The Reason

So, why does the world need another messenger App?

Well it where some general thought, that convinced me:

  1. I do believe in the universal human rights. And I do believe, that they are a high value.
  2. I am not a Libertarian. I do NOT believe, that Freedom Rights are the only value or should be kept on any price.  Of course: Freedom does always have to be balanced against other values like Justice, Security, Equality …
  3. BUT I do believe, that it needs _really_ good reasons to delaminate the fundamental Freedom rights.
  4. In my perception, even in the so called “Free World”, this got out of balance. Or it is at a high risk to get out of balance. For Example: According to “our World in Data” the Human rghts index is decreasing worldwide since 2011. Human rights index, World (ourworldindata.org)
  5. Furthermore at least about 46 % of the world’s population do not live in the so called “Free World” but in non-democratic regimes. These peple do generally have no or just very limited to the human rights. (People living in democracies and autocracies, World (ourworldindata.org), Freedom Index by Country 2023 (worldpopulationreview.com)). And let me express my doubt if all Democracies really care for the human rights (well enough).
    See also: Amnesty International Report 2022/23: The state of the world’s human rights – Amnesty International for a complete picture oft he human rights situation worldwide.

Human Rights

According to the human rights (Universal Declaration of Human Rights | United Nations) I would like to point out at least 2 Articles

Article 11: Presumption of innocence

You are considered innocent until it can be proved you are guilty according to law. If accused of a crime you have the right to a defence.

1 Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.

2 No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.

Article 12: Right to privacy

You have the right to protection if someone tried to harm your good name, enter your home without permission or interfere with your correspondence.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation.
Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

Article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights | Stand up for human rights | UN Human Rights Office (standup4humanrights.org)

Especially Privacy is a human right not only for the UN but also for Example for the European Convention on Human Rights (coe.int)

That says:

ARTICLE 8

Right to respect for private and family life

1. Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.

European Convention on Human Rights (coe.int)

Also: Almost any free Democracy follow this as a part of their constitution.

CETS 201

But in a complete violence to these Standards the EU is planning a new Regulation CETS 201 – Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse (coe.int) here the german version  eu-kommission-verordnung-gegen-kindesmissbrauch.pdf (netzpolitik.org)

OK, but what is bad on protecting children?

NOTHING OF COURSE!

The problem is, that this title is totally misleading. In Germany this Regulation is famous as “Chatkontrolle” (Chat Control). In essence this regulation plans to weaken end to end encryption of any popular chat messenger. With a technique called “Client-Side Scanning CSS”. This shall undertake the service providers to scan contents prior to sending it.

In clear words: The right of privacy shall be skipped for all EU citizens. At the same time the EU is putting ANY EU CITIZEN under a general suspicion. And this does also violate the Article 11 of the universal declaration of human rights. And no matter how noble the (ostensible) target might be: This is a massive imbalance.

As if this wouldn’t be bad enough, the EU is not planning to do these Scans themselves… No they want to oblige this to parners you can trust; Meta, Google, Apple, Microsoft etc. Private Companies, that earn their money with what? Correct! With our data or in other words: with their knowlege about us.

Or maybe this is a little abstract. So, what would you say if the government would oblige your landlord or major to come to your house any week? And he will „scan“ your private belongings. Check your closets, your safe, your bills and your photo album. Checking under the carpet and the sofa, just to ensure that you do not own child abuse material. Rr maybe you have something else that is suspicious?

Well, this sounds silly? Ok, but this is pretty much what this regulation is planning to do. And well: If you don’t have anything to hide, then it would be okay, wouldn’t it?

I believe it is not!

See some Links to this topic, to make your own mind:

General learnings

Well but this particular Regulation is just one brick. There have been dozens Laws worldwide violated or destroyed individual Freedom Right. And the pattern is always the same:

You start this law to fight something, that the majority would agree, that this is a bad thing. Until 89 it was Communism on the one side of the iron curtain and Capitalism on the other side of it. Nowadays it is Terrorism, Islamism or maybe “war on drugs”, organized crime or why not? Child Abuse.

Such a law is usually committed under high standards like „only in case of Terrorism“, „heavy crime“ or whatever.

The next step is, that “medium” crime becomes “heavy” crime and so fourth. And finally after a usually short time it is common to use these instruments for nearly anything.

The list of examples is nearly endless. And by the way: This is not only happening in the US or EU. For example: Russia. Russia was turned from a young promising Democracy into a totalitarian, warmonging Autocracy. And this took place step by step under the narrative to fight Terrorism, Organized Crime and (how ridiculous) Fascism.

But back to the so called “free world”. I will point out just one thing, that made me angry in the last time:

In 2018 many German Federal States changed their Police Laws (POLG). One of the critical points of this law was, that now the police is allowed to arrest people also if they did not already commit a crime.

In Bavaria this is possible for 30 days or longer. And well this is a big violation of freedom rights. But maybe I could imagine some cases where I might conclude, that this heavy instrument could be appropriate. Maybe a terrorist attack or a person that wants to murder someone …

But what happened in 2022? 4 years later? In Bavaria the police arrested activists of the “Last Generation” to prevent them from sticking themselves on roads…

You can think about the “Last Generation” and their protest what you want. BUT they are no terrorists, no murders, no child abusers and no Mafiosi’s.

In essence the police is using this “heavy tool” to ensure road safty. And now I ask you: Do you think, this is appropriate?

And let me say one final Word: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the European Convention of Human Rights and the free Democracy’s Constitutions are NOT a “detached nice to have in a better world dream”.

They are the absolute minimum we citizen can expect to

YOU CAN NOT PROTECT FREEDOM BY DESTROYING FREEDOM