Olives @olives@qoto.org

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/10/eff-and-45-organizations-tell-un-reverse-decision-host-igf-saudi-arabia What do you think of this?

The tricky thing about "something should be done" is that someone can always argue that "more should be done". Radical (or less euphemistically, extreme) things get pushed through, those extreme measures get treated as "standard", then that "standard" gets cast as "negligence" when the cycle repeats itself.

It's a cycle of greater authoritarianism. #chatcontrol

https://reason.com/2023/10/16/brickbat-were-here-to-help-2/ What do you think of this?

@DannyMekic
"mandatory reporting buttons in chat apps"

I think this would depend on how the chat app is implemented. Something like cwtch.im is more of a tunnel which doesn't understand what users are doing through it.

Also, a particular message would have to be attributable to a particular user.

"scanning photos on hosting servers"

This is also an invasion of privacy though, and has many of the same problems as the other chat controls.

"cracking down harder on rogue hosting providers"

I would be very surprised, if this were not already happening in really egregious cases.

Not an exhaustive list of points I could make.

#chatcontrol

Looks like the game "Anime Maze Game - Visual 2D"(1) is being censored by Australia(2), probably because the system was built by freakin puritans (who worry about things which don't matter(3,4)).

As always, you can write to reps at the territory, state, and federal levels (5) to oppose any and all censorship.

#anime #auspol

New citation for less nonsense.

1 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.DefaultCompany.HentaiGame1

2 https://www.refused-classification.com/censorship-timelines/game-iarc/

3 https://qoto.org/@olives/111083302650803082

4 https://qoto.org/@olives/111192296198968801

5 https://www.efa.org.au/get-involved/lobbying/

Patrick Breyer MEP swears to open GDPR complaint against Ylva for violating it via micro-targeted ads in support of chat control.

Looks like the Finnish Parliament is against the chat control and is binding the government. Good progress.

So, I've been seeing chatter, mainly from Americans / Germans about how Finland is some uniquely enlightened place about this issue, so I decided to look further. (I also partially decided to post this because a QAnon type conspiracist was bothering me and getting on my nerves and it *might* be related to this sort of thing.)

I'm reading a Finnish article (from a few years ago) about a child abuser and it is, uh, quite something? First off, he is in prison, which is not terribly surprising. Commit abuse. Go to prison. Kind of how things work.

As you might expect from a progressive take, there's a segment about how he was unloved as a child, and his parents never spoke to him. Also, he was bullied at school, and he had no friends. In fairness, that does sound like something that would contribute to problems, but while that is all fine and well to point out, I don't see what this writer wants to do about it.

Also, mentions how the only content seen to do with their sexuality, as this writer would put it, has to do with being killed or creepy Nazi stuff, which is very intimidating / alienating. This sounds a lot like "internet tough guy" type stuff (I've always been sceptical of "internet tough guy" virtue signalling behavior). This is kind of ironic btw, because as I'm about to describe, this article is *also* alienating.

There's a point where this writer incidentally conflates "fantasy" with "abuse", but for "good progressive reasons" like rehabilitating abusers. That is also problematic. Abusers are responsible for themselves and their own actions (it's not really inherent to it). Singing the tune of the poor abuser is far harder than just pointing out someone is very unlikely to be an abuser and it's not of much benefit to that many people. Also, any rational person would not want to be treated like that.

It also decreases the number of general mental health services which might otherwise be available to someone (and might also fuel someone's persecution complex which also doesn't help). To avoid falling into a potential stereotype, I'll point out there are many reasons why someone might need a mental health service which have nothing to do with "not abusing someone", though theoretically, that might have the incidental effect of there being less of that. A mental health framing is better for the general public than a justice type framing. One is paranoid and suspicious by it's very nature, the other less so.

There are vague guesses as to how many people might be abusers, based on criminals locked up in prison. First off, ignoring the fact that some prison statistics put the percentage of abusers among child porn photo criminals in the single digits, this is impossible to generalize to even like populations outside of prison (as some are going to be statistically more likely to be arrested, thereby skewing those statistics), or the general public.

Even among prisons, it could be that more serious criminals are sent to a particular penitentiary (or in an unethical American study, since retracted, they were threatened to confess to crimes they didn't commit, or be deemed "uncooperative" with the "therapist", and be sent to a rougher prison). I imagine this sort of number might make someone feel very smart, but it's actually worthless for all practical purposes (and probably only serves to make someone paranoid).

In fact, the article itself... points out that such forms of abuse are so rare, that there are few correctional facilities in Finland to deal with it. That should give a hint as to how "common" it really is... I won't deny that it happens but acting as if it is *everywhere* is nonsense.

