Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

https://mullvad.net/nl/blog/2023/2/2/stop-the-proposal-on-mass-surveillance-of-the-eu/

by Frisiavones • 3 years ago

1512 511 3 years ago

The best way to deal with this is non-compliance and there need to be technical solutions to deny such attempts.

One major factor that works against users is central authentication. Schemes like oauth2 might bring convenience and security in many cases, but will endanger net freedom overall.

Google just added age restriction on blogger. Result is that you need to provide Google with ID information to access some content. If more an more users elect to ID with their Google account you can see where it can lead. Naturally the EU wants to increase such schemes as well.

It just released a law (DSA) that allegedly to restrict the influence of tech giants. That their proposals will drive people into ID schemes of said tech companies is either an oversight or something worse. I would think it is the latter and giant tech companies are very glad about the behavior of the commission. Because they too tried get people to use their ID solutions.

Digital tech doesn't really prosper in the EU but certainly surveillance leveraging services of others.

The only defense against such laws is to make them technologically not feasible. While Google did many good things for net security, their compliance on topics that serve its self-interest is a danger. Same goes for other large tech companies.

That there is close collaboration between certain political elites and tech companies is pretty much a given. It was decried as a conspiracy theory until it was proven. Although it should be no surprise that there are such connections. Perhaps the influence of the EU commission is smaller, but I would not bet on it. Access to the market is on the hand they can play. Easily a strong enough hand to subject users to surveillance.

ur-whale3• 3 years ago

The best way to deal with this is non-compliance and there need to be technical solutions to deny such attempts.

I disagree.

While these are good to have, they are not enough.

The reason is always the same: if you are found to be using the circumventing tech., you'll likely be in breach of the law, which will give the goons a legitimate reason to come and harass you.

In a civilized country, that can translate into a fine, community service, etc...

In the borderlands, it'll land you in jail or worse.

carlosjobim3• 3 years ago

The goons will come and harass you if you are inconvenient or a threat to the ruling class, even if you are complying with all existing regulations. This happens in every country and region.

For the common man non-compliance is the only non-violent way to preserve his rights or exercise freedom. You can do it successfully if you are smart and agile.

alphazard3• 3 years ago

It's much easier for people to resist by using "forbidden" systems in private, than to affect political change. In the context of the EU, other rights afforded to citizens make things like this hard to enforce.

Seattle35032• 3 years ago

Sometimes I think we have romanticized civil disobedience a little too much. Not because having authoritarian laws is good, but because it seems like some people would rather be heroic resistance fighters than engage dry policy work and advocacy. It would be better to never live under bad laws at all.

userbinator• 3 years ago

The reason is always the same: if you are found to be using the circumventing tech., you'll likely be in breach of the law, which will give the goons a legitimate reason to come and harass you.

Not if almost everyone does it at once.

kragen15• 3 years ago

One major factor that works against users is central authentication. Schemes like oauth2

also dns and the tls ca system, even including let's encrypt

huslage• 3 years ago

I'm not sure I follow how let's encrypt is included on this list. They are very transparent.

danuker2• 3 years ago

Or Cloudflare which is a MitMaaS

jasmer• 3 years ago

Apple and Google will do what the EU tells them to do in the end.

danuker2• 3 years ago

That won't stop them trying to lobby their way into banning third parties from the web if they could.

Apple, Google, and Facebook are the 5th, 6th, and 7th largest lobbyists in the EU.

https://www.lobbyfacts.eu/?sort=lob&order=desc

Eduard2• 3 years ago

Schemes like oauth2 might bring convenience and security in many cases, but will endanger net freedom overall.

Your statement makes it look like OAuth2 is inherently endangering net freedom.

This isn't true.

If OAuth2 was used ...

- for authentication (versus authorization) only AND

- AND by a select few providers (e.g. Google, Github, Facebook, Twitter) solely AND

- AND NO other privacy-protecting authentication methods (e.g. classic username-password credentials) are available

... THEN your statement has reasonable truth.

k0k0r0• 3 years ago

Feels like where we are heading to.

dmitriid3• 3 years ago

The best way to deal with this is non-compliance and there need to be technical solutions to deny such attempts.

You cannot solve human issues by technical solutions

One major factor that works against users is central authentication. Schemes like oauth2 might bring convenience and security in many cases, but will endanger net freedom overall.

And what is your solution for that? Any authentication solution will inevitable converge to having trusted actors authenticating you. There's no technical solution for that.

It just released a law (DSA) that allegedly to restrict the influence of tech giants. That their proposals will drive people into ID schemes

So what is your technical solution to this human law?

The only defense against such laws is to make them technologically not feasible.

I also want to wish for moon and the stars. But we're not dealing with the realms of fantasy.

ecmascript6• 3 years ago

This is really, really scary and what scares me even more is these proposals just seems to keep coming and in time some of them will probably make their way into law.

Used to be for EU but if any regulation like this goes through, I will immedietly vote for any politician willing to exit the EU.

Honestly, I am kind of for leaving the EU anyway since I don't like the large centralized power it has become. There is litterally few who understand how the EU works, there is practically no way of knowing how to change EU politicians minds etc. If I want to change public opinion in my home country, that is way easier than doing it for the majority of the EU countries.

It is barely a question of time until bad stuff happens in my view.

TheFattestNinja• 3 years ago

Brexit happened and I'm not sure the UK tech law landscape on these topics is a lot more reassuring. But who knows.

988747• 3 years ago

Actually, seems like one of the reasons for Brexit was ability to do even more surveillance and other totalitarian practices without EU interfering. Not surprising given the fact that UK is one of the Five Eyes.

stinos2• 3 years ago

I will immedietly vote for any politician willing to exit the EU

Willing to exit EU might however be completely orthogonal to preferences regarding surveillance laws. I mean, such politician might just as well propose similar laws like Chat Control after the country leaves the EU. And looking at some of the specimens around here that would not even be unlikely.

ecmascript6• 3 years ago

I don't understand how this is an argument for staying though, even if so many brings it up.

It feels more or less impossible to influence EU-politicians. I don't know who they are, what they do or barely how the EU system works. It is too complicated for laymen to get into in general.

If a local politician proposes a stupid law as this one, I can call them up on my phone while when EU does it you don't even know it's happening.

carlosjobim3• 3 years ago

"Better the devil you know than the devil you don't" is the idiom used for this kind of thinking.

The pessimist says "Things can't get worse, I'll vote to leave the EU", the optimist says "Things can always get worse, let's stay in the EU".

maxehmookau• 3 years ago

EU commissioners propose laws, they don't vote for them. The EU parliament will probably reject this.

As a brit, let me tell you that leaving the EU will not solve this problem. Your local politicians will just do that anyway.

ecmascript6• 3 years ago

I do not think so, Swedens population has a history of rejecting mass surveillance ideas and lot's of privacy advocating stuff has come from Sweden like Mullvad and The Pirate Bay.

Anyway, it is way easier for a citizen to affect your local politician rather than some other random countries politicians that don't care about you.

miohtama• 3 years ago

Even if the EU parliament passes a neutered bill, it is going to be lose. Some politicians seem to have inane will (and lobby money) to pass these laws no matter what, including in bit by bit in smaller pieces and partial defeats.

jiriknesl4• 3 years ago

Yes, but it's easier to influence politicians in your country than in the EU. It's easier to influence politicians in your county council than in your country. It's easier to influence politicians in your town hall than in your county council.

gghhzzgghhzz• 3 years ago

It won't solve your problems, correct.

But it will make responsibility clear. Out of the EU, no domestic government can claim plausible deniability on a directive like this, claiming not to support it yet there being nothing they can do about it - while secretly wanting to implement something like that anyway, but without the political fallout.

anfogoat2• 3 years ago

EU commissioners propose laws, they don't vote for them.

The distinction isn't meaningless but it's certainly a generous one when left to stand on its own.

The commissioners hold little allegiance to the spirit of democracy and these proposals are either career boosters or pet projects for them. They're not just going to pass it on to the parliament and leave it at that. They're going to do their best to finagle behind the scenes, horse trade, intimidate and pull from their endless infatuation with coddling the children the most fantastical justifications that, by pure chance I guess, smear any opponents.

As a brit, let me tell you that leaving the EU will not solve this problem. Your local politicians will just do that anyway.

But it will help. No modern government will pass a law that grants its citizens more privacy. It's better to have a many smaller ones, each with different rates of deterioration (re privacy) than a super government where every little nudge towards the eventual zero-privacy Internet affects us all at once.

Sadly, residing in a region formerly part of the Russian Empire, together with last year's events, kind of kills the glee I felt in the past whenever I fantasized about the EU disintegrating, which is to say voting to leave the EU would only makes sense if online privacy was the only thing you cared about.

zx85wes4• 3 years ago

I wouldn't be so sure... https://www.euractiv.com/section/data-protection/news/new-eu...

esskay• 3 years ago

Be careful what you wish for. Here in the UK since leaving the government have been doing all they can to ensure mass surveilance and repression becomes more and more common, without those "pesky" EU laws stopping them.

ecmascript6• 3 years ago

Yeah I know, sorry to hear that but:

1. It is way easier to change the minds of the people in your home country rather than in several countries.

2. My country of birth, Sweden, has more history of rejecting stuff like that.

zx85wes4• 3 years ago

I'm pro decentralisation too. The eurosceptic parties I know are all in favour of more surveillance. Pick your poison. ;-)

pskisf• 3 years ago

Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem.

- Thomas Jefferson

dijit3• 3 years ago

Roughly translates to: I prefer liberty with danger to peace with servitude/slavery.

xwolfi• 3 years ago

And perfectly translates to: Better dangerous liberty than quiet servitude.

Not sure why you needed to make such an awkward rough translation when the concepts are clear, the idiom known and the sentence so short in the target language, which is the language of the author as well, thus sharing bias in its latin...

But I think this sentence is itself dangerous in its shortness, it almost makes you believe it's a discrete dichotomy rather than, as usual, a loooong gradient between two extreme, with orthogonal concerns adding to it to make it a zigzag. Better very rich in a quiet dictatorship than middle class in a chaotic old democracy, for instance. Or better poor in a clientelist theocracy than poor in an industrial dictatorship.

It doesn't really make sense in the end, since freedom and servitude are not related to danger or safety. You can have all together, at different time or degree, for different people and geographies, regarding different slice of concern (freedom is so so vague, for instance).

"Better have what you can tolerate for what you can afford, than something unaffordable or untolerable", is probably more interesting to understand the compromises real people make everyday, but I guess, so obvious we prefer to dream of a dichotomy :D

nonrandomstring2• 3 years ago

The right to be insecure is one of the least appreciated in our time [1].

[1] https://www.ted.com/talks/eve_ensler_what_security_means_to_...

xenonite2• 3 years ago

"Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem."

malo ... quam ... ⇒ I prefer ... to ...

Preferring what to what? This is why all other words are in accusative singular as simple enumeration:

periculosam ⇒ dangerousness

libertatem ⇒ freedom

quietam ⇒ quietness

servitutem ⇒ slavery

Hence I would take his statement as: "I prefer dangerousness and freedom to quietness and slavery."

rqtwteye2• 3 years ago

The slaveholder and rapist Jefferson deserves the Noble Prize in Hypocrisy for his ramblings about freedom and liberty.

can16358p• 3 years ago

We certainly need decentralized systems that cannot be controlled by EU, US, or any government/entity.

Privacy is a human right. We probably all know that they will show reasons like "fighting terrorism", "preventing national threats" or "hunting down child pornography" etc, whereas the real motivation is to control people's freedom of speech and communication even though they will 100% deny it.

