Discussion summary
EU Parliament approved first round of Chat Control legislation, raising concerns about privacy and misuse. Some users discuss potential platform coverage, encryption, and local government reactions.
What the discussion says
- Concerns about misuse of tools by undemocratic parties.
- Debate over encryption and steganography effectiveness.
- Some support for Chat Control as a measure against extremism.
- Criticism of EU's approach as potentially invasive.
- Discussion on technical challenges like image compression affecting steganography.
“I'm always astonished how democratic politicians allow tools that might be misused.”
“Local governments may block the initiative, seeking secure messaging options.”
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- Hacker News
- First they tried to approve software patents during an agriculture and fisheries council session, now they are bending procedural rules to hack it in before summer vacations. Some weird form of democracy™.by storus
- Why are we so passive to the promotion of such scams?
I keep telling people about such things and I am looked at as nerdy, geeky or boring.
But this stupid reaction finally explains to me why human life for ordinary people will always largely be a life of suffering.
by asxndu - I was curious to see how the MEPs voted, you can check it here.
https://howtheyvote.eu/votes/195338
For once I'm pleasantly surprised that everyone I voted for was against.
by yreg - So many comments about the EU constantly re-trying the same law with minor tweaks, and about how legislatures do this in general. I wanted to provide an explanation for this behaviour.
The way legislation is expected to proceed in countries with parliamentary systems, especially with strong civil services, is that
1) a problem is identified. This can be the civil service detecting it on their own, petitioning from groups impacted by the problem (lobbying, the public etc).
2) The government prioritizes problems to solve according to political imperatives.
3) The civil service and/or parliamentary committees gather evidence on the problem and possible solutions.
4) the civil service and/or committee report on the issue. In practice this always finds the solution that the government wanted.
5) A bill is drafted based on the report.
6) The bill then proceeds through parliamentary committee, legislative votes, and whatever else is part of the lawmaking process.
When we see this issues fail, it's typically at step (6). But the problem still exists, and the issue is still on the agenda. It's still a priority to solve. So steps 4-6 are re-tried with different parameters that hopefully allow the bill to pass and the problem to be solved.
Just failing to pass parliament is not enough. You also need the political leadership to redirect their prioritization and implicit preferred solution.
I'm not saying this is good, just this is what happens.
by advisedwang - Even if you are not in the EU, this will affect you. Some countries really like to copy such regulations from others. Once services starts complying, other governments will go like "if you did for them, you can do it for us, right? so it's not technically impossible", and things only get worse from there. Not all services will simply block the EU as well, which would be better to send a stronger message if approved.
I really fear where this is headed.
by harrisoned - “We decide on something, leave it lying around, and wait and see what happens. If no one kicks up a fuss, because most people don't understand what has been decided, we continue step by step until there is no turning back.”
And
“If it's a Yes, we will say 'on we go', and if it's a No we will say 'we continue'.”
- Jean-Claude Juncker
by rollulus - From a post on Mastodon:
> democracy is when you repeatedly push for unpopular laws until they pass, and the more times you do it the more democratic it is
It is unlikely that 60 additional “no” votes can be found by Thursday to stop this.
by iamnothere - "The procedure now chosen gives the proponents of Chat Control a significant tactical advantage. Since the law is in its second reading, an absolute majority of 361 votes of all parliament members is required for amendments or a renewed rejection on Thursday. In contrast, a simple majority of the MEPs present is sufficient for the other side. As many parliamentarians have historically already departed by the last day before the summer break, the re-enactment of the regulation is considered almost unavoidable."
So, if I'm reading this correctly, Chat Control is bound to become law? and this is after I think 2/3 rejections, how democratic of the EU.
Oh, and parliamentarians starting their summer break whenever they want will never not be funny.
by belowavgiq