7. In the end, every citizen would be under surveillance, while criminals would simply download an app that doesn’t comply with this absurd requirement.

Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#47

Post by messe »

Y_Y wrote: post #45
sackfield wrote: post #32

This pops up every few years, and I bet once it gets in it never goes away. It seems asymmetric that one side only has to win once to win permanently while the other side has to win constantly. Is there any mechanism to stop this in the EU and make this kind of legislation explicitly barred?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratification_of_the_Treaty_of_... Like when the Irish electorate rejected the Lisbon Treaty, and then was then harangued into accepting a reheated version. Opponents of the treaty reasonably asked if it could be best-of-three.

> and then was then harangued into accepting a reheated version

After receiving concessions.

Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#48

Post by tolmasky »

myrmidon wrote: post #36
izzydata wrote: post #10

I assume this is just a police state overreach rather than genuine intent to stop crime. They must know that anyone actually engaging in criminal activity is going to not be caught by this because they use other forms of encrypted communication.

I'm not saying that this is NOT police state overreach, but the assumption that all (or even most) criminals practice good operational security still seems laughable to me. I think you are letting your ideological alignment (against surveillance state) push you into irrational standpoints ("more surveillance would not catch additional criminals"). I'm 100% with you on opposing legislation like this, but it is very im…

I think the slightly more sophisticated position is that, regardless of the operational security that is currently employed, if you were to implement something like this, then criminals would quickly adapt to improve their operational security accordingly. Especially because "operational security" in this case is doing a lot of heavy lifting to obscure how easy it would be: just use a good E2E messenger.

This is not some wild hypothetical, the recent explosion in VPN use by every country that has implemented an age restriction law should be sufficient to display this effect in place. In a world without weird country restrictions (whether that be intellectual property restrictions or content restrictions), VPNs would be a niche technology for business. Instead unbelievably large amounts of the general population are now not only using it, but paying for it.

I think the assumption that criminals would not learn how to use one of the many free E2E encrypted messengers is the deluded and naive position.

Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#49

Post by Bender »

The first mitigation steps that come to mind:

- Keep casual conversations on mainstream crap to be reachable by the masses and give the appearance of being monitored.

- Send friends to a tiny URL that redirects to a tiny ephemeral private anonymous chat instance running entirely in RAM with an IP certificate [0] once available to remove domain name ownership from the picture. When done with that chat edit redirect to be something benign and wipe the chat instance. Block most crawlers using Anubis [1] and some other tricks. Chat crawlers that validate URL's are usually very obvious.

I would wager HN could come up with 1000% more clever ideas.

[0] - https://letsencrypt.org/2025/07/01/issuing-our-first-ip-addr...

[1] - https://github.com/TecharoHQ/anubis

Re: EU proposal to scan all private messages gains momentum

#50

Post by gjsman-1000 »

9rx wrote: post #40
NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if it were true (and it might be) that these people would commit less-or-none abuse if they can continue to have access to the csam, the existence of the csam itself necessitates abuse. It seems akin to child sacrifice. Whose kid must be tormented so that other kids can go unmolested? That said, not sure that draconian, ubiquitous surveillance is the correct (or even effective) solution to the problem.

> the existence of the csam itself necessitates abuse. Just as the existence of America as we know it necessitates the pillaging and raping of native tribes. But we're not going to watch over your shoulder to make sure you don't participate in American society and send you to jail if you do. As unfortunate as past damage is, life moves on. Of course, that it incentivizes production of more CSAM is the logic behind th…

> as we know it necessitates the pillaging and raping of native tribes

Believe me, any historian will tell you, that tribes pillaging and raping other tribes was completely common before the European settlement. While this does not justify the European settlement by itself, we were the winners who beat the previous winners. Our atrocities are just better documented.

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