Anyone who is really into something illegal will use something alternative anyway.

This will only hurt people actually fighting for their rights, and this needs to stop.

msm_3• 3 years ago

We certainly need decentralized systems that cannot be controlled by EU, US, or any government/entity.

I agree in principle, but controlled != regulated. It's (technologically) relatively easy to create a private, censorship-resistant distributed system, but if it's illegal people just won't use it. It's a human problem, not a tech problem.

kragen15• 3 years ago

here in argentina uber was very illegal for several years and people used the fuck out of it

in the usa heroin and meth are super illegal and people are using the fuck out of them

many 80s pc video games only survive in a playable form because of a very illegal system of organized copyright infringement that removed copy protection mechanisms; people used the fuck out of that too

in the usa gay sex was super illegal until, in many locations, 20 years ago. guess what gay people did

"if it's illegal people just won't use it" is clearly not correct; i think it's what dave chappelle would describe as an extremely white thought

the problem is if the design of the system provides law enforcement a bottleneck they can use for leverage against righteous lawbreakers

AlchemistCamp2• 3 years ago

It's (technologically) relatively easy to create a private, censorship-resistant distributed system, but if it's illegal people just won't use it.

Ask a Gen-Xer about Napster and Bittorrent sometime.

Ajedi32• 3 years ago

Once a decentralized system becomes sufficiently ubiquitous, banning it becomes tantamount to imposing economic sanctions on yourself. That's basically what happened with the internet. That might have just been a fluke, but it would be awesome if we could somehow manage to create more systems like that.

barnabee• 3 years ago

It is necessary both to try to get rid of bad laws and to encourage, facilitate, and protect mass civil disobedience.

bartislartfast2• 3 years ago

Anyone who is really into something illegal will use something alternative anyway.

I'm not for more surveillance, but this is the exact argument that people give against gun control

gherkinnn• 3 years ago

So?

wizzwizz44• 3 years ago

Unless you're a gunsmith, it's not really comparable. Anyone with a sufficiently-powerful desk calculator can use illegal encryption, but not everyone can procure an illegal firearm.

neysofu• 3 years ago

If you pay enough attention, you will notice that the same argument is used to push many political agendas (for better or worse):

- "You can't ban encrypted messaging. Terrorists will always find a way to communicate."

- "You can't outlaw abortions, just safe ones. Women will always find a way."

- "You can't uniformly enforce gun control. Dedicated criminals will keep buying weapons on the black market."

- "You can't ban cryptocurrencies. Enthusiasts will still trade on P2P exchanges."

All of these are half truth, and half lie. Every policy introduces a certain amount of user friction, which is proven to discourage action. Some people will refrain from infringing the policy (e.g. using guns, performing abortions, using encrypted messaging apps), some others will comply. Percentages obviously vary depending on the specific policy, but it's never 0% nor 100% like "both" sides want you to believe.

photochemsyn• 3 years ago

For years the US government has attempted to limit the use (and 'export') of strong encryption protocols like PGP using the argument that they should be treated as munitions. The case against Zimmermann in the early 1990s regarding his posting of PGP to a Usenet site, and the eventual decision by the US government not to proceed with the case, is illustrative. Here's an excerpt from the statement by lawyer on the case. It's from over two decades ago, but still worth reading (the laws have been relaxed somewhat since then, but it's not really clear how far):

http://dubois.com/No-prosecute-announcement.txt

"Now, some words about the case and the future. Nobody should conclude that it is now legal to export cryptographic software. It isn't. The law may change, but for now, you'll probably be prosecuted if you break it. People wonder why the government declined prosecution, especially since the government isn't saying. One perfectly good reason might be that Mr. Zimmermann did not break the law. (This is not always a deterrent to indictment. Sometimes the government isn't sure whether someone's conduct is illegal and so prosecutes that person to find out.) Another might be that the government did not want to risk a judicial finding that posting cryptographic software on a site in the U.S., even if it's an Internet site, is not an "export". There was also the risk that the export-control law would be declared unconstitutional. Perhaps the government did not want to get into a public argument about some important policy issues: should it be illegal to export cryptographic software? Should U.S. citizens have access to technology that permits private communication? And ultimately, do U.S. citizens have the right to communicate in absolute privacy?"
"There are forces at work that will, if unresisted, take from us our liberties. There always will be. But at least in the United States, our rights are not so much stolen from us as they are simply lost by us. The price of freedom is not only vigilance but also participation. Those folks I mention in this message have participated and no doubt will continue. My thanks, and the thanks of Philip Zimmermann, to each of you."

One obvious concern about this move in the EU is that they'll try to criminalize the use of cryptography again.

ethbr015• 3 years ago

We probably all know that they will show reasons [...], whereas the real motivation is to control people's freedom of speech and communication even though they will 100% deny it.

I don't think this is how it works, absent an already existent police state.

In democracies, it really is pushed for {good reasons}.

Once built, it's then used by law enforcement, because it exists and gets the job done.

Pretending there's a sinister, organized New World Order (aka "them") with decades-long plans to restrict freedom is fantasy, and doesn't help us target the actual problem.

A lot of bureaucrats and legislators are instead just disorganized, technically clueless, and listen to the loudest and most organized group. Which tends to be intelligence or law enforcement.

TFA rightly calls on citizens to instead be that group, on the side of freedom.

mach1ne• 3 years ago

Even though something has a benevolent rationalization, it doesn’t mean the true motives are benevolent. It doesn’t need any New World Order conspiracy either. People in ruling positions often enjoy power, and they may be clueless as to how this desire is affecting their decisionmaking.

oauea4• 3 years ago

The reason is, and always has been, to enable lazy police work. They won't have to do their jobs if facebook will just tell them who the criminals are.

A4ET8a8uTh03• 3 years ago

There is no need to pretend. People with power want more power. As a thought exercise consider how you would arrange the world were you in a position to do so and try to determine placement of structures that could undermine your benevolent rule. Freedom of speech is such a structure. It is not really a paranoia if there are people out there working on just that. Now, just because there are also fellow travelers who truly believe 'for the children' cry, that is quite another and separate conversation.

throwbadubadu• 3 years ago

Pretending there's a sinister, organized New World Order (aka "them"

How did you got this out of GP? I think you both saying/meaning the same.

and listen to the loudest and most organized group. Which tends to be intelligence or law enforcement.

Yep, and their actual desire is to control people's freedom (even admitting that some or all of them themselves belief that this is only for good cause, the reasons that also GP listed.. ).

FredPret• 3 years ago

listen to the loudest and most organized group

I donate money to the EFF in the hope that they turn out to be this group eventually

gjsman-10002• 3 years ago

Pretending there's a sinister, organized New World Order (aka "them") with decades-long plans to restrict freedom is fantasy, and doesn't help us target the actual problem.

I'm not a conspiracy theorist, and I don't really believe too much in the existence of such a group, but I can argue this is really bad logic.

A. Do you think such a group would be public with their ambitions? Such a group would doubtless deny their own existence. Arguing that they do, or do not exist, can only be based on observation and opinion, because it is not falsifiable.

B. Secret societies do exist, and there are some that still exist to this day that had major political power previously. The Freemasons, for example, were pretty influential in the French revolution on both sides, and counted leaders like Napoleon, Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, Winston Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Paul Revere, and so on among their members. We know that nine freemasons, at a minimum, signed the US Constitution. (Then, fun fact, they put "Novus ordo seclorum" on the great seal of the US.)

C. And even if there weren't powerful secret societies historically (which is doubtful), we currently live in a very globalized world with much easier ability to meet and privately message, so there's always a first. Saying that it never happened, therefore it can't happen, is always misguided.

D. The World Economic Forum literally called for everyone to build a New World Order in 2018. With that exact terminology. It's still on their website. I would argue that makes them partially culpable for the conspiracies. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/12/we-must-work-together...

Xelbair• 3 years ago

no matter the reasons, even if current politicians and institutions are 100% trustworthy, no such law should be made.

you cannot guarantee that future institutions, and governments will be benevolent, and with such laws you give them easy access to tools of oppression.

rdevsrex• 3 years ago

Ahem, have you forgotten about the NSA spying on US citizens? Every government covets that power. It's a fantasy to assume they don't.

soperj• 3 years ago

it's then used by law enforcement

Never seen any abuse by law enforcement before :|

JustSomeNobody• 3 years ago

Pretending there's a sinister, organized New World Order (aka "them") with decades-long plans to restrict freedom is fantasy

I wouldn't be so naive. Groups like the Council For National Policy and Lance Wallnau pushing The Seven Mountain Mandate have been working for DECADES to push the agenda that you're seeing in schools and politics today.

Maybe not a "world order", but they'd certainly like to be.

macrolocal4• 3 years ago

Is anyone else astonished by how dramatically Hacker News has shifted its tone on this issue over the last five to ten years?

masterof03• 3 years ago

It doesn't need to be a "World New Order" for three letter agencies lobbying to increase surveillance, and hence their power over the people. You are right, bureaucrats are clueless, but they don't need to be sharp, the agencies that will benefit from violating people's privacy and right already are. The is no possible good coming from those laws, the argument of "saving the children" falls flat, because you could extended to anything, "ban knives because children could cut themselves", etc... Privacy is a right, and those agencies(also known as deep state) pushing lawmakers to subvert it, are doing in to control people indeed.

pelasaco5• 3 years ago

A lot of bureaucrats and legislators are instead just disorganized, technically clueless, and listen to the loudest and most organized group. Which tends to be intelligence or law enforcement.

I agree with you. We are too dumb, to selfish, to humans to be able to run a a New World Order, with decades-long plans in silence. For sure one stupid member would do a tiktok video while using their funny clothes

im3w1l• 3 years ago

How do you explain the countless tyrants in ancient and modern history? Hell, even in contemporary times. The truth is that there are absolutely very dangerous people around. And also a lot of good people too. We can't know for certain who is who, so the best approach is to be as polite as if they were good people but as cautious as if they were evil.

pessimizer7• 3 years ago

In democracies, it really is pushed for {good reasons}.

It's marketed to upper-middle class elites as reasonable, and of course it's upper-middle class elites that are paid to put together this marketing. But it's really orders from an owner class that has entirely different interests from the other 99.9% of the population.

If an individual member of of the upper-middle class has a problem with {the imposition of the week}, they are harshly corrected, shunned, then eventually ejected from the upper-middle class. Your credentials will be taken away, your friends will avoid you to keep from being suspected themselves (and will rationalize this behavior to overcome cognitive dissonance, becoming energetic state chauvinists), your credit will be destroyed.

Pretending there's a sinister, organized New World Order (aka "them") with decades-long plans to restrict freedom is fantasy, and doesn't help us target the actual problem.

This is just a slander. There are people who own large parts of the economy, and people live for decades, and people pass their ownership to their children. They are also friends with their peers. The fantasyland is when we imply that they never speak to each other, never make plans, and have no agendas. It's a failure of thinking at scale.

bassrattle• 3 years ago

This is just such an ignorant take with no regard for real history. The PATRIOT act in America was quickly used to facilitate mass surveillance, and it reflects a greater pattern of government behavior. While there are "useful idiots" who embody the technically clueless bureaucrats you describe, there is absolutely collectives of nefarious actors aiming to control populations.

mordae2• 3 years ago

I don't think this is how it works, absent an already existent police state.
In democracies, it really is pushed for {good reasons}.

If public servants were left to their own devices and could mandate any law they like, they would instantly prohibit any behavior that is not explicitly allowed. Because that's how they themselves must function so that public can hold them accountable.

