The European Commission has proposed a controversial new regulation that would require messaging apps like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger to selectively scan users’ private messages to identify child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and attempted harassment.
After a draft of the regulation leaked online earlier this week, privacy experts have been very vocally critical of the bill. Many different experts and groups, including members of the European Digital Rights group, interpreted this draft and its observing obligation as an unacceptable move against free democracy.
With this new proposal comes new obligations for a very large group of “online service providers”, namely app stores, website hosting companies, and all “personal communication services” providers.
The harshest of these responsibilities affect communication service platforms such as WhatsApp, Signal and Facebook Messenger. If a firm in this group receives a “determination order” from the EU, it will need to scan selected users’ messages to find all known and unknown CSAMs or content that could count as “child delinquency”.
These “determination orders” will be submitted by EU member states, and the Commission says these orders will be “targeted and specific” to reduce privacy breaches. However, the regulation does not provide clear information on how the targets of these orders will be determined. For example, it is unclear whether these orders will target individuals or groups, or cover much larger areas.
Critics of the regulation say that these orders can be used very broadly and in violation of large user groups, emphasizing that the proposal says orders can be targeted, but not mandated, and can be used for much broader surveillance and tracking purposes.
Also, experts note that this proposal could seriously disrupt or even eliminate end-to-end encryption. In addition, considering the wide impact of the EU’s decisions on the digital world, it is emphasized that it is possible for these decisions to spread and to be used by more authoritarian countries by showing a precedent.
In addition to all these, targeting unknown items other than known items will require the use of browsers that use algorithms, and experts state that these algorithms can have a significant margin of error, especially in terms of “seeming behaviors”, which can lead to innocent people. Being placed under state surveillance can mean a violation of their rights and even freedoms.
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