Progressive takes aren't really exclusive to Finland though, and even in this one, the writer seems to casually throw in questionable assumptions. She should have avoided using an abuser as a highlight for this subject matter as it tends to lead towards someone regurgitating nonsense which almost certainly originate from someone's "tough on crime" posturing against abusers. The world doesn't revolve around abusers though, and that is why the article is problematic.

I suppose there has been more discourse lately about how these numbers are a nonsense, so maybe there might be less nonsense in the future? Or perhaps not.

My response to what Ylva wrote (1):

"In my home country a for-profit company selling privacy products has launched an expensive billboard campaign against my proposal with the company name and logo on full display and sent brochures to all MEPS. Yet no one asks: is that political campaigning or commercial advertising? Is there not a conflict of interest here?"

1) It's not only this particular company which is opposing it.

2) They're not micro-targeting individuals based on their religion or other sensitive attributes. That was one of the reasons why she came under fire, and leaving this out leaves out a great deal of context.

3) They're not using the resources of the State (i.e. taxpayer money), that has to be millions of euros on advertising, to try to push through a highly controversial (and somewhat misleading) proposal which undermines fundamental rights.

"If my proposal is not adopted, we face a complete ban of the detection of child sexual abuse when the temporary legislation that allows it expires next year."

This is not true (2), it could easily be extended. Also, this hasn't been quantified, and aren't the only means to discover abuse. It's been argued throughout this entire process that this proposal is simply not proportionate and violates fundamental rights.

"Providers will be obliged to prevent abuse on their systems. If – and only if – that prevention fails could they be obliged to detect it."

Practically speaking, the Commission is always going to argue it has failed on any provider large enough to really matter. Also, nebulous attempts to "prevent abuse" sounds like a recipe for other kinds of fundamental rights violations.

"Opponents of my proposal have focused on my gender, or my appearance."

Looking at comments on Twitter, I cannot find any comment which focuses on gender, or appearance. Comments appear to be more along the lines of her being corrupt, incompetent, or evil.

In any case, facing heat is an inevitable consequence of disingenuously trying to push a proposal which impinges on people's rights. Expecting them to just roll over and take it without any show of emotion is just ridiculous.

"No individual company or organisation will benefit."

Curiously, she leaves out that people are accusing Thorn (who has high level access to her which many do not) would make money from it, and the AI investor techbro who runs it would be able to sell "AI" as a "wonder solution" more broadly.

"Yet no-one asks if these are strange bedfellows, no-one assumes Apple is drafting EDRI’s speaking points."

It's not hard to assume someone is influencing Ylva's speaking points, when she repeats what someone said line by line, word by word, uncritically, even when it comes off as completely nonsensical or irrelevant. Even mindlessly dropping in the "let victims work as police officers" proposal at one point which never really made sense.

Also, I assume that Apple didn't found this organization, and is not the primary funder of it, which I can't say the same about when it comes to some of these shadow lobbying groups, like WeProtect (founded by and it seems funded by the foreign British Government), which one of her it seems deputies is sitting on the board of.

WeProtect tries to convey the impression of being a multi-stakeholder group involving industry and others, but when you actually look into it, it is really just a government lobbying shell org. The idea that people would just ignore this sketchy looking org at such an important time is a silly one.

EDRi is not exactly my favorite org. I think they put too much faith in the State, and it is precisely State power which leads to the undermining of all the things they'd hold dear, such as fundamental rights. Nonetheless, this is a very weak insinuation from a desperate official.

As always, there is a strong stench of emotional manipulation throughout this entire article, because that is really all Ylva has.

"a new poll"

A poll which was barely warmed up, and which I casually spent a bit of time completely eviscerating as pure nonsense by a pressure group (3).

"Like the 150 experts in a recent letter."

Unlike the letter with hundreds of PhDs though (4), I recall this one includes people who work for think of the children groups (among others). It is also objectively easier to say warm fuzzy words about vague government initiatives (while not thinking of the practical implications).

#chatcontrol

1 https://commissioners.ec.europa.eu/news/setting-record-straight-2023-10-15_en

2 https://qoto.org/@olives/111240892835205013

3 https://qoto.org/@olives/111232581893336051

4 https://edri.org/our-work/open-letter-hundreds-of-scientists-warn-against-eus-proposed-csa-regulation/

"If my proposal is not adopted, we face a complete ban of the detection of child sexual abuse when the temporary legislation that allows it expires next year."

