Explain yourselves. As a “child protection” organization. Are you committed to protecting children? How about a compromise: The ability to scan encrypted messages for CSAM and auto-delete it without reporting when it involves encrypted messages? We need to do everything we can to destroy these horrible messages.
Also, how do we stop groomers? I have a suspicion about Prostasia… Something is up… And it ain’t pretty.
You’re not really in a position to demand anything. If you were to ask respectfully, I’d be happy to explain:
The compromise that you are suggesting is similar to what the European Commission is already considering: they propose that images should be encoded on your device, sent to a server for scanning, and then only if they match a known image of CSAM, it would be reported.
The problem with this is that it can’t, technically, be limited to just CSAM. Enabling the behavior described above would allow anything to be scanned, which would defeat the purpose of end-to-end encryption. For example, leaked documents could be added to the CSAM database, enabling whistleblowers like Edward Snowden to be caught.
Now, if the CSAM databases were maintained in a completely transparent and accountable process, then this might be less of a concern—but they’re not, and therein lies the problem not just for us, but also for the European Parliament. Ultimately, Europe is planning to bring in a much more strictly regulated regime for maintaining the CSAM databases. This may change some things, but we’ll have to see.
Anyway, that is years away, and in the meantime this dilemma can be addressed immediately by moving some of our resources away from surveillance and censorship technologies, and towards prevention interventions. There is much more that we can do right now to prevent the perpetration of CSAM offenses, that don’t require any surveillance or censorship.
As for grooming, we just published an article about this.
And once again, enough with this “explain yourself” bullshit. Please address others on this forum respectfully and assume good faith.
The compromise that you are suggesting is similar to what the European Commission is already considering: they propose that images should be encoded on your device, sent to a server for scanning, and then only if they match a known image of CSAM, it would be reported.
For example, leaked documents could be added to the CSAM database, enabling whistleblowers like Edward Snowden to be caught.
I was actually thinking of something that just destroys the file if match is close enough to hash value and does not have the capability to report any specific person, would that be more acceptable. Some of your users mentioned the difference between mass surveillance and mass censorship. So long as it can only destroy files, and lacks any ability to report persons, it is simply mass censorship, not mass surveillance. The moment it has the ability to report any person for anything, it becomes mass surveillance. Destroying these images slows it’s circulation. However, if it spreads beyond child abuse images like classified documents, it wouldn’t be that Snowden would get caught, rather, that classified copies would be automatically deleted.
In reality, of course, what would happen is that there would be a black market in devices that don’t have this “feature,” so that only criminals and well-connected people would be able to own them. Censorship is never going to be a fully effective solution.
In reality, of course, what would happen is that there would be a black market in devices that don’t have this “feature,” so that only criminals and well-connected people would be able to own them. Censorship is never going to be a fully effective solution.
No one said censorship will be fully effective. But it is ABSOLUTELY necessary. There is no question that increase in censorship is a necessity. We do not need people distributing CSEM with impunity, traitors leaking classified documents at the expense of the United States. Many people MAY HAVE FUCKING DIED as a result of Chelsea Manning’s leaks. THIS IS DEADLY FUCKING SERIOUS. Imagined if all this crap got CENSORED. Fuck we could have prevented a whole ton of harm.
No shit some criminals will attempt to circumvent the feature. But the point is it makes it more difficult so fewer people would be able to break the fucking laws. What is YOUR solution? How do you plan to address this problem? You speak of prevention. How… How do you PREVENT it from happening?
Mass censorship is problematic in itself, such power would undoubtedly be abused, at the cost of freedom.
People who want to will always circumvent censorship, and it won’t just be criminals circumventing such mass censorship. They would find new and create be ways and these would easily make it onto the hands of criminals.
Prevention is a much more effective solution. We can intervene before people start accessing CSEM, work on safe alternative outlets, provide better support to people who are progressing to darker and more taboo porn.
Mass censorship is problematic in itself, such power would undoubtedly be abused, at the cost of freedom.
What if the benefits is stopping terrorism? Stopping traitors like Chelsea Manning from putting our brave men, women and nonbinary service members at harms risk? What about a 90% reduction in people’s ability to see or access (both intentional and unintentional) of csem?
I’m not advocating for an automated system that reports people who match hash values, I’m just looking for some kind of file destroyer than if matches the hash value, the matched files will be automatically destroyed. We could go along way at slowing the dissemination of csem and classified documents related to national security.
Excuse me, but has it been proven that anything Chelsea Manning sent — and was vetted by the proper journalistic standards — “hurt” or in any way caused actual damage or injury to US soldiers? 
And w h a t does Manning’s case have to do with Prostasia?
Excuse me, but has it been proven that anything Chelsea Manning sent — and was vetted by the proper journalistic standards — “hurt” or in any way caused actual damage or injury to US soldiers?
Is this a serious question?
We need censorship to protect users and victims from harm. Neither you nor I want to accidentally access csem. Censorship protects us. It also protects csem victims. By destroying as much of this as possible, we can keep as many people as possible safe.
The state relies on classified documents in order to protect us from terrorists and rogue state actors. Leaking such documents is one of the most serious crimes you can commit, maybe on par with murder. Because of these criminals, America is LESS safe. The only reason 9/11 was able to happened was because a rogue state employee sold certain top secret documents. (He’s currently in prison on a 84 year sentence btw for that). Right now thanks to the digital age, it’s easier than ever to leak such classified documents! This CANNOT be tolerated.
We NEED some way to utilize photoDNA and similar technology to destroy any contraband it detects that is in transit or stored on an electronic device. If you don’t want it to treat everyone like a potential criminal, just have it destroy the detected likely illegal files without reporting the person! Like one of your users have argued. “if all it does is detect and destroy likely illegal files, it can be argued to be protecting the user from harm just as much as preventing possible crimes, but if it also has the ability to reports the user, than it’s treating the user like a possible criminal”.
RE: Manning — you needn’t take my word for it —
“ The US counter-intelligence official who led the Pentagon’s review into the fallout from the WikiLeaks disclosures of state secrets told the Bradley Manning sentencing hearing on Wednesday that no instances were ever found of any individual killed by enemy forces as a result of having been named in the releases.
Brigadier general Robert Carr, a senior counter-intelligence officer who headed the Information Review Task Force that investigated the impact of WikiLeaks disclosures on behalf of the Defense Department, told a court at Fort Meade, Maryland, that they had uncovered no specific examples of anyone who had lost his or her life in reprisals that followed the publication of the disclosures on the internet. “I don’t have a specific example,” he said.”
RE: Censorship— I am not morally or universally opposed to all censorship, however, as a civil libertarian I do not support any type of state-sponsored censorship that is so far-reaching and nebulous. The dragnet of such legislative action would (a) be presumably unilateral or geopolitically specific, meaning (b) proliferation would continue and © the processes of actual detective work involved in finding exploited children would be overwhelmed with an enormous, almost indecipherable, amount of raw data.
Frankly, all this is moot on this forum. In terms of censorship in media, if anyone is compelled to commit crimes, due to fictional media, it’s the person in question who is too weak for this world. It’s a good filter.
