European Policy, Government Surveillance
Global Encryption Steering Committee Statement on the Passing of UK’s Online Safety Bill
This is a statement of the members of the Steering Committee of the Global Encryption Coalition, which consists of the Center for Democracy & Technology, Global Partners Digital, the Internet Freedom Foundation, the Internet Society, and Mozilla.
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From the statement:
On 19 September 2023, the UK Parliament passed the Online Safety Bill, a critically flawed legislation when it comes to encryption that puts the safety of everyone online at greater risk than ever.
The Online Safety Bill gives a UK regulator, Ofcom, the power to compel platforms to conduct mass surveillance by scanning content using technologies which would undermine the security and privacy provided by end-to-end encryption.
Safe versions of these scanning technologies do not exist and are unlikely to ever exist.
Our concerns over this power are shared by civil society groups both within the UK and internationally, academics and researchers, industry, and members of the general public.
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