The trouble is that they inherently push this mentality to the politicians who must rely on them to get popularity contest points and sometimes manage to win these nonsense laws that help nobody.

Pretending there's a sinister, organized New World Order (aka "them") with decades-long plans to restrict freedom is fantasy, and doesn't help us target the actual problem.

Sure, but there actually is "them". They are clueless, individually powerless, out-of-sight, largely disconnected social class that actually makes this happen. And they can wait decades for the right situation. In Czechia, the public servant actually responsible for introducing DNS blocking was actually tasked with online hazard oversight. He pushed it through in order to block just 6 websites because it was somehow easier for him than negotiating banning payments to them, probably because of turf wars. The respective two ministries are rivals and won't ever cooperate. He lobbied for this for like 10+ years and then a bunch of idiots has gotten elected and ran with it.

So in a way, you are right. But you are also somewhat wrong. From my experience finding the actual people pushing for this (it's usually not the politicians) and outing them would work way better.

arrosenberg• 3 years ago

Pretending there's a sinister, organized New World Order (aka "them") with decades-long plans to restrict freedom is fantasy, and doesn't help us target the actual problem.

Thankfully, we don't have to pretend! A cadre of wealthy Americans have a documented history of conspiring against the people of this country.

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/assets/u...

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

croes2• 3 years ago

Parts of Germany instated laws that allowed to arrest people without trial for 30days.

They claimed to only use it to prevent severe crimes like terrorism.

Current statistics show, the most people that got arrested via that laws are climate activists.

So either the law makers and police are incompetent and therefore shouldn't make these laws way or they know what they are doing and therefore shouldn't make these laws.

BTW these laws made for "good reasons" don't get the jobs done.

zelphirkalt2• 3 years ago

There is a "them" though: Tech giants. And they are pushing/lobbying hard with their huge financial reserves, which they extracted from clueless uninformed masses. A company like Google would love for all privacy protections to disappear tomorrow, because of the riches they can amass then. It is simply capitalism and greed at work.

Geee• 3 years ago

"Them" is a metaphor for aligned incentives. If there are incentives for something to happen, it will happen. These incentives create a self-organizing conspiracy where the participants don't even need to communicate with each other, but they are co-operating anyway, just by acting in their own interest. It doesn't matter whether "them", the NWO or the lizard people are real or not; the end result is the same.

tomxor3• 3 years ago

We certainly need decentralized systems that cannot be controlled by EU, US, or any government/entity.

I used to think this way, and still do to a degree... but it's not enough. The idea of zero trust as an absolute is flawed, because if the adversary is your own government they will just keep shifting targets. Lets play this out:

1. Gov start monitoring all proprietary messaging platforms and services. So lets assume that in response, decentralised FOSS based e2e encrypted private messaging services flourish, and everyone actually adopts them... All proprietary messaging platforms/services die off. Great, what next?

2. Now gov mandate that all hardware must have have backdoors to circumvent those measures. So lets assume in response, consumer hardware transforms into IBM PC style open standard and people start assembling their own smart phones and tablets out of interchangeable components so that they can avoid those pesky backdoor chips... and miraculously everyone does this and proprietary handset manufacturers all die off. Now what?

3. Gov mandate all fabs must etch an additional microcontroller onto every CPU/microcontroller with > n gates, with full memory and network access. Do we all start running local fabs in our basement?

Hopefully you get my point, the reality is that there is friction in both directions and neither end has absolute power, but we must push back against policies like this to prevent erosion of our values, do not "give them an inch" so to speak. We cannot trust all of society, but we also cannot afford to not trust civilisation in it's entirety, it's just not possible, we cannot build our own computers out of sticks and mud.

If you want an example of what a technological arms race with your own government looks like, it's happening in China right now. They aren't even fighting for privacy, they are fighting to just communicate and access information freely.

seanw4445• 3 years ago

Agreed. Just like every fight for freedoms, it is a constant battle, and one that will never end.

staunton• 3 years ago

everyone actually adopts them

I think that scenario is unrealistic because if a majority of people are at a point where they would go to such lengths for privacy, democratic governments wouldn't be monitoring everything in the first place. I believe most high-democracy-index countries are democratic enough for this to apply. Actual reason for these policies is that most people do not care about privacy.

YoshiRulz• 3 years ago

IMO, your hypothetical falls apart at the second point:

Now gov mandate that all hardware must have have backdoors to circumvent those measures.

A government could legislate that it may not rain anywhere in the country on Tuesdays, but executing that isn't practicable. Likewise, backdooring one family of CPUs may be possible, but you can't simply tell chip fabs to backdoor each and every design. They'd grind to a halt in order to comply.

And I want to say that there exists provably un-backdoor-able "zero-knowledge" computing, something like Ethereum's smart contract ISA, but I may be misremembering.

In the end, our governments are democratic, we elect politicians to represent our will. They shouldn't be pushing for things like backdoors at all when no citizens are in favour. So yes,

[...] we must push back against policies like this to prevent erosion of our values, do not "give them an inch" so to speak.

I agree that China is currently, to continue your metaphor, winning the fight against privacy—but only because using the government-friendly superapps is necessary for everyday life, and not because they've blocked the likes of Tor.

int_19h16• 3 years ago

The key here is that the "systems" that we need to decentralize include political and economic systems, not just technological ones.

stagas6• 3 years ago

I've always wondered behind the rationale on privacy being a human right. What if it wasn't? What if instead we were enforcing transparency? Force everything to be public, starting from the government down to the local coffee shop. All transactions, all communications, everything. Make privacy a crime for everybody, including the government and the military. Just as a thought exercise, it would be a remarkably different world. I think the problem privacy is solving enables a different set of problems to emerge that would have otherwise been impossible. And one could argue that these new problems are those that enable the necessity for privacy to be established as a human right in the first place.

rrsmtz2• 3 years ago

The point of human rights is to protect the underprivileged - the privileged of any given society don’t need to have these protections because they are at the top of the social hierarchy and get to call the shots. They would simply use their influence to get an exception for themselves. That’s why the US constitution is great, because it’s such a pain in the ass to change (unfortunately the privileged invent “interpretations” to change it retroactively).

Your thought experiment exists in a utopia where the above isn’t the case, which isn’t really applicable to any human society that’s ever existed. The top of the food chain will Until humans stop forming hierarchies, we need rights.

reedjosh• 3 years ago

I've had similar thoughts, but I always land on the asymetry between governments and its populace being the key issue.

If transparency is the norm, governments need to go first.

Since that will never happen, the only solution remains privacy for all, or no government at all.

masterof03• 3 years ago

Sure, let's make everyone to walk around naked. Let's also make sure, that everyone knows what is going on in your life, where you and your loved ones live, what they buy, how much money they make, what they say, ....... Your argument is ridiculous.

kragen15• 3 years ago

people need privacy not because their acts are unworthy

people need privacy because others' intentions and judgment are unworthy

if you've ever known anyone who was gay, who got divorced, who secretly had a deprecated ethnic background, who left their faith, who didn't want their ex-boyfriend to know where they lived, who revealed government corruption, who struggled for political change, or who could be raped or robbed by a stranger, you've known someone who needed privacy

even though they had nothing to be ashamed of

you might argue that if nobody had privacy, nobody would be able to get away with rape, or with lynching people they discovered had a drop of black blood, or with lynching apostates, or with gay-bashing, so these things wouldn't happen in a world without privacy

that would be a stupid argument because people did those things openly all the time, and they usually got away with it, and some of them still do; humans have a social pecking order, and it is defined by aggression with impunity

also people murder their ex-partners all the time even when they won't get away with it

boring_twenties3• 3 years ago

Without privacy, human beings cannot be their true, complete selves. Why do some people only sing in the shower?

PurpleRamen2• 3 years ago

We certainly need decentralized systems that cannot be controlled by EU, US, or any government/entity.

No, not really. A World with controlled controllers is better than a world without any control. See the awful space which is the crypto community ATM. EU and US so far are fair and tame (to their own citizen). They are not always good, but not bad. And that's fair enough for any decent citizen.

Though, part of this deal is that we take control on when they go too far, and do stupid things. Which seems to be the case in this case, because of which we push against it, because that's how we hope to get a healthy world.

Privacy is a human right.

So is security. It's all about balancing interests and abilities.

whereas the real motivation is to control people's freedom of speech and communication even though they will 100% deny it.

That smells like QAnon-level of conspiracy BS.

Anyone who is really into something illegal will use something alternative anyway.

No, they are not. The majority of criminals are not some organized super villains. They are usually also depending on the same tools and networks as everyone else. And they are also just flawed humans, making errors.

jokethrowaway3• 3 years ago

> whereas the real motivation is to control people's freedom of speech and communication even though they will 100% deny it.
That smells like QAnon-level of conspiracy BS.

Are you familiar with a country called China?

idlewords• 3 years ago

Systems outside the control of any government entity devolve into a familiar cavalcade of horrors. You need a better answer for the fact that those horrors exist, and that many people who draw government paychecks devote their careers to fighting them in good faith, with good results.

You'd think that after twenty years the debate would have moved past advocating for complete lawlessness, but we get stuck in the same puerile tropes. The fact that bad state actors exist does not change the fact that horribly abusive material, with real victims, will be shared on any platform those abusers consider safe, and that the existence of such platforms will encourage further abuse.

Anyone who has worked on child sexual exploitation material on any platform knows this, and any privacy advocate has to have a better answer for it than 'nuh-uh'.

notepalf• 3 years ago

We certainly need decentralized systems

Matrix and XMPP exists, what should we do to make this more popular?

seanw4445• 3 years ago

Make it accessible.

AlbertCory• 3 years ago

There are a lot of people objecting to the "real motivation" argument (it's just bureaucratic incompetence, they don't know what they're doing, etc. etc.)

Usually those are good arguments. Not this time.

This proposal is Pure Evil. Hardly anyone is willing to come out and say they admire the Chinese social credit system. But when their every action leans towards replicating it, it's more than fair to drag them out into the sunlight.

atmosx2• 3 years ago

We certainly need decentralized systems that cannot be controlled by EU, US, or any government/entity.

No. If such a system could work in any meaningful way, it would be already in place.

Trying to fight legal frameworks with technology, failed in the past with some notable but hardly repeatable exceptions. In the 90s a few geeks tech awareness could match the resources of a small state, non tech-savvy state. Nowadays it is impossible because the discrepancy in resources is huge.

There are countries that force you to download their own "secure" SSL certificate, so they can sniff all traffic. China is the worst and most prominent example.

This battle need to be fought on the street, with votes, by raising awareness, etc. If we want to be "free" we need to take-over the political battle, not the tech battle because if we win on that front, most likely won't matter. I don't want to risk jail for using an open source encryption tool.

humanizersequel• 3 years ago

No. If such a system could work in any meaningful way, it would be already in place.

I'm reminded of the EMH joke about the economist walking by a 100 dollar bill on the street, assuming that it must be fake because if it were real, someone already would have picked it up.

ComodoHacker2• 3 years ago

Anyone who is really into something illegal will use something alternative anyway.

That's the hard part, IMO.

Imagine that we really got that "decentralized system that cannot be controlled" going and everyone is using it. Everyone, including those who is into illegal things. And they don't get caught.

Now the government starts to push their "this decentralized shit is doing more harm than good" agenda. Whatever their motivation is, it would be easy to sway public opinion against surveillance-free communications, because the harm is real, not hypothetical, like it is now.

loup-vaillant3• 3 years ago

Criminals are using encrypted communications right now, though. The harm is already real.

Now, I have a cryptography library to polish.

pelasaco5• 3 years ago

Anyone who is really into something illegal will use something alternative anyway.

