“Bye bye bye.” It took some time, and a serious amount of research, but I have finally crossed the finish line. I have officially migrated my digital life to pure, EU-hosted solutions.
You’re seeing that because it’s above the table. I think other large countries are simply doing it under the table. I think the NSA/CIA basically own Microsoft and Google encryption whenever they want.
A good rule is: If you don’t want it read, don’t store it on someone else’s servers with someone else’s encryption keys.
Generally speaking, Microsoft and Google don’t have encryption in the Privacy sense, only in the security sense. They hold the keys, and are therefore happy to have anything over that’s requested. No need to break any encryption.
you are right of course. But US surveillance has been public knowledge before snowden and even the big shock then wasn’t that they were mass spying everyone, it was that they were spying US citizens as well which was supposed to be illegal. So legality doesn’t even matter. They will find their loopholes anyway. It’s the intent of the council and the bureaucracy for more control that worries me.
Mainly about protectEU 2030 project. Chatcontrol 1.0 and 2.0 are kinda adjacent to it. Basically more rights to law enforcement and intelligence services in general and them having the right to read anything that goes on in the internet. By this summer they are going to present a law that would make no log VPNs illegal in the EU because law enforcement would have to have access to ip addresses and identifiable ‘metadata’ of the users.
On one hand the only thing the document says is this:
“Commission will prioritise an assessment of the impact of data retention rules at EU level and
the preparation of a Technology Roadmap on encryption, to identify and assess technological
solutions that would enable law enforcement authorities to access encrypted data in a lawful
manner, safeguarding cybersecurity and fundamental rights.”
That’s it. “VPN” is not even mentioned anywhere. There are no proposals yet alone votes. We don’t know what politicians say, just some expert groups. Calling it “waging a war on encryption” is a bit much when nothing was done to weaken encryption in any way.
On the other hand, I get it that someone has to be vigilant and start protesting whenever someone even thinks about implementing backdoors. Personally I prefer factual discussion but I agree exaggeration and propaganda is sometimes a useful tool so if that’s what you want to do it’s fine.
EU regions is also becoming a privacy nightmare with the EU commission’s general war on encryption in the name of “safety”.
You’re seeing that because it’s above the table. I think other large countries are simply doing it under the table. I think the NSA/CIA basically own Microsoft and Google encryption whenever they want.
A good rule is: If you don’t want it read, don’t store it on someone else’s servers with someone else’s encryption keys.
Generally speaking, Microsoft and Google don’t have encryption in the Privacy sense, only in the security sense. They hold the keys, and are therefore happy to have anything over that’s requested. No need to break any encryption.
We know about the NSA backdoor into every is tech company. We should assume the eu has the same deals in place.
How did the EU manage to keep their back doors secret where the USA didn’t?
you are right of course. But US surveillance has been public knowledge before snowden and even the big shock then wasn’t that they were mass spying everyone, it was that they were spying US citizens as well which was supposed to be illegal. So legality doesn’t even matter. They will find their loopholes anyway. It’s the intent of the council and the bureaucracy for more control that worries me.
EU is waging war on encryption? Are you taking about Chat Control 2.0 that specifically says encryption cannot be weakened in any way?
Mainly about protectEU 2030 project. Chatcontrol 1.0 and 2.0 are kinda adjacent to it. Basically more rights to law enforcement and intelligence services in general and them having the right to read anything that goes on in the internet. By this summer they are going to present a law that would make no log VPNs illegal in the EU because law enforcement would have to have access to ip addresses and identifiable ‘metadata’ of the users.
https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/news/commission-presents-protecteu-internal-security-strategy-2025-04-01_en
https://www.techradar.com/vpn/vpn-privacy-security/vpn-services-may-soon-become-a-new-target-of-eu-lawmakers-after-being-deemed-a-key-challenge
On one hand the only thing the document says is this:
That’s it. “VPN” is not even mentioned anywhere. There are no proposals yet alone votes. We don’t know what politicians say, just some expert groups. Calling it “waging a war on encryption” is a bit much when nothing was done to weaken encryption in any way.
On the other hand, I get it that someone has to be vigilant and start protesting whenever someone even thinks about implementing backdoors. Personally I prefer factual discussion but I agree exaggeration and propaganda is sometimes a useful tool so if that’s what you want to do it’s fine.