In the autumn of 2025, the European Union could adopt a law that transforms each phone into a potential surveillance tool. Under the pretext of protecting children, Brussels is considering forcing platforms to automatically scan all messages, including end-to-end encrypted ones.
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The law called “Chat Control” has been launched since 2022 by the European Commissioner for Internal Affairs, Ylva Johansson. The stated purpose: to combat abuses on minors in the online environment. But since then, the project has undergone multiple delays and reviews, due to the opposition from both technology companies and cryptography experts.
Critics point out that the measure would practically mean the compromise of end-to-end encryption, considered the safest form of digital messages. Once created a technical “portion” for automatic scan, it could be exploited not only by authorities, but also by authoritarian regimes or groups of hackers.
Reddit revolt: “It’s a madness”
The subject exploded on Reddit Europe, where thousands of users reacted. A comment through viral states: “The European Union wants to use AI to scan and report all encrypted private communications. It is crazy and violates the foundations of intimacy and end-to-end. Do not overlook this, European! Call and bombard your representatives in Brussels.”
Other voices have denounced European hypocrisy and incoherence. “In some EU countries you are not allowed to have a video camera on board the car because you shoot people without consent. And now governments violate our privacy and we should be OK.”
Some go further: “It is worse than in China. They have the great wall of fire, but they do not scan private encrypted messages. Europe goes to a new stasi.”
Another user emphasizes the danger of moralist justifications: “I disgust the fact that the protection of children is used as an excuse to invade our intimacy on an unmoved scale. Chat Control is incompatible with fundamental rights.”
Opposition of parties and political fractures
The debate also has a political dimension. According to users who monitor the votes of MEPs, the main center-right parties, especially the EPP, support the initiative. The irony causes extremist parties, such as AFD in Germany, to be among the few formations that declare themselves against Chat Control: a paradoxical alliance between extremes and digital rights organizations.
“It is incredible that the left and the right agree on a single topic. And even more incredible that the green has not yet decided”, notes a user.
Others point out that the great European governments already seem to have inclined the balance. “Germany is the key. If we lose Germany, we lose everything,” wrote a commentator from the Netherlands.
“A power tool, not security”
On the forums, the dominant suspicion is that the measure has less related to the safety of children and more with political control.
“European governments choose the easy option: mass surveillance. Thus they can control the narrative, suppress the opposition and maintain the power. It is not about security, but to stay in power”, Write a German user.
Another warn: “If we allow politicians this power, it is not a question ‘if we will reach a totalitarian regime, but’ when ‘.”
Experts: a useless and dangerous measure
Mihai Ghiță, a co-founder of Syphar, explains the real risks. “This kind of initiative is not new. In fact, even recently, the UK government has asked Apple to introduce a back-door in the encryption system, which will allow the government to seek through Apple phone users, also with the stated purpose of fighting terrorism and investigating sexual abuses against minors.” shows the expert for the “truth”.
But even at a simple analysis, he adds, you can see that solutions of this type are completely detached from reality.
“Assuming that the scan would be done before encryption, as I understand it is proposed, so without implementing a actual backdoor, given that it is a public regulation and which will be massively popularized by the press, those targeted will simply not continue to use the popular messaging applications, but they will pass on the type-to-to-off” says Mihai Ghiță.
Or they will not use messaging applications at all, he believes. “Or they will encrypt the files before loading them in the messaging applications. There are so many ways to bypass this regulation that, from the beginning, the measure is unlikely to have any real impact in detecting abuses. And then, we continue to add regulations – until we get to monitor absolutely everything: from the device, to the network, to the network huge private information without bringing any benefit, but only risks ”, he continues
Risks that are multiple and major. “Since the massive violation of the right to privacy (in essence, if we still have so many data, why not use them for something else, of course for the public good), errors (users investigated for false alarms), security breaches (how attractive would be access to any photograph from a device), limiting freedom of expression and much” he concludes.
A historical choice
In the following months, the MEPs will be subjected to huge pressure: both from the commission and from the citizens mobilized through the FightchatControl.eu campaign.
The question is whether Europe will remain faithful to the principle of digital intimacy or if it will inaugurate an era of total supervision, in which private messages become public territory.