Thats the same argument for less gun control.

thefz• 3 years ago

Privacy is a human right. We probably all know that they will show reasons like "fighting terrorism", "preventing national threats" or "hunting down child pornography"

The four horsemen of the Infocalypse

The phrase is a play on Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. There does not appear to be a universally agreed definition of who the Horsemen are, but they are usually listed as terrorists, drug dealers, pedophiles/child molesters, and organized crime.

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

stiltzkin2• 3 years ago

Nostr has been with good development lately.

1337shadow2• 3 years ago

Who is "actually fighting for their rights in the UE" exactly? care to share some examples?

peoplefromibiza4• 3 years ago

Privacy is a human right

I believe you where talking about secrecy.

WhatsApp chats are secret, but not necessarily private.

Authorities can ask Meta to release the meta data and they can inspect phones to retrieve the chat logs.

Private communications have never been secret, it was always possible for the people with the necessary authorizations to access them.

Privacy is consensual, secrecy is not.

But there is no right to secrecy.

As much as I love mullvad and their excellent products, they never link the proposal they talk about in that page, which hinders the people' ability to form their own opinion.

All the material we can find revolves around the same actors, quoting each other, some like the Pirate party, say it was leaked

Leaked Commission paper EU mass surveillance plans

https://european-pirateparty.eu/chat-control-leaked-commissi...

But it's not true, it's officially published on the EU website, it wasn't being kept hidden, it had to be translated to all the EU official languages before being published.

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=COM%3A20...

I understand being concerned, what I do not understand is being catastrophic.

Even if everything they wrote was true, a proposal is not a law, so whatever happened in the Swedish parliament, was not influenced by the EU proposal.

p.s. the system is similar to CSAM, which I don't like either, but sooner or later such systems will be everywhere, like it or not.

The discussion must be held in a way or another.

Apple too considered scanning the users' devices to match CSAM pictures, they dropped it, for now, but probably only because they are developing their own system, independent from the government, so they don't have to give them any kind of access.

Here the discussion is being held in public, by people elected by European citizens directly with their vote, these people are paid exactly to discuss these matters, theya re doing their job.

You wrote "the real motivation is to control people's freedom of speech and communication even though they will 100% deny it." but the they you mention are elected officials, not SP.E.C.T.R.E. evil agents

bodge5000• 3 years ago

Not sure if it was here before, but they also posted an article yesterday on how this may (or may not, its up to interpretation) affect open source operating systems

https://mullvad.net/en/blog/2023/2/1/eu-chat-control-law-wil...

demindiro• 3 years ago

It was[1] but for some reason it got pushed off from the front page very quickly.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34608330

gadders• 3 years ago

Is this more or less stringent than the UK law?

Hizonner2• 3 years ago

Somewhat different in emphasis. Less about a vague "duty of care" and more about detailed, specific spying mandates. Different enforcement structure. Maybe slightly less chaotic in its impact. Still a giant shitshow.

DoingIsLearning3• 3 years ago

As a pro-EU citizen I feel more and more inclined to agree on some of the Brexit rhetoric.

Commissioners have shown multiple times that they are too permeable to lobbying, too willing to water down tough environmental regulation, and too keen on 'security' surveillance.

So far the EU parliament members have balanced the act with some sanity. But the power and lack of transparency of the EC both with regards to lobbying and conflict of interest is very concerning.

dijit3• 3 years ago

EU Parliament has nothing to do with this proposal.

It's proposed by the EU Commission, and such things have been struck down by the Parliament before.

Also: Britain hardly has any leg to stand on regarding privacy (which is something the EU usually has a focus on[0]).

Did you forget the Snoopers Charter[1]? That isn't a proposal. That's law.

[0] https://gdpr.eu

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investigatory_Powers_Act_2016

DoingIsLearning3• 3 years ago

I am making the point that the parliament votes, and _rejects_ proposals that overreach.

My point is not Britain as an example, but that one of the Brexit rhetoric points was the rah rah 'unelected officials'.

Arguably we both know that EC comissioners are appointed by democratic governments but we see multiple times how permeable EC commisioners are:

1. Surveillance proposals such as posted in this thread

2. Net Neutrality exemptions - allowing Facebook/Youtube/et al. 'zero ratings' on metered connections

3. SUPD with guidelines that have so many Plastic exceptions that basically only q-tips and plastic forks got banned. Nestle, Coca-Cola, all the supermarket wrapping remain untouched.

4. 'Green Deal' was completely watered down on implementation. [0]

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/mar/06/exxonmobil-...

Over and over they start with strong technocrat proposals and then cave in to business lobby.

zx85wes4• 3 years ago

They've voted in favour of mass surveillance too. https://www.euractiv.com/section/data-protection/news/new-eu...

irusensei3• 3 years ago

It's proposed by the EU Commission, and such things have been struck down by the Parliament before.

Like article 13?

gpvos• 3 years ago

On the other hand, I am happy with EU environmental regulation because it's often stronger than that in my own country (Netherlands). It's a balance.

More transparency is indeed needed though.

yreg4• 3 years ago

UK conservatives wanted less surveillance?

DoingIsLearning3• 3 years ago

I clarified my point in a child comment you are choosing to misread.

starkd3• 3 years ago

The EU is literally a government by committee. A kind of technocracy with very little accountability for those making these decisions. The UK has a lot of problems right now, but at least BREXIT helped preserve some sovereignty from that behomoth. That is good for the long term.

zelphirkalt2• 3 years ago

I had several discussions like that and always said something along the lines of: "Well, I am not so sure about it being a bad decision in the long term. I think time will tell." and every time people have valid arguments of why Brexit is bad for the UK, but still I will say something like "Lets see how it all turns out.", because we do not know the future.

When the EU cooks up the next surveillance law attempt, I am always reminded of those conversations. But where else to go, if even EU gets too crazy? There are probably only worse places with regards to privacy.

slickrick2163• 3 years ago

It isn’t a democratic system. It’s clearly been infiltrated by both lobbyists as you say but also foreign powers. Further integration should be halted in my opinion until the undemocratic elements are dissolved and replaced with ethical moral means of representation if that doesn’t happen then we are at an impasse for which I see no future in this system. Personally I will not donate the labor my life to it. Everyone is free (for now) to do what they wish. Nothing is perfect but society should benefit those who benefit society not oligarchs and tyrants.

kypro• 3 years ago

The idea that a continent full of people with different cultures and economies would benefit from following laws set by politicians elected by voters they can't even communicate with in their native language seems insane to me. I really just don't get it at all. Can't we just do the free trade thing without all the surveillance laws and other crap?

I'm all for European trade, but I felt I had to vote Brexit because obviously the goal of any political system should be to maximise the political power of individuals and local communities. The more you centralise and expand power over larger geographical areas the less tolerant of regional political difference your political system must become. This become obvious when we talk about a country like Turkey potentially joining the EU.

That said, I hate the UK government with a passion and they are arguably even worse when it comes to surveillance, but at least we can vote them out.

midoridensha4• 3 years ago

Can't we just do the free trade thing without all the surveillance laws and other crap?

Basically, no. What you're asking for is what the EU has tried to do somewhat: become a confederation. It doesn't work. The USA tried it back in the 1700s and it was a disaster. The country couldn't defend itself, have any kind of central banking and currency, or any consistent policy. It was replaced in 12 years with the more centralized federal system that exists now.

The EU was created because the European nations wanted to be a powerful continent-sized political entity that could rival the US, and have the same benefits and power on the world stage. But there are costs to this: you need much greater centralization. Arguably, the US doesn't have enough centralization and this is causing many of its internal problems now.

Basically, if you want to be a world power, you can't just be a bunch of small, disparate countries in a loose trade confederation. You need more centralization of power, and the problems that come with that. If you don't want that, you need to just be happy with being a bunch of separate, sovereign nations with different currencies and trade barriers between them all. Pick one.

From my perspective, the EU's problems you see are because it won't just commit to a centralized system and eliminating national sovereignty, and it's trying to have it both ways.

fidgewidge5• 3 years ago

The idea that a continent full of people with different cultures and economies would benefit from following laws set by politicians elected by voters they can't even communicate with in their native language seems insane to me

Yep but it's even more insane than that. The laws don't even come from elected people at all!

qikInNdOutReply• 3 years ago

There should be a law against spamming the lawmaking process with proposals that have previously failed or are near identical to it, for a set time period. Means, you are no longer allowed to lobby for a law proposal once it has been rejected for a time period of one voting cycle.

arlort• 3 years ago

This proposal hasn't been made before (at least in the EU at the EU level)

If you're thinking that you saw something like this last year and now again it's the same law. The EU legislative process is extremely slow (not that it's a bad thing in this case, I'd rather this not get rushed through, or even better not get through at all)

And even now it is not likely to pass before December 2023 or might even get delayed to January 2024

ur-whale3• 3 years ago

1. The book of law should have a fixed number of words, written in stone in the constitution. Side effects:

    a) you want to pass a new law? Pick one in the book to get rid of.

    b) magically, the enforcement budget and the size of the fat leech that feeds off of it (the government) remains constant. See "The Advantage of a Dragon" by Stanislaw Lem [1]

2. A law should always (with the possible exception of those in the constitution) have an expiration date, voted with the law, with a maximum of 10 years, at which time the law should get re-voted on if it turns out it was actually useful to society.

[1] http://www.loper-os.org/?p=3725

nemo44x• 3 years ago

The EU just seems like a more and more dystopian place where they placate the docile population with a few social benefits and threats to corporate interests at the cost of any sense of individual liberty and a rapidly declining set of rights and privacy from the state.

pelasaco5• 3 years ago

Just to play the advocate's advocate here:

When the internet became so safe? They push, we push back. They block, we circumvent. That was always about that. We old hackers are used to that. Nothing will work out of the box, and it will be fine. Just embrace and adapt it.

pammf• 3 years ago

Well, isn't this already part of pushing back?

pelasaco5• 3 years ago

if "we encourage journalists and citizens in all EU countries to question their governments and urge them to vote no." would help then Julian Assange/Snowden would have a different life today. Just get prepared to circumvent e vote better next time.

Kukumber• 3 years ago

Only the US should be allowed to spy on the EU, no the EU themselves :)

guy982387104• 3 years ago

Loss of balance. Child protection appears to have infinite weight. Conversely, personal privacy, access to information (esp. medical), and right to education appear to have zero weight.

grumple• 3 years ago

Yep. You can justify any injustice with "won't somebody think of the children" or similar fears which inspire pearl-clutching. Don't fall for these authoritarian tactics.

prof-dr-ir3• 3 years ago

The making of EU legislation can take years and is surprisingly transparent; in particular, the public is asked for input at several stages. So I am surprised that the article does not provide any link to an actual proposal - without it, how am I going to believe its claims?

tephra• 3 years ago

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=COM%3A20...

And the feedback https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-sa...

I should note (as someone who has been fighting against this) is that commissioner Johansson has avoided meeting with civil servant groups in the lead up to this proposal (we have tried _multiple_ times to get a meeting).

prof-dr-ir3• 3 years ago

Well, thank you for your efforts but I do not think I see anything alarming at this stage. (Perhaps this means that your efforts paid off...)

The proposal itself does not explicitly forbid end-to-end encryption; it might one day try to, but the regulatory scrutiny board insists that the legislation should "respect the prohibition of general monitoring obligations."

In fact, having seen all this I think I can kind of see why journalists are not actively "pursuing" this as the article keeps asking.

guy982387104• 3 years ago

The very purpose of privacy is to break laws. Privacy is the space where laws do not apply.