Ylva keeps repeating this lie but repeating a lie doesn't make it true. The Parliament could easily extend this particular carve-out (although, there are those who think that such a carve-out is also problematic from a privacy perspective).

Still, from a political perspective, if she thinks she can get her authoritarian proposal passed, then it should be easy to get an extension for this passed. Ylva is the one who insists on only pushing her own proposal.

Also, the Commission (which includes Ylva) was presumably part of the process which led to the current temporary derogation.

Talking to a nonsense speaking internet tough guy who wants to censor art because nonsense QAnon arguments (it's not coherent in the slightest), it didn't take long for him to admit that he also wants to ban furry art too, because it contains "bestiality".

"The Kill Online Speech Act" Wow, that is a great alternate acronym for KOSA.

How nice of Electronic Frontiers Australia to have all that information there.

https://qoto.org/@olives/111193032675481781 More nonsense here.

Looks like the game "Anime Maze Game - Visual 2D"(1) is being censored by Australia(2), probably because the system was built by freakin puritans (who worry about things which don't matter(3)).

As always, you can write to reps at the territory, state, and federal levels (4) to oppose any and all censorship.

#anime #auspol

1 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.DefaultCompany.HentaiGame1

2 https://www.refused-classification.com/censorship-timelines/game-iarc/

3 https://qoto.org/@olives/111083302650803082

4 https://www.efa.org.au/get-involved/lobbying/

The "loaded answers" are particularly interesting here (it's a multiple choice style survey).

Let's say someone is asking a question about a policy. Normally, you would expect there to be "Yes" and "No" as options.

Here though, there is instead something like "Yes, I think children shouldn't suffer" and "No, I think children should suffer" (it's not quite that but it is pretty close to it).

So unethical. #chatcontrol

There appears to be another questionable survey, this time from a "think of the children" group (they're not known to carry out ethical surveys). I'm sure you will see it in the coming days. I don't want to give these kinds of vile and disingenuous people clicks though.

Some flaws (these are very likely not the only ones):

1) The first informatory segment is not neutral or particularly nuanced. It instead frames the situation in a propagandistic manner favorable to the ideology of this group. It also contains no negative drawbacks.

To understand why it is so problematic to present something in such a one-sided manner like this, and particularly without providing the long history of misleading claims and statements (or if we're to be less charitable, what we'd refer to as lies), we only need to refer to the example of "dihydrogen monoxide"(1).

2) One question conflates minors viewing online porn with abuse. This likely inflates the number of responses where minors are "more at risk" now. I've been over online porn not being a big deal (2).

3) The second informatory segment deceives the respondent about what content might be flagged by the algorithm. There is no mention of the heated discussion around false positives either. Also, they claim that only "a few providers do scanning" but there appears to be no actual evidence for this claim (though, even if they didn't, it's arguable they'd still have a right not to do so). They also leave out that these few providers which do appear to disproportionately account for the majority of known child abuse photos.

4) A question following this fails to note that most providers are probably already "preventing exploitation", though there are probably human rights considerations at play. No evidence is provided that they don't.

The only "evidence" I've seen in around three years, unrelated to this document, is a Canadian group bringing up a few anecdotes where specific pieces of content didn't appear to be moderated to their liking. This Canadian group is very activist and appears to have zero or little regard for the human rights implications of their actions, they've even been accused of censoring historic stamps which they erroneously identified as "child abuse".

At other times, this Canadian group talks in a vague manner like "broad" and "narrow", and do not actually say what sort of content they're flagging. This creates room for creative interpretations of "abuse" which don't actually involve abuse. They refuse to define these terms. One of their advisors (who appears to be very responsive to conservative concerns, even fringe ones, and has often been preoccupied by things like "ritual abuse" in schools) explicitly refers to things which are clearly not abuse as "abuse". They network with organizations which do this. I'm also aware that the executive director of this organization has met with E.U. reps very recently.

5) There's some nonsense about it "being possible to detect things within E2EE environments". In the real world, companies just wouldn't implement E2EE, because that is the most practical thing to do. It's a red herring argument in more ways than one.

6) Loaded questions intended to make you feel like a bad person for not agreeing with the premise. Inflates responses in line with the group's ideology.

This is not an exhaustive list of all problems with the #chatcontrol spying / censorship proposal (or this survey). I don't want to repeat all of that discourse in this post.

1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dihydrogen_monoxide_parody

2 https://qoto.org/@olives/111083302650803082

Ylva defends this as a "standard normal practice".

When you're being accused of engaging in unethical practices (and she seems very unethical, indeed), it doesn't seem like essentially saying "I do this all the time" is a particularly good defence...?