Position paper: A safe internet for all – Upholding private and secure communications
Despite the importance of its goals, the European Union’s proposed Child Sexual Abuse Regulation (CSAR) will not only fail in its aims to protect young people, but it will also even harm those it wants to protect.
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Position paper: A safe internet for all – Upholding private and secure communications
Despite the importance of its goals, the European Union’s proposed Child Sexual Abuse Regulation (CSAR) will not only fail in its aims to protect young people, but it will also even harm those it wants to protect.
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News from Ireland question effectiveness and lawfulness of online scanning for tackling child sexual abuse: Lessons for the EU
An investigation in Ireland published today shows that tools for scanning private communications to detect child sexual abuse material (CSAM) online suffer not only from low accuracy and high rates of false alarms but have led to people’s data and privacy being put in danger without reasonable suspicion.
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Johansson’s address to MEPs shows why the CSA law will fail the children meant to benefit from it
On 10 October 2022, EU Commissioner for Home Affairs, Ylva Johansson, addresses the European Parliament’s Civil Liberties (LIBE) Committee about the proposed EU Child Sexual Abuse Regulation (2022/0155). The address follows months of criticism from civil liberties groups, data protection authorities and even governments due to the risks it poses to everyone’s privacy, security and free expression online.
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EDRi-gram, 28 September 2022
We celebrate the ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union that the general storage of data undermines people's right to privacy and data protection. We're also exploring how a community-focused project enables young people to defend their online privacy.
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United Nations report voices digital rights groups’ concerns over encryption in EU’s new rules
On 16 November 2022, the United Nations Human Rights Office published a report on the right to privacy in the digital age warning against the European Union’s plans to undermine encryption and the threat of mass surveillance in the proposed chat control legislation.
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Foreign authorities are banning Google and Microsoft services from schools, the Czech Republic is floundering
Jan Cibulka, a journalist for iROZHLAS and member of the Big Brother Awards CZ Jury, organised by EDRi member Iuridicum Remedium, has investigated how Czech authorities and schools are approaching the protection of privacy when using distance learning tools. Such tools send sensitive information overseas, where US law gives intelligence agencies access to it. The tools do not guarantee that children's private chats will not be accessed by, for example, teachers. While the first regional governments in Europe are developing safer alternatives, in the Czech Republic the risk assessment remains up to individual schools. In practice, they have little choice.
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Rather delete than comply: how Europol snubbed data subject rights
On 8 September 2022, the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) issued a decision ordering the EU law enforcement agency, Europol, to give Dutch activist Frank van der Linde access to the personal data the agency holds on him following a two-year investigation by the data protection watchdog. Findings of the inspection reveal that Europol tried to cover up the traces of the data processing and to avoid complying with the data access request by deleting van der Linde’s data.
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Does Google accuse you of child abuse? Impossible! Right?
The legislator in Europe is working on a proposal that could force companies to scan all messages we exchange for child sexual abuse material. The goal is noble but it can very easily go wrong. And if things go wrong, you might suddenly be accused of sexually abusing children.
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Football fans are being targeted by biometric mass surveillance
Apart from its undemocratic nature, there are many reasons why biometric mass surveillance is problematic for human rights and footabll fans’ rights.
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Travel surveillance: member states seek to circumvent court judgment on PNR
In June this year the the Court of Justice ruled that the rules governing the EU's system for travel surveillance and passenger profiling, set out in the Passenger Name Record (PNR) Directive, must be "interpreted restrictively" to conform with fundamental rights standards. The ruling requires substantial changes to member state practices - but the Council, in time-honoured fashion, is looking at how to circumvent it, and to ensure the greatest possible freedom of manouevre for law enforcement authorities.
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Police plans for the “future of travel” are for “a future with even more surveillance”
Plans hatched by Europol and Frontex to develop a “European System for Traveller Screening” that would require massive data processing and automated profiling have been condemned as ushering in “a future with even more surveillance” by German left MEP Cornelia Ernst, who told Statewatch that “the daily lives of millions of people” should not be shaped by “agencies that long ceased to be controllable by the public and the parliament.”
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European Parliament calls loud and clear for a ban on biometric mass surveillance in AI Act
After our timely advocacy actions with over 70 organisations, the amendments to the IMCO - LIBE Committee Report for the Artificial Intelligence Act clearly state the need for a ban on Remote Biometric Identification. In fact, 24 individual MEPs representing 158 MEPs, demand a complete ban on biometric mass surveillance practices. Now we need to keep up the pressure at European and national levels to ensure that when the AI Act is officially passed, likely in 2023 or 2024, it bans biometric mass surveillance.
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