I don't remember where I heard it, but I really like this definition of privacy. It's a defense against bad laws and there are quite a few of those, including child porn and child abuse laws that actually lead to prosecution of adolescents (sending nudes to each other) and loss of access to medical information for kids (anyone tried to search for "12yo penis" images?).

bpfrh• 3 years ago

No privacy can also be that you vote for measure x but nobody knows that but you, e.g. you can have an opinion/hobby without anyone knowing about it but you and people you trust.

guy982387104• 3 years ago

Indeed, privacy protects from social pressure in addition to protecting you from the government. In any case, it's intended for things other people do not approve of.

kragen15• 3 years ago

privacy is the space where coercion does not apply; law enforcement is necessarily coercive, but not all coercion is legal

not even all police coercion is legal; when the police disappeared tens of thousands of people here during the last dictatorship, the police were breaking the law, and in some cases the disappeared were not

also, privacy can protect people from repercussions from activities that are legal at one time but prohibited later, perhaps after a change of government, such as celebrating passover

ivan_gammel• 3 years ago

No, that is wrong. It is the purpose of the laws to protect privacy, which is our right to protect ourselves by prevention of sharing sensitive information with bad actors. Our privacy means that others cannot exploit our weaknesses to get our money or to bully us. It means that rogue cop cannot blackmail us by exposing details of our private life to public. There are many scenarios when too much data landed in the wrong hands.

People may use privacy as an excuse to hide their crimes, but criminals are minority and lawful citizens will be exposed to criminals and police states if privacy shield no longer exists. As for child abuse, when we have to seek for evidence, the crime has already happened. Solving it is important, but what is more important than that? Prevention.

guy982387104• 3 years ago

It's not just a few bad cops. No matter how well the law is written and executed, it is always bad from the point of view of some people. There is no universal agreement about what should be illegal. People who lose the fight over laws can use privacy as a refuge.

random_upvoter• 3 years ago

The European leaders talk big about being the protectors of democracy and yet all the time things get pushed through that literally nobody wants.

rcMgD2BwE72F• 3 years ago

Just as non-European leaders.

zerodensity3• 3 years ago

I dunno I like this proposal. So at least one person wants it.

alexbiet3• 3 years ago

Let them have it. Complete and absolute control over all citizens. Nothing more, nothing less. Then what? They will finally realise absolute power is an empty pursuit that brings nothing but misery for both the masses and the so called elites.

False leaders have no place leading anyone as they lead through fear and insecurity. Their lack of trust cemented in incompetence, arrogance and hubris leads to a neurotic chase for absolute and utter control over everything and everybody. How empty that path must be... and deemed for nothing but failure.

True leaders inspire through visions for the future and they will eventually rise to lead. A true leader inspires action and trust, unity and purpose. True leaders are instinctually acknowledged by everyone, are accountable to everyone and value responsibility over personal power. Maturity, good character and wisdom is naturally part of their character.

Hardly anything resembling a true leader can be observed in the current political space... and that speaks volumes to the state of our society.

Here comes the change, unexpected and imminent, to sweep away all falsities and reveal the truth.

walterbell3• 3 years ago

Why would mortal humans waste time/money on mass experiments with predictably useless outcomes?

alexbiet3• 3 years ago

Entirely the point I am making, albeit indirectly. The majority of rules and regulations nowadays are aimed at more and more control over the people at little to no benefit to them. People get angry and protest such measures. Rinse and repeat, for at least the last decade or two. It’s repetitive and pointless. When does it become clear the once great system which brought us growth and prosperity is no longer fit for purpose? At what point people realise we need to shed the old system and its top crème de la crème in favour of a new one?

We need new leaders capable of creating a vision for our future to inspire 8+ BLN people and to put in place the means to get us there.

xorry2• 3 years ago

every single line that you write in all kinds of messaging apps (including encrypted services), your e-mails — yes, all of this — can be filtered out ...

how exactly will this work?

menaerus• 3 years ago

Network equipment of our ISPs already have this type of surveillance software. And there are number of examples where we have seen that it is being used by the government intel with success, and regardless of the communication chain being encrypted or not.

mderazon• 3 years ago

There's no shortage of ways. For example mandate preinstalling a spyware on every mobile device sold

brutusborn• 3 years ago

Government controlled firmware on all devices that reads the messages after they are unencrypted?

lcampbell• 3 years ago

Probably just an extension to existing ETSI legal interception interfaces[1] that I believe are required to be implemented by all service providers of a certain size in the EU. Your personal email server and private IRC network are probably out of scope.

[1] e.g. for email: https://www.etsi.org/deliver/etsi_ts/102200_102299/10223202/... - the specs are really boring to read and there are lots and lots of them, if you want to deep dive. From what I can tell it's basically just the service provider implementing an API client that feeds everything they're required to a centralized endpoint.

alphazard3• 3 years ago

For all of the software engineers here, you would have a much larger impact by tackling this problem at a technical level, or contributing financially to groups that lobby against this sort of thing. Going out and protesting, or even helping to circulate a petition is going to be less impactful, and an inefficient use of your time and skillset.

Your vote is worth 1, maybe your influence is worth a dozen or so. You could make millions of votes against you totally moot with the right piece of software.

Look for existing projects that deal with secure networking, E2EE, self-hosted apps and ask how you can help.

ianopolous• 3 years ago

Totally agree! Shameless self promotion: have a look at Peergos - https://github.com/peergos/peergos

Our tech book might be a better starting point for this group: https://book.peergos.org

okokwhatever2• 3 years ago

Love it. Thanks!

loup-vaillant3• 3 years ago

That piece of software still needs to be legal. If it's illegal much fewer people will actually use it, and those who use it anyway can arbitrarily be punished for it.

alphazard3• 3 years ago

Detecting whether someone is using a particular piece of software is just part of the threat model, another technical problem, with a technical solution.

Eduard2• 3 years ago

Better fix the root cause, not the symptoms.

TT-392• 3 years ago

Something in me almost wants to see this law pass, just to see what happens. I am guessing anyone who knows about internet infra / privacy / security, would either stand up and protest it. Though, for some reason, part of me thinks people would just find a way around it, feel like it is fine like that and not protest at all (I sure prefer the first option). Or I guess the third option: mass noncompliance. Which I guess has been the answer to a lot of EU laws.

yreg4• 3 years ago

Mass non-compliance is problematic strategy, because then the government can persecute arbitrary people for stuff that “everyone” does.

GDPR is one such high stake example where no business can really feel safe.

malermeister• 3 years ago

But GDPR is kind of the opposite in that it protects the right to privacy (in this case from surveillance capitalism), so conflating them seems counterproductive

daneel_w• 3 years ago

Every SMS and phone call on the PSTN of most European countries is already part of a long-term archiving process dating back more than two decades. This legislation is in part meant to bring purely Internet-based communications into the dragnet, and part just retroactive legal gyrations to publically formalize the already established mass-surveillance of the PSTN.

walterbell3• 3 years ago

Earlier Mullvad op-ed mentions age-verification, https://mullvad.net/en/blog/2023/2/1/eu-chat-control-law-wil...

  Article 6 of the law requires all "software application stores" to:

  - Assess whether each service provided by each software application enables human-to-human communication
  - Verify whether each user is over or under the age of 17
  - Prevent users under 17 from installing such communication software

California passed the AADC law in 2022, taking effect in 2024, requiring, https://www.techdirt.com/2022/09/16/californias-age-appropri...

  - “impact assessments” before launching new features that kids are likely to access
  - businesses, not parents, to figure out what’s in the best interest of children
  - [treating] children as if they all .. face the same risks .. lumps together 17 year-olds and 2 year-olds
  - threatens to make face scans a routine and everyday occurrence
  - before you can go to a new site, you will have to do either face scanning or upload age authenticating documents

Utah draft legislation, https://www.ksl.com/article/50569189/utah-lawmakers-want-age...

  - would require every adult in Utah to submit age verification in order to use social media
  - minor accounts would need to be associated with a verified adult account
  - social media companies.. collect personal information from their parents

keraf• 3 years ago

It's quite ironic how much critics are aimed at China being a surveillance state when the EU train is going full steam ahead in that direction... Dark days ahead.

stu432• 3 years ago

Who'd have thought those in charge were a bunch of hypocrites?

throwrqX• 3 years ago

Every time this comes up people talk about protecting privacy and anonymity and what not and while luckily for us most of the time the laws die out they still do pass on occasion. The fundamental issue to me is that society still wants to protect against pedophiles or drug dealers or whatever other group more than protect privacy. As an example, how many people here could go on television onto some talk program or news show with their real name and face and tell a child abuse victim that while their concerns may be valid they are wrong and they should shut up? I doubt very many. I ran into a similar scenario once defending privacy when a lady who said she was abused as a child came into the conversation and told her story to the crowd. As you can imagine the crowd was very supportive of her and my concerns were more or less dismissed afterwards. There is nothing technical I could say that could persuade them as much as the poor lady's life story could.

vorpalhex• 3 years ago

"Would the law you propose have stopped you being abused?"

No. Police are not psychics. They do not stop theoretical crime. They can only respond after crime has happened.

_vertigo2• 3 years ago

how many people here could go on television onto some talk program or news show with their real name and face and tell a child abuse victim that while their concerns may be valid they are wrong and they should shut up?

Well, putting aside the "shut up" part, I'd be happy to state publicly that under no (reasonable, peacetime) circumstances should the government be allowed to read my texts, emails, and documents.

Obviously there's a bunch of qualifiers to assign to that (if I'm under suspicion of something, OK, sure, maybe the government can get a warrant) that I'm not qualified to speak intelligently about, but that's the gist. Saying that the government should not be able to read your email or list to your phone calls is not an unpopular opinion, at least in the States, and it's also not one that requires you to be of an overly technical persuasion to have.

People support victims of child abuse and they also distrust the government and don't want it to have awesome powers of espionage it can wield against the entire populace at scale all of the time. Those positions might conflict with each other if you frame the conversation that way, but if you do frame it that way, I don't think it's a given that the child abuse argument is always going to win the debate.

pfortuny• 3 years ago

That is why passion is not a good way to write laws.

Something being useful (lack of privacy) does not make it either good or necessary.

r3trohack3r2• 3 years ago

The fundamental issue to me is that society still wants to protect against pedophiles or drug dealers or whatever other group more than protect privacy.

Speaking from a U.S. perspective here.

A pedophile with a cameraphone is terrible. But law enforcement without the 4th amendment is worse.

A racist with a social media account is terrible. But a president without the 1st amendment is worse.

There are people who do terrible things in this world. Unfortunately people who do terrible things can run for government and be appointed to positions of power.

There are darker things down the path of eroding our protections from our government than whatever evil they’re asking us to yield for.

skrebbel2• 3 years ago

I had to look this up, so here's my attempt at translation for non-Americans:

A pedophile with a cameraphone is terrible. But law enforcement that can search and seize property at will is worse.
A racist with a social media account is terrible. But a president that can deny people their freedom of expression & assembly is worse.

I agree.

(ps. offtopic meta remark, the American enthusiasm for remembering laws by number never ceases to amaze me)

jeremyjh2• 3 years ago

What does the first amendment have to do with social media companies?

supercheetah• 3 years ago

There are darker things down the path of eroding our protections from our government than whatever evil they’re asking us to yield for.

I agree with you, but this illustrates part of the problem of our messaging. These policies are still just tools which don't have an inherent moral value. The evil comes from their abuse on a mass scale, and the huge temptation to abuse them, with the emphasis on how easily the powerful can be corrupted.

