Platforms warn against UK Online safety bill
WhatsApp, Signal and other messaging services have written to the UK government asking it to reconsider its draft Online Safety Bill (OSB). The bill is presented as a way to regulate harmful content online, including child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and terrorist content, but potentially comes at the cost of threatening end-to-end encryption.
WhatsApp, Signal and other messaging services have written to the UK government asking it to reconsider its draft Online Safety Bill (OSB).
The bill is presented as a way to regulate harmful content online, including child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and terrorist content, but potentially comes at the cost of threatening end-to-end encryption. Ministers’ intention is for the regulator to have the power to require platforms to monitor users in order to eradicate child abuse images. Platforms are concerned, in their open letter, that the bill could undermine end-to-end encryption – that is, the message can only be read on the app used by the sender and receiver apps and nowhere else.
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