360

[EFF] Today The UK Parliament Undermined The Privacy, Security, And Freedom Of All Internet Users (www.eff.org)

submitted 1 year ago by Raisin8659 to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

40 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Summary

The UK Parliament has passed the Online Safety Bill (OSB), claiming it will enhance online safety but actually leading to increased censorship and surveillance. The bill grants the government the authority to compel tech companies to scan all user data, including encrypted messages, to detect child abuse content, effectively creating a backdoor. This jeopardizes privacy and security for everyone. The bill also mandates the removal of content deemed inappropriate for children, potentially resulting in politicized censorship decisions. Age-verification systems may infringe on anonymity and free speech. The implications of how these powers will be used are a cause for concern, with the possibility that encrypted services may withdraw from the UK if their users' security is compromised.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[-] ono@lemmy.ca 26 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

They don't need to backdoor end-to-end encryption when they can instead snoop at the endpoints (e.g. the apps).

Governments can force service providers to either do that or no longer operate in their jurisdiction.

This won't stop especially knowledgeable people (including criminals) from using encrypted comms, but it will make it much harder to access for everyone else, thereby robbing the general population of an essential safety tool, among other things. It's terrible for democracy and dangerous to vulnerable populations. The article is worth reading.

this post was submitted on 19 Sep 2023

360 points (99.2% liked)

Privacy

32142 readers

927 users here now

A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.

Some Rules

Posting a link to a website containing tracking isn't great, if contents of the website are behind a paywall maybe copy them into the post
Don't promote proprietary software
Try to keep things on topic
If you have a question, please try searching for previous discussions, maybe it has already been answered
Reposts are fine, but should have at least a couple of weeks in between so that the post can reach a new audience
Be nice :)

Related communities

much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)

founded 5 years ago

MODERATORS