Majority of EU member states want strong encryption to end

Spain advocated banning encryption within the European Union. This is evident from leaked documents that have come into the hands of the American magazine Wired.

Noble goal, but with a nasty aftertaste

The document is a survey of the views of the EU Member States commissioned by the European Commission. The reason, as is often the case for privacy-violating legislation, is the fight against child pornography. Because there has been a bit of a drag in terrorism lately, which has brought this old horse out of the stable again.

The proposed European law would make it mandatory for internet companies to scan platforms for illegal material, including private messages. Of course you cannot tell from a message whether it contains child pornography or not, without reading it. Which would mean that the internet provider has to read all messages, and therefore has to break strict cryptography.

Abuse very easily

And once this data is stored somewhere, the police can demand that it be released. Also for relatively innocent matters, such as illegal downloads or politically sensitive statements. The means is there then, so, as the past shows in the Netherlands, among others, overzealous police detectives and secret services will also abuse it.

The leaked document contains the views of 20 member states. The other nineteen EU member states have a less extreme position than that of Spain. The majority of Member States, 15 out of 20 in the survey, do want it to be possible to scan encrypted messages in some way.

Every backdoor is a weakening

Cryptology experts strongly object to such proposals. Any backdoor you build in can and will be abused by an actor. This criminal, corrupt police detective or agent of the secret service of, for example, China or the US can then read all European message traffic.

The member states questioned by WIRED about the document all stated that the document is authentic.