Signal and Rights Advocates Urge Berlin to Reject CSAM Proposal Ahead of Critical EU Vote
The German federal government faces mounting pressure to withdraw its support for a European Union proposal aimed at scanning online content, a move critics say threatens privacy on a massive scale.
The EU’s Justice and Home Affairs Council is scheduled to vote on October 14 regarding a regulation known as Chat Control, which seeks to combat child sexual abuse material (CSAM) online. Given Germany’s influential position within the EU, its stance on the regulation is crucial. This proposal has encountered significant opposition from privacy advocates and security experts since it was introduced by the European Commission in 2022.
This coming Tuesday, Germany’s Federal Ministry of Justice will determine the country’s official position on the proposal. Previous anti-CSAM initiatives, including those from Belgium and Hungary that advocated for the surveillance of encrypted communications, have failed to gain traction due to divisions among EU member states.
German digital rights activist Patrick Breyer, a former member of the European Parliament, stated that supporting the proposal would represent a severe infringement on digital security. He expressed concerns that it could lead to an unprecedented surveillance regime in the free world.
The latest iteration of the proposal, which was introduced by the Danish EU presidency in July, would allow law enforcement to issue orders for end-to-end encrypted services like Signal to conduct extensive scanning of private messages for CSAM. Danish officials claimed that the EU is “running out of viable options” to effectively combat CSAM distribution and protect children’s online security, while the proposal limits detection orders to videos and URLs to help preserve user privacy.
Signal President Meredith Whittaker articulated in an open letter to German authorities that scanning messages—whether pre- or post-encryption—undermines the fundamental principle of end-to-end encryption. She cautioned that attackers would not need to bypass encryption directly, as they could exploit access granted to these scanning systems.
According to Whittaker, Germany must “hold the line” on this proposal, as its decision could significantly impact the future of privacy rights in Europe. Other encrypted messaging platforms, such as WhatsApp and Threema, have voiced similar concerns regarding the implications of the proposed regulations.
A petition initiated by German advocacy groups against the Chat Control proposal has garnered over 120,000 signatures. The German Federal Office for Information Security has previously warned that any attempts to compromise end-to-end encryption could heighten security risks by expanding potential attack surfaces.
As of Tuesday, the Federal Ministry of Justice had not yet disclosed its position on the proposal, and no comment was made in response to inquiries.
In total, over 700 privacy and technology experts have cautioned that narrowing the scope of CSAM detection still does not alleviate serious privacy and security issues. They raised alarms about potential false positives arising from current error-prone AI detection models.
If Germany decides to support the CSAM proposal, it will move toward final trilogue negotiations involving the Council, Parliament, and Commission. Austria, the Netherlands, Poland, and Slovenia are among the EU member states opposing the proposal, while France and Ireland are in favor of it.
