The U.K. Parliament is pushing ahead with a sprawling internet regulation bill that will, among other things, undermine the privacy of people around the world. The Online Safety Bill, now at the final stage before passage in the House of Lords, gives the British government the ability to force backdoors into messaging services, which will destroy end-to-end encryption. No amendments have been accepted that would mitigate the bill’s most dangerous elements. If it passes, the Online Safety Bill will be a huge step backwards for global privacy, and democracy itself.
  • Redkey@programming.dev
    14·
    1 year ago

    “We’re not going to violate your privacy by opening your mail at the postal sorting center! We’re just going to switch from the old system, of posting your sealed letters into the post box, to a new system, of you handing your unsealed letters to a postal worker, who will read them and then seal and send them for you as long as they don’t find anything that matches a list of objectionable topics. Privacy protected! Now let’s not hear any more silliness about Big Brother!”

  • eluvatar@programming.dev
    6·
    1 year ago

    Yes this is bad. But how does this effect everyone else outside of the fact that other governments think it’s a good idea because the British are doing it. Is it because it will effect anyone talking to British people? If Signal or another app is dedicated to privacy then just don’t officially make your app available there. I really hope this doesn’t go through but if it does what other option do apps have?

  • exapsy@programming.dev
    5·
    1 year ago

    … I’m at the state in this world, even as a 24yo having seen so much … been cheated, my mother’s country is at war, worrying about close people dying because of a stupid president deciding to brainwash his whole country and commit atrocities and hearing even about nuclear war, having seen so much gore, people dying from stupid childish wars, past girlfriend was raped and then she abandoned me when I took care of her so much and loved her … seeing my father dying at my 20yo from cancer and seeing him suffering from pure pain even on morphine … and me thriving despite all of this and having felt all this pain renting my own home at a poor country, building my career with pain and sweat.

    Point is … such things start feeling so … stupid … insignificant sometimes … and childish and bizarre straight like they came from TheOnion. They start feeling like they’re there more to entertain you rather than make you angry. Because … they’re TOO STUPID in relation to what you’ve been in.

    in general having felt so much at such an age, it’s starts overwhleming me, that im at a point where even things like this can feel … like … “yeah … okay be my guest. Fuck encryption. Be … my … fucking … guest, you first”.

    Politicians are so fucking stupid that they don’t even realize they have MUCH … MUCH more to hide than the average joe.

    Be my motherfucking guest and ban encryption. No, ban doors on homes too. You have nothing to hide … right? So, why not ban doors too? And locks! Ban locks! Why do we have a whole industry for locking sht? We have nothing to hide! We shouldn’t lock things!

    • leviosa@programming.dev
      2·
      1 year ago

      Unfortunately the mission to regain control of information flow is a top-down policy and the UK government is just swimming in the direction everybody is being steered to. There are several countries all implementing their own versions of this, for example India recently banning some e2ee apps. Also the EU has approved a law which requires that companies be able to scan content of user messages.

      I don’t know any specifics about the laws being considered in North America, or what’s happening in South America, Africa or the rest of Asia at all, but I’d imagine any banned list would be pretty long by the time the dust settles. In the meantime it’ll be more than a little cringe worthy watching the politicians in different countries trying to take credit for the trickle down policies they sell.

      Perhaps a technical solution could be apps with backdoored encryption exposing an interface for other apps to pass and receive encrypted messages. Dividing themselves in two even. A custom text editor isn’t a messaging app.