Chat control: The latest EU plans to outlaw encryption and introduce telecommunications surveillance

EU Commission plans to proactively involve telecommunications providers in the surveillance of their customers’ e-mail and chat messages has been a contentious issue for some time. mailbox.org has reported on this repeatedly, criticised the proposals, and contributed to open letters. Instead of taking the public response into account, the EU has opted to double down and tighten their surveillance requirements even further than was originally planned – to an extent that data protection professionals have denounced the plans as a blatant attempt to abolish the legal protection of private correspondence in the digital realm. The proposed changes include a ban of properly encrypted communication, disguised as a measure to combat CP. We believe this would open the door to the widespread surveillance of all telecommunication activity, threaten the privacy of all people and shake the foundations of our values and fundamental rights as European and German citizens.

Mandatory surveillance and a ban of secure encryption

In the autumn of 2021, it transpired that the EU Commission intends to make the previous “voluntary participation” in their surveillance measures mandatory. They also plan to widen the scope to include other serious offenses such as terrorism and violent crime. Until now, only those providers who already process customer data for purposes such as offering personalised ads were required to monitor communications for potential legal offences.

https://mailbox.org/en/post/chat-control-the-latest-eu-plans-to-outlaw-encryption-and-introduce-telecommunications-surveillance