Mastodawn

End of "Chat Control": EU Parliament Stops Mass Surveillance in Voting Thriller

https://www.patrick-breyer.de/en/end-of-chat-control-eu-parliament-stops-mass-surveillance-in-voting-thriller-paving-the-way-for-genuine-child-protection/

End of “Chat Control”: EU Parliament Stops Mass Surveillance in Voting Thriller – Paving the Way for Genuine Child Protection!

The controversial mass surveillance of private messages in Europe is coming to an end. After the European Parliament had already rejected the indiscriminate and blanket Chat Control by US tech companies on 13 March, conservative forces attempted a democratically highly questionable maneuver yesterda

Patrick Breyer

amarcheschi 1d ago

I would say "end of chat control, for now"

leosanchez 1d ago

For today or for this month.

lo_zamoyski 1d ago

The value of persistence!

vintermann 1d ago

Those guys only ever have a "maybe later" button.

rsynnott 1d ago

That's pretty much how it works; there's generally no way, in a modern parliamentary democracy to say "no, and also you can never discuss it again". You could put it in the constitution, but honestly there's a decent argument that parts of chat control would violate the EU's can't-believe-it's-not-a-constitution (the Lisbon Treaty is essentially a constitution, but is not referred to as such because it annoys nationalists) in any case and ultimately be struck down by the ECJ, like the Data Retention Directive was.

account42 1d ago

Constituional cours are a last defense against bad laws though and should not be the first one - they are not designed to be fast enough to prevent a lot of damage being done before they strike something down.

rsynnott 1d ago

I mean, they're _not_ the first defence. This is a story about the parliament rejecting a bad law.

wongarsu 1d ago

The first defense is that the Council of the EU (formed by government ministers of the member states) and the European Parliament (elected directly by EU citizens) have to agree on the legislation. And while the council is staffed by career politicians, the parliament is a more diverse group that's generally a bit closer to the average person

From the point of view of the individual, the parliament is our first defense. And this is an example of it working

ApolloFortyNine 1d ago

If something in 'Chat Control' is so fundamental that it should lead to the law not even being brought up for discussion (privacy), then that 'right' should be more clearly defined in the constitution, or constitution like structure.

It's when laws can exist, but simply have bad implementations, where you obviously can't jump to an amendment process.

cucumber3732842 1d ago

That constitution sure did stop Giuliani from having the cops shake down all those black guys.

At the end of the day you still need people to actually believe it, for whatever "it" is.

rsynnott 1d ago

Yeah, this is more or less what I'm saying. Large parts of 'Chat Control' likely _are_ unconstitutional, but that doesn't necessarily stop it being brought (it just makes it likely that the courts will kill parts of it if it ever passes).

cucumber3732842 1d ago

> (it just makes it likely that the courts will kill parts of it if it ever passes).

Years after harm was done and lives were ruined no less.

nickslaughter02 1d ago

> Despite today’s victory, further procedural steps by EU governments cannot be completely ruled out. Most of all, the trilogue negotiations on a permanent child protection regulation (Chat Control 2.0) are continuing under severe time pressure. There, too, EU governments continue to insist on their demand for “voluntary” indiscriminate Chat Control.

> Furthermore, the next massive threat to digital civil liberties is already on the agenda: Next up in the ongoing trilogue, lawmakers will negotiate whether messenger and chat services, as well as app stores, will be legally obliged to implement age verification. This would require users to provide ID documents or submit to facial scans, effectively making anonymous communication impossible and severely endangering vulnerable groups such as whistleblowers and persecuted individuals.

miroljub 1d ago

[flagged]

They literally just voted it down. Twice in 2 days. Also compared to whom?

miroljub 1d ago

> They literally just voted it down. Twice in 2 days.

And they will try again tomorrow. Until it passes.

> Also compared to whom?

Why compare? The fact that there are worse regimes than the EU doesn't make the EU even a single bit better. Lesser evil is still evil. Let us strive for good.

"They" being the member states. The EU is the institution preventing them from implementing it, not enabling them.

You're inverting roles here.