This is prone to being called out for being a slippery slope fallacy, but we need to just back it up with historical precedent, like how similar policies were abused in the US as revealed by Snowden.

nhchris• 3 years ago

Say "Most sexual abuse is domestic. Shall we mandate cameras in every room of every house? Or remote engine-lock to stop terrorist car attacks? There are cameras everywhere, forensics is more advanced than ever, 'going dark' is the opposite of reality. But there is always some small remaining scrap of freedom left to sacrifice for supposed 'safety', until we are reduced to cattle. Doing so is spitting on the graves of everyone who ever died for freedom, of everyone who chose to fight instead of 'peacefully' submit to foreign conquest or domestic dictatorship.

But suppose you do prefer 'safety' to all else, to privacy and liberty. Suppose you want to sacrifice everything for it. Will you even get it? We can today build prisons and surveillance far more effective than at any point in history, and once we've turned society into a safe cage, how sure are you the wrong people won't get the keys? Historically, how many governments would you have trusted with such total surveillance of their citizens? Tsarist Russia? Soviet Russia? Present day Russia? Communist China? Present day China? Nazi Germany? The Stasi? The Khmer Rouge? The Ottoman Empire? Iran? The British Raj? But you're sure nothing like that will happen here? This time, benevolent government will last, and we can safely surrender all means of opposition?"

alar44• 3 years ago

It's a great argument but way over the head of the average citizen. Most people are unable to think about things this way. The government and police are the good guys etc.

8note• 3 years ago

I'd just point out that the TSA is known for exploitatively using it's naked scans of people.

Ensuring that the government has access to everyone's nudes includes children's nudes.

Pedophile police officers is worse than pedophile non-police, since the pedophile police would have the law on their side

Hnrobert42• 3 years ago

Ah. I’m going to need a source to back this one up.

I steadfastly refused to use the mm wave scanners for years until DHS went through the proper comment period. I have no love for those things.

Initially, the device produced revealing images. Now the images are more or less anonymous white figures with private areas even more obscured.

If you have data to the contrary, Im interested.

ghusto2• 3 years ago

Conflating privacy stripping laws with paedophilia protection is something I'd happily deconstruct, whether in front of a camera or otherwise. It's not difficult to show with logic how one doesn't help the other, and I could even go as far as showing how the laws make things worse.

Don't bring feelings to a logic fight.

Seattle35032• 3 years ago

Convincing people not to support privacy eroding laws isn't a logic fight as you are imagining it. Advocacy is much more complicated than that.

mahathu• 3 years ago

As an example, how many people here could go on television onto some talk program or news show with their real name and face and tell a child abuse victim that while their concerns may be valid they are wrong and they should shut up? I doubt very many.

I think I'm misunderstanding you here, are you implying presently real politicians would have to do that to advocate for privacy laws?

pessimizer7• 3 years ago

Don't worry about that audience. Us profesional-managerial upper-middle class types are surrounded by people whose beliefs are subordinate to their personal ambition; it's a qualification for entering the class, because it takes an enormous amount of hard work, social connections, and study to reach and maintain that position. So you end up surrounded by people who live a politics of personal interests i.e. real concern about issues that affect them and the people they love (deemed universal), and ephemeral concern that sometimes borders on actual ignorance of things that don't affect them and theirs. This ephemeral concern and ignorance is entirely based in fashion.

Upper-middle class PMCs generally aren't worried about being monitored or censored by authorities (except within the games of party power politics and wedge issues.) If anything, when they hear about it, they look to see if there are job openings. They are concerned about child abuse, because even wealthy children get abused. Universal.

They constitute (if I'm being generous) 20% of the population and are useless to try to convince. It's their duty to explain to you that the society that has rewarded them generously for their hard work actually has everyone's best interests at heart, no matter how ludicrous it seems.

mab122• 3 years ago

Side argument - why do you need protection from drug dealers? Just don't buy drugs from them if you don't want any.

Main argument: you bring up very important aspect - emotional one. We are very emotional and in the heat of the moment you probably won't be able to make good technical and reasonable case to persuade people, but that doesn't mean they are right.

Also I am not against _solutions_ to the problem. I am against solutions that when implemented have really low cost of switching them into tools of abuse.

Example: There is law that allows banning of websites (just DNS resolution) that promote gambling, illegal porn etc. It was recently used to "take down" a website that leaked emails of politicians of current government (it could be bad if we speak of some national security / military stuff, in that case they share info about corruption and nepotism)

benevol• 3 years ago

By that logic, we'd need to make knives illegal, because people get stabbed to death every day somewhere.

canadaduane2• 3 years ago

It isn't logic, and I think that's the point--it's an appeal to emotion, and if you pit logic vs emotion, emotion will almost always win in the broader culture. (A few oddball cultures like ycombinator and lesswrong etc. aside, perhaps).

posterboy2• 3 years ago

Which logic?

It's always a matter of availability, balance, justification, right. The justification is there, so your argument is a strawman.

It would be more relevant in a direct comparison to gun control, which. Blades are fairly easy to furnish on the spot, easier than guns, so this comparison fails, too.

Balance requires a need for knives, which is difficult to put aside and certainly not the point of this argument. The ball park figure alone is not making a rational argument.

The internet is not the breaking point either way, though it could be used to implement access control.

So, I am effectively unsure if your whatabout'ish strawman is in favour of intrusive regulation.

BeFlatXIII2• 3 years ago

That’s why you let people vote how they want and then give them the Truman Show.

canadaduane2• 3 years ago

This is an awesome point, and one I think geeks need to hear often: We act based on our emotions even if they are well-hidden beneath logical explanations.

Perhaps the "answer" to the lady who was abused as a child is to tell another emotional story--for example, Ann Frank:

Have you heard the story of Anne Frank? She was a Jewish girl who lived in Amsterdam during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands in World War II. She and her sister lived in hiding for two years until they were eventually discovered and arrested by the Gestapo. They later died of typhus in a concentration camp.
How did surveillance play a role? No one knows who betrayed her. She lived through constant fear of being caught. Knowing they were being watched added to the already difficult conditions of living in hiding--the stress of the situation affected their relationships and mental health.
If you or those you care about ever find yourself on the "less desirable" list in society, it's vital that you have some control over things you say to others in confidence. The Nazi's oppression of the Jewish people limited their freedom and contributed to Anne's tragic end.

charles_f• 3 years ago

Ok I know it sounds crazy but hear me out.

I'm certain my neighbour is secretly conspiring against me. I've seen the signs, I'm not an idiot. He closes the curtains when I look into his place, I've seen him talking with the other neighbours, and you won't believe it! He named his dog Bozo, which I'm sure is just to allow him to call me names scott-free! I confronted him but he tells me to chill out. The balls on this guys...

Now if we get that mass surveillance going on, we can safely assume that they'll mission private companies to do it. We all knoe what's happening in this case, they hire the best of the best (and by that I mean the best at cutting on cost and maximizing shareholders revenues). These have the best security teams! (and by that I mean that they cost very little). I can only hope for an Equifax or a Lastpass like breach, but worst case scenario I'm sure they will gladly sell my neighbour's data, and I'll finally be able to prove that SoaB is after me.

I know all the privacy-conscious sissies out there will cry out, but I don't have anything to hide. I take good care of deleting my browser history and using private mode when I browse illegal websites

okokwhatever2• 3 years ago

Jokes aside. You and me knows that this will happen. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow but it will happen. And when the day comes nobody will be accountable for the great mistake some politicians are gonna commit.

sl0wh0rses• 3 years ago

Funnily enough it is European companies and not American ones that are leading the charge on privacy. ProtonMail / Tutanota etc for example on the email front. I've heard of a company called Snacka! as well that seems to be using some gaming tech in streaming for end-to-end encrypted communication that doesn't suffer performance as much as services like jitsi. If more companies follow privacy principles like this in the way they build their products that's only part of the battle, though - it's also important to prevent such things from a legislative perspective.

zx85wes4• 3 years ago

Tutanota was forced to install a backdoor by a German court (see https://www.heise.de/news/Gericht-zwingt-Mailprovider-Tutano...) I don't think a US court can force a US company to do so.

welterde• 3 years ago

Didn't Lavabit shutdown because of exactly that [1]? So pretty sure the US secret courts can very much force companies to do just that and worse (even require them to be silent about it, which clearly is not the case in Germany).

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/20/why-di...

jokethrowaway3• 3 years ago

Stupid EU bureaucrats, don't they know you're supposed to put in the work and inject zero days in every consumer product so that you can create your very own spy network?

You can't just legislate it!

LelouBil• 3 years ago

Could this even be allowed by the constitutuons of EU democracies?

EU doesn't pass laws, it passes directives, rulings or recommendations.

If it's not compatible with a member's constitution it will not pass.

alan-stark3• 3 years ago

Sometimes I feel that the world is sleepwalking straight into the pages of 1984. Proposals to monitor chats, ban encryption, legitimize location tracking create perfect infrastructure for new dictators. If some day a new Hitler grabs power in a nuclear-capable country, he'll be able to track down and destroy dissenters before they have a chance to protest.

What are some simple and practical actions any EU citizen can take now to stop this from going forward?

rqtwteye2• 3 years ago

Totally agree. Hitler's gestapo, Stalin's NKVD and East German Stasi would have loved the surveillance infrastructure and technology we are building up right now.

O__________O21• 3 years ago

Strangest thing to me about the topic is that it’s obvious vast percentage of citizens within democracies wish they lived in an authoritarian country, yet choose to live in a democracy and use the liberties they’re provided to actively destabilize and destroy it. To me this is the largest issue, not a given topic that results from it.

Yes, I am aware current authoritarian countries wage propaganda campaigns, but in my experience such campaigns would be meaningless without an existing tendency to seek out authoritarian rule.

While likely flawed opinion, I do feel like one possible explanation is nationalism in general, since while many democratic countries will argue they believe in the rule of law, ultimately any non-citizen is treated as if they are within an authoritarian country and for sure not as citizens by default. Only once there are countries that treats all people equally and as citizens, will such an issue be addressed in my opinion.

dingusdew• 3 years ago

Unpopular opinion: If you don't like democracy and use your democratic rights to actively work to dismantle it, you probably shouldn't actually be allowed to participate in democracy since you are operating in bad faith.

O__________O21• 3 years ago

While I don’t agree, I do believe it’s a common perspective and one that’s important to have dialogue on.

While for sure an imperfect response, I would say that no democracy will ever be absolutely perfect, since it would require a consensus on everything and everyone understanding the topic equally prior to voicing their opinion. Further, authoritarian beliefs are only true threat to a democracy if majority support authoritarian rule, at which point I would argue it’s not a democracy.

That said, with the advancements of AI, it increasingly dangerous, since if given the tools and opportunity, an authoritarian minority might over take an unprepared majority.

lizzardbraind• 3 years ago

If you let them vote, they'll vote to destroy their society.

If you don't let them vote, they'll act to destroy their society.

It would be emotionally satisfying, but ultimately destructive. It would also be ripe for abuse; imagine how awful it would be if we had secret lists of people who weren't allowed to do other normal activities, like air travel or vehicle registration.

pessimizer7• 3 years ago

That's not unpopular, it's a typical authoritarian opinion. Every censor out there is defending us from threats to our democracy. They would love the idea of setting up the Agency for the Good Faith Belief in Democracy and Democratic Rights, who would certify individuals as being qualified to vote.

https://allthatsinteresting.com/voting-literacy-test

rwmj• 3 years ago

A few constitutions explicitly defend democracy, so you cannot modify the constitution to remove the democratic system. Germany is the most famous example (because, you know, Hitler).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entrenched_clause#Germany

micadep• 3 years ago

Reminds me of Popper’s idea that a democracy shouldn’t give it’s tools to those who seek to destroy it.