Just look at the UK and how crazy they've gone now that the EU can't shoot their ideas down anymore.

rsynnott 1d ago

> With every new proposal, every vote, they are closer to the totalitarian regime. Proposals can be declined a million times, but the EU regime is always finding sneakier and more manipulative ways to push again and again.

... I mean this is how all parliamentary systems work. It's more _visible_ in the EU than in others, I think, because the council/commission are more willing to put forward things that they don't really think the parliament will go for (in many parliamentary systems, realistically the executive will be reluctant to put forward stuff where they think they'll lose the vote in parliament).

But there's not really a huge difference; it would just be _quieter_ in most parliamentary systems, and you wouldn't really hear anything about it until the executive had their votes in place, brought it forward, and passed it. I actually kind of prefer the EU system, in that it tends to happen more out in the open, which allows for public comment. And public comment and pressure is a huge deal for this sort of thing; most parliamentarians, on things they don't understand, will vote whatever way their party is voting. But if it becomes clear that their constituents care about it, they may actually have to think about it, and that's half the battle.

> We should all just leave it and maybe try again in a few generations with entirely new premises.

Nice try troll. Given your views and username might it be a stretch to assume you align more with the eastern side of governance ?

> At this point, the EU can't be fixed. It has to be abandoned completely, both as an idea and as an implementation. EU requirements were wrong, architecture was worse, and the implementation was the worst.

Dying to see your citations for these.

miroljub 1d ago

[flagged]

"What did the Romans ever do for US?" :P

We already don't have free speech. There's nothing protecting it (and many laws already to the contrary.) There aren't really any such constitutional protections from what I can tell.

Once laws are passed they aren't revoked. So it's just a matter of political climate. Just wait for people to get a little more negative, a little more paranoid (which has historically been "helped along" in various ways)-- a law only needs to pass once, and then we're stuck with some stupid bullshit forever.

It doesn't really seem like how you'd want to design it.

mariusor 1d ago

"fascism" has a pretty well defined meaning, which is not whatever the EU would become if something like chat control ever passes. Towards totalitarianism, sure, but again not all totalitarianism is fascism. I wish people would stop using le mot du jour as a replacement for everything in an subconscious need to increase others' engagement.

brightball 1d ago

The timing of having Meta dropping encrypted chats on Instagram is...interesting.

"Next up in the ongoing trilogue, lawmakers will negotiate whether messenger and chat services, as well as app stores, will be legally obliged to implement age verification."

Trilogues should be burned down, closed doors meetings with Ministers writing laws from their own services.

_fat_santa 1d ago

It seems like an almost never ending hamster wheel of chat control being introduced, voted down, then introduced again in the next session.

ryandrake 1d ago

That's the problem with modern democracies (it happens in the USA too). They only have to win once and it's law. We have to win every time.

Need to amend constitutional rights to privacy then these laws can be struck down in courts.

The US really, really wants it implemented, and several national police institutions in the EU does too. Plus the politicians that start to drool a little at the prospect.

Political engineering angle: "These people will not rest until they are able to read your child's messages."

_the_inflator 1d ago

No, this is the end of the wording for the initiative, nothing else.

We will see many new initiatives, old wine in a new bottle. Any bet that EU diehard bureaucrats will change tune, not the goal. They are going to use the so called salami tactic.

Death of free speech by many cuts, so to say. It is in the left wing DNA. Have a look at German history regarding "Landes-Verfassungsschutz" units. It is disturbing to read this article here: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verfassungsschutz_Nordrhein-We...

And back then already it was the so called center-right party ruled against this left wing initiative - imagine, first thing you do right after WW2 is ramping up a control unit to control freedom of speech.

Please value free speech. Agree to disagree, but remember: those who live by prohibitions will ultimately use this tool against you as well. Consider wisely what is something you dislike personally and simply exercise your right to not listen to certain voices or appeal to prohibition.

Prohibition becomes a tool and everybody knows that people love to use their tools. And since I have a law degree, often times what you plan is not what is finally what courts decide, how they apply the law.

Freedom rights are fundamental.

Verfassungsschutz Nordrhein-Westfalen – Wikipedia

You’re painting an EPP/ECR initiative as left wing? That’s inconsistent with the facts.