“If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.” Karl Popper

anthonypasq• 3 years ago

seems like you dont like democracy lol. If the members of a democratic country dont want a democracy anymore, that seems within their rights.

red1reaper• 3 years ago

That is a good opinion in principle, but rather complicated to implement in a way that would work as expected. Most implementations would at best add too much bias to the process which would make it counterproductive, at worst it would corrupted in no time and lead to an authoritarian government which would defetat its porpouse.

systemvoltage3• 3 years ago

Well, I think we had a solid bipartisan support for classical-liberism up until 2015. It's worth going back to it with the lessons learned. It was the bedrock that allowed limited centralization and most importantly, accountability.

We need new journalism that keeps powers in check and hold them accountable, not pander to their readers in an ever resonating echo chambers.

O__________O21• 3 years ago

Assuming by “we” you are referring to Americans, which to me not a democracy, but a plutocracy; that is, a society that is ruled or controlled by people of great wealth, either as a individual or organization.

As for American media, issues related to pandering to readers is likely related to it deregulating media industry in the 80s; for more information see:

https://apnews.com/article/business-immigration-deregulation...

pessimizer7• 3 years ago

Well, I think we had a solid bipartisan support for classical-liberism up until 2015.

This is a fantasy history. We have had solid bipartisan support for neoliberalism (property rights are king) and neoconservatism (and we need motivating myths about them to keep the proles in line) for a long time. That consensus continues. "Classical liberalism" has never been popular anywhere.

edit: we're having an extreme authoritarian wave as a reaction to the internet, but we shouldn't pretend like we don't come from countries that used to open people's mail to look for pamphlets about contraception.

BeFlatXIII2• 3 years ago

Pandering is the only way to feed and house the journalists.

pessimizer7• 3 years ago

it’s obvious vast percentage of citizens within democracies wish they lived in an authoritarian country, yet choose to live in a democracy

Most people don't get to choose where they live. It's really a relatively tiny percentage of the population who would have the financial ability and/or skills to emigrate, and those are really the people you're talking about. They have no loyalty to where they live because they don't need any; they can leave whenever they want, and threaten to whenever they get upset about anything.

O__________O21• 3 years ago

Understand your point, though disagree. My understanding is the majority of people on Earth stay within days walking distance from where they grew up. Further, there are numerous countries that if they wanted could easily cover the costs related to relocating anyone that desired to leave another country.

I would argue the real explanation is most likely regardless of person’s situation, most want a predictable future, regardless of how good or bad their current situation. Moving to a new culture with no home, no source of income, no family or friends, etc — is viewed as predictably unpredictable by most.

mjburgess4• 3 years ago

Nationalism is such an ubiquitous and powerful ideology, we don't realise that pretty much everyone today is an extreme nationalist.

Before "nations" people didnt regard borders, states, etc. as they do today. "citizenship" of a "nation" is a relatively recent phenomenon.

Most today think it's a good-and-fitting thing to defend "one's country". And this impulse is vastly more powerful than defending "democracy".

Who would die to stop a coup? Few. Who would die to stop an "invasion", apparently, many.

What motivates Ukrainians after all?

Quite an extreme ideology, one that puts so many men on the battlefield. But nations were invented, there is nothing "natural" to fight for here; nor anything even clearly moral.

"Democracy", therefore, is clearly a vastly vastly weaker ideology. Nationalism is the most powerful ideology to ever exist.

danenania4• 3 years ago

I don't think Ukraine is a good example of your point, as apart from being a war between two nations, it is clearly also a war between democratic and authoritarian belief systems. That ideological divide is a large part of what sparked it in the first place--the whole thing began with mass pro-democracy demonstrations that ousted an authoritarian leader.

My perception is that Ukrainians know what it's like to live under an authoritarian system and they would rather risk death and the total destruction of the country than go back to it. Nationalism is clearly a factor as well, but it is deeply intertwined with pro-democratic and anti-authoritarian ideals. I don't think you'd see anything close to this level of resistance if victory would mean an authoritarian Ukraine rather than a democratic Ukraine.

O__________O21• 3 years ago

Tribes have existed since before written history; not sure if you’re referring to something else, but to me a tribe is essentially same thing, us vs them.

lo_zamoyski2• 3 years ago

Before "nations" people didnt regard borders, states, etc. as they do today. "citizenship" of a "nation" is a relatively recent phenomenon.

"Nationalism" had more to do with the relationship between the state and the nation, not the existence of nations. The word "nation" is very old.

Nation comes from the Latin "natio" meaning "birth, origin; breed, stock, kind, species; race of people, tribe"[0]. Thus, the essential basis for nationality is familial, a matter of common descent (as all human beings form an extended family, where you draw the line on this blurry map will depend on other factors like culture and language and ultimately the good held in common; note how Croats, Serbs, and Bosnians speak basically the same language, it is the religious and therefore cultural differences that separate them). Naturally, people migrate all the time between nations. That is normal to the degree that migration does not harm the common good of the host society. But immigration is effectively a matter of adoption. We can adopt children. We can also adopt nations.

[0] https://www.etymonline.com/word/nation#etymonline_v_2309

danielscrubs• 3 years ago

You are fighting for who has the “monopoly of violence”, which is the most natural thing ever, that we have those cliques as big as they are might not be though.

int_19h16• 3 years ago

Most today think it's a good-and-fitting thing to defend "one's country"

Not in Europe. This poll was in 2014, when Russia first invaded Ukraine:

https://i.imgur.com/QnTeCwP.png

lo_zamoyski2• 3 years ago

I think we need to slow down and look at this with level heads.

1. What is a reliable measure of this "vast percentage"?

2. Are you perhaps lumping any departure from your preferred political model as "authoritarian"?

3. Are you perhaps overattributing the level of "democracy" to your preferred political regime?

4. Have you considered the motivations behind the distaste with ostensibly "democratic" regimes?

Simply declaring "nationalism!" is not an intellectually substantive remark and probably caricaturish because a) what do you mean by "nationalism", and b) you haven't identified the confluence of motives to see what might be happening and why.

My 2 cents: liberalism as a political ideology traceable to Locke and Hobbes is unraveling because of its inherent tensions and errors (like the tension between knowledge and the mistaken liberal notion of "freedom" understood as "do what thou wilt" versus "do what thou ought"; its radical individualism; its totalitarian "neutrality" which is a manipulative, underhanded means of entrenching liberal presuppositions; its egalitarianism). It is to be expected that someone whose sentiments have been shaped in a social climate that valorizes an ideology will view any departure as hostile and "authoritarian", not on objective grounds, but merely according to habituated affect. You had the same thing in post-Soviet Russia and post-War Germany.

O__________O21• 3 years ago

From the first sentence of the related post — “The European Commission is currently in the process of enacting a law called Chat control. If the law goes into effect, it will mean that all EU citizens' communications will be monitored and listened to.”

Level headed person would see that the next step is logically that all communications regardless if they’re in private, in person, etc should be monitored. If that’s not an authoritarian state, I am happy to be listen to why.

As for a vast percentage, I mean that topic like this would not even see the light of day if there wasn’t source of significant support; hint, there is.

I have neither have preference over given political party, nor would I be affiliated with a given group; that is, I am fine independently observing, understanding, evaluating, and if needed, acting on any situation as needed.

Not sure understand you point 3, please feel free to clarify.

As for point 4, I covered a possible reasoning why current democracies might be viewed as unjust; if you missed that, might be worth reading my OP comment again.

And yes, nationalism is toxic. It treats other humans as subhumans by default, that is non-citizens are not treated equal, and for sure not as citizens by default. If there was a country that treated all humans as citizens, equally, fairly, etc - I would be happy to reevaluate my beliefs related to nationalism.

And for your two cents, I prefer plain-English and first principle reasoning, not reference to historical ideologies, list of ism’s, etc. Said another way, I don’t understand what you hoped I would understand, but happy to listen.

browningstreet• 3 years ago

Most people voting/supporting these kinds of things believe there is a dastardly "other" that this will apply to more than it will apply to them. There are plenty of recent political endeavors where this was extremely obvious and loudly detailed and, yet...

So much of the large-scale political nastiness these days isn't because a rising minority wants to enforce fair rules that everyone has to abide by together. They want rules that suppress the opportunities of someone else and are certain that the rules won't suppress them.

You can argue that there's little difference between one side or the other, but it's like a game cube -- in one direction it's left vs right, flip the cube and it's rich vs poor, spin the cube again, it's majority race/religion against others. The dastardly part is that, say, the propaganda of one orientation of the cube is often accepted by the oppressed parties of another orientation of cube.

O__________O21• 3 years ago

Agree. Another possibility (or possibly expansion of your points) is that people feel that they are being responsible by amplifying the predictability of their current environment without realizing the potential for it to destabilize it instead. Honestly puzzled by topic and it’s one that spent a lot of time and effort trying to impact. Ultimately, I want to believe people understand they’re making an informed choice, but obviously concerned and puzzled by the pattern, which is neither new, nor likely to fade away, especially as AI‘s role advances in societies. That said, I have hope, and believe future is truly open to those willing to take the time to make a positive difference.

int_19h16• 3 years ago

They want rules that suppress the opportunities of someone else and are certain that the rules won't suppress them.

It should be noted that some of this sentiment comes from people who used the same techniques themselves to disrupt social arrangement, and who want to suppress them precisely because they know that it can work. Here's what one Soviet dissident had to say on the subject of human rights after USSR was gone:

"I always knew that only the decent people should have rights, and the indecent ones should not. ... Personally, I've had enough. Some time ago we [dissidents] and the USA have used this concept as a ram against the USSR and communists. This concept has served its purpose, and we should stop lying about human rights and promoting their defenders, lest we undermine ourselves."

It's rarely that blatant, but you can kinda sorta see similar sentiments in e.g. the explanations of why ACLU "evolves" on free speech.

klabb3• 3 years ago

For reference, many years ago when a similar surveillance law was implemented in Sweden (the FRA law), 90% of people were against it (in random polling) but politicians voted it in anyway. It later turned out this was a diplomatic back channel direct order from the US, which was found out through that big Wikileaks dump.

So, the people are not at fault in these situations imo. First, it’s politicians and after that it’s journalists. Sunlight keeps malicious politicians in check, investigative journalism has been severely crippled with corporate media. As has whistleblowing.

O__________O21• 3 years ago

Regardless of what form of government is currently ruling a given country, ultimately the people within it are responsible for the actions taken by the government, not the government itself.

As for your other point, I agree, free balanced independent journalism, whistleblower, leaks, etc - play a clear role in insuring public stays informed.

That said, in my opinion, if 90% percent of a population was against something, but they passively allowed it to happen, it is no one’s fault but there own. I don’t for a second believe average person does not understand they have a choice over who rules them and how, even if that choice is to fight to the death to defend that right, flee the area, or for that matter, simply do whatever they’re told to do.

dmitriid3• 3 years ago

So, the people are not at fault in these situations imo.

In 2022 elections year one of the largest parties in Sweden (Moderaterna) had "more cameras and surveillance on our streets" as one of their big campaign points, including campaign signs and bilboards. It came in second.

People are definitely at fault.

lern_too_spel3• 3 years ago

It later turned out this was a diplomatic back channel direct order from the US, which was found out through that big Wikileaks dump.

Source? I can't find any such documents.

slickrick2163• 3 years ago

So close to a breakthrough but you lost it at the end.

O__________O21• 3 years ago

How so specifically?

trieste92• 3 years ago

The Commission’s new demands would require regular plain-text access to users’ private messages, from email to texting to social media.

So maybe just don't rely on proprietary messaging clients that claim to be encrypted?

TallBellows3345• 3 years ago

Was surprised to see this coming directly from mullvad. Big names are pushing back on this recently. Good.

1337shadow2• 3 years ago

Why not but then what's your plan against the explosion of crime?

Laaas2• 3 years ago

If this goes through I will personally leave EU, and I wouldn't be surprised if others do too. What reason is there to remain in the EU? It being a regulatory superpower [0]? Metaphorical lol.

[0] https://ecfr.eu/article/commentary_the_eu_as_a_digital_regul...

zerodensity3• 3 years ago

Where would you go?

nforgerit2• 3 years ago

As a German: It is good tradition to escape to South America.

Laaas2• 3 years ago

Any country in the top-50 of GDP (PPP) per capita would likely work well, but I would personally likely go to Hong Kong or one of the Arabic countries.

pfoof• 3 years ago

Don't you worry, one or two exploits by a black hat and "Johansson tapes" will be torrented around

FpUser• 3 years ago

"The politicians proposing this legislation claim to be doing it for the sake of the children."

For the sake of those children having an actual future rather than political GULAG I propose to fire those politicians, never let them close to any position of power again and have them monitored 24x7 as offenders.

sAbakumoff• 3 years ago

>In other words, your personal life will be fully exposed to government scrutiny. So, why is it that almost no one is talking about this?

Personally, I don't give a flying fuck about it. I have nothing to hide and if the proposed surveillance measures help in preventing crimes, I say – go for it, babe.

skrebbel2• 3 years ago

Any tips for what an EU citizen can do against this, beyond upvoting this story on HN?

mordae2• 3 years ago

I think it's too late.

https://european-pirateparty.eu/parliament-approves-chatcont...

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

prof-dr-ir3• 3 years ago

Your first link talks about a specific derogation approved by the EU parliament. It provides an exemption to the ePrivacy directive, which allows for (existing) searches for child sexual abuse material by major content providers to remain legal. Without this exemption these searches would apparently be in violation of the ePrivacy directive.

You can read the derogation here: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A... . There is a somewhat helpful first page that provides context.

Personally I think it is quite a reasonable derogation; the pirate party clearly disagrees.

alan-stark3• 3 years ago

Perhaps write letters to members of European Parliament explaining our concerns, then ask all our friends to do the same?

To make it a low-cost effort, we could (a) prepare a list of relevant politicians (b) create a template of the letter. Then our non-technical friends need only sign and mail this. And if we put this all up as a one-pager on GitHub pages, it's suitable for sharing on social networks too ;)

alan-stark3• 3 years ago

Turns out Patrick Breyer from the Pirate Party already put up a list of practical steps, infographics and EP members, see https://www.patrick-breyer.de/en/posts/chat-control/#WhatYou...

PaulHoule• 3 years ago

How is they can make a really problematic privacy law that degrades the web in the name of privacy (would love to sue the EU on the basis that those cookie banners cause problems for people w/ disabilities) and an equally problematic law that helps embezzlers re-offend in the name of privacy but can then invade everyone’s privacy with chat control?

Is there some court that can rein it in? Can the EU be made to explode like a computer in an old movie when it is faced with a contradiction? Can the rest of the world make the EU relocate to the moon or mars so we can have some peace?

glass3• 3 years ago

A bit off-topic:

Which structure would be needed to make mass surveillance acceptable? Would it be possible to make it secure and transparent to the point that a mass surveillance system can be accepted as safe?

dang• 3 years ago

EU chat control law will ban open source operating systems - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34608330 - Feb 2023 (190 comments)

Chat Control: The EU’s CSEM scanner proposal - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34183772 - Dec 2022 (3 comments)

EU chat control bill: fundamental rights terrorism - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31416599 - May 2022 (5 comments)

Chat control: EU Commission presents mass surveillance plan on May 11 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31329368 - May 2022 (323 comments)

The latest EU plan to outlaw encryption and introduce communication surveillance - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29308617 - Nov 2021 (251 comments)

EU interior ministers welcome mandatory chat control for all smartphones - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29200506 - Nov 2021 (59 comments)

EU Chatcontrol 2.0 [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29066894 - Nov 2021 (197 comments)

Messaging and chat control - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28115343 - Aug 2021 (317 comments)

EU Parliament approves mass surveillance of private communications - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27759814 - July 2021 (11 comments)

European Parliament approves mass surveillance of private communication - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27753727 - July 2021 (415 comments)

Indiscriminate messaging and chatcontrol: Last chance to protest - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27736435 - July 2021 (104 comments)

IT companies warn in open letter: EU wants to ban encryption - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26825653 - April 2021 (217 comments)

pagutierrezn• 3 years ago

The proposal from the EU is not the first step towards the end of our privacy. In fact, it is the last one. Everyone else does already have our data, they just want what the rest already have.

TBH, I think we've lost every opportunity to correct this. And I'd be happy to be wrong

capr2• 3 years ago

Cuz UE is so big on privacy don't you know. GDPR for the plebs and total surveillance for the state, got it.

raydiatian• 3 years ago

At least the EU asks before just doing it. Or have we forgotten why Edward Snowden is a Russian now? /s

pelasaco5• 3 years ago

Funny how every department has the same aligned discourse. From https://www.coe.int/en/web/impact-convention-human-rights/ri...

Governments can only interfere with these rights when it is specifically allowed by law, and done for a good reason – like national security or public safety.

People have been screaming for that since years, but because of the impression that was for a good cause, we accepted. In the beginning was the bad hackers, then the terrorists, then to protect the children, then because of nazis, because of people that dont want be vaxx.. I will post it again, Glenn Greenwald is talking about it in different parts of the world https://rumble.com/v25depn-exclusive-extreme-escalation-of-b..., so either we defend this rights, regardless of who is the victim, or the surveillance will only increase - everywhere in the World.

nforgerit2• 3 years ago

This whole act of ignorance, incompetence and "smart stupidity" on politicians side infuriates me so much, I feel seriously sympathetic towards going underground devoting the rest of my life to trolling the shit out of the EU gov'ts.

chaostheory2• 3 years ago

This and the 14 eyes agreement further demonstrates that the GPRD is really just protectionist legislation for the EU’s tech and media companies. The EU is extremely hypocritical when it comes to the privacy of their citizens.

GoToRO• 3 years ago

" Therefore, we encourage journalists and citizens in all EU countries to question their governments and urge them to vote no."

How about you go and vote for the -right- government? You can't fix a country with technology.

Also, if you are a telecom operator in my country that means that you automatically allow the equivalent of FBI/CIA to connect directly in the switch with a cable. There is no other way to be a telecom operator.

What you really want is to have a judge agree to listen to somebody or not.

thomastjeffery• 3 years ago

Here in the comments I see dozens of instances of the same argument: is legislation like this the result of malicious power-grabbing conspiracy or the blind social fear of out-groups?

Either way, the conclusion is the same: government-run mass surveillance gets proposed and taken (politically) seriously. It's impossible to use that conclusion alone as evidence for either side of this argument, yet that is precisely what most of the comments here are trying to do!

It's such a pointless argument to be had. There is no utility in either answer.

It's impossible to fight a conspiracy without constructive evidence, and if a conspiracy is using propaganda to increase fear (as opposed to that fear being organic), then fighting that propaganda directly (as opposed to fighting the fear itself) requires knowledge of the propaganda's source, which itself is evidence of conspiracy!

Right now, both perspectives seem likely to be valid, but choosing one over the other is pointless. We are stuck fighting a single conclusion: fear itself; so we may as well focus our energy on that.

scotty79• 3 years ago

Remember the times where ACTA was THE issue?

Now we have a pandemic that just won't end, war with associated militarization and hit to the economy, inflation and cost of living crisis and climate change mass migrations to look forward to.

How do people have mental capacity to even think about the potential dangers of mass surveillance in democratic countries?

fleddr• 3 years ago

Excessive authoritarianism is scary but the thing that people should really wake up to is the nuclear combination of authoritarianism and digitization.

As an example, capital controls.

I grew up in the 80s, which was largely cash-based. You got paid in cash, spent in cash, and gift/transact to others in cash. Oversight was severely limited, close to non-existent.

The concept is that you're innocent until proven guilty. It's your money, do with it what you want and it's nobody's business what you do with it. And should you engage in any illegal matters, then it's up to the government to build this case with due diligence: have a probable cause, collect evidence, maybe arrange a warrant, etc.

The important part is the very high barrier to building such a case. It's a huge amount of work just to do this for one case. Because of this, authoritarianism is kept in check. You could say it doesn't "scale".

Now we fast forward to our digital "cash" society. It's questionable if you actually own the money at all, but that's a technicality that is beyond the point.

You have no transaction privacy. Not only is it all on record, the threshold for a flagged transaction gets lower and lower. Buy a car and the bank knows and the IRS knows (in the Netherlands). There's a proposal to do laundering analysis on any transaction > 100 euro. You can't deposit or withdraw sizable money without caps or raising all kinds of flags.

The privacy is eliminated. There is no probable cause or warrant, you're treated as guilty by default and evidence is to be collected that you're innocent. A full reversal of assumptions, rights and freedom.

Which is only the beginning, because my true point is that this scales. A government now has the ability to do whatever the hell they want with your money. They can analyze millions of us and control it with the push of a button.

Wrong photo in iCloud? Money frozen. Political opponent? Assets seized. Spent too much of your money on high energy products? Programmatic tax applied.

You can make that list as long as you want, but let's take even the absolute simplest case of having that wrong photo. Imagine the analog scenario where a government regularly bursts through the door of your home to look at your photo albums. That would be the most absurd thing ever, not to mention ridiculously inefficient. Yet this is digitally happening as we speak, and nobody knows or cares.

This kind of digital insight and power over your life is a power that should not exist. Most people in this world live in authoritarian countries. Quite a few democratic one are edging towards it. Do the math.

double2helix• 3 years ago

It's 1984 for real. I read Edward Snowdens biography a couple weeks ago and one thing that floors me is people's lackadaisical response to the gross violation of laws our government was violating.

I think people are afraid to stand up for there right to privacy, because they feel unpatriotic or that it may make them look like a criminal with something to hide.

I do belive with proper due process and warranting the government should be able to carry out covert surveillance of those suspected of MAJOR terrorism only. But who draws that line? And how do you trust them?

neelkadia• 3 years ago

EU is bullshit. I wish I can fine EU for doing mass surveillance under their own laws.

noduerme• 3 years ago

Dumb question but it sounds like this law would also require EU-based VPNs to mirror all their traffic to governments without a warrant... where (if anywhere) would folks here look for a secure VPN if it passes?

cbeach• 3 years ago

In other words, your personal life will be fully exposed to government scrutiny. So, why is it that almost no one is talking about this?

Because it’s coming from the EU Commission, and they are intertwined with media and institutions in all member states.

In the U.K., when we debated leaving the EU, I was struck by how obviously our leading broadcasters, such as the BBC, expressed such a pro-EU bias. Obviously, the mainstream media tends to align with the wealthy metropolitan liberal types who benefit from the EU. But we simply didn’t have a neutral media that we could rely on to report truths about the EU.

That’s still the case today. The media won’t expose the EU for what it is - an ambitious, expansionist, authoritarian political project which benefits a few at the cost of many.

Anonboxis• 3 years ago

Here is the Regulation in question:

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=COM:2022...

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

Its full name is the: Proposal for a REGULATION OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL laying down rules to prevent and combat child sexual abuse